The Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) is the international affairs and public policy school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university located in Morningside Heights, Manhattan, New York City. SIPA offers Master of International Affairs (MIA) and Master of Public Administration (MPA) degrees in a range of fields, as well as the Executive MPA and PhD program in Sustainable Development.
SIPA's alumni include former heads of state, business leaders, journalists, diplomats, and elected representatives. Half of SIPA's nearly 1,400 students are international, coming from over 100 countries. SIPA has more than 70 full-time faculty, many of which include the world's leading scholars on international relations.
Contents
History
Columbia University's School of International Affairs was founded in 1946 following the aftermath of World War II. Emphasizing practical training, the mission of SIPA was to foster the understanding of critical regions and to prepare diplomats, officials, and other professionals to meet the complexities of the postwar world. It originated in dynamic regional institutes that drew on Columbia's renowned faculties in history, economics, political science, linguistics, and other traditional fields. The school initially awarded a Master of International Affairs (MIA) degree.
By 1967, the school was home to eight regional institutes, covering nearly every part of the globe. It also contained the non-area-specific Institute of War and Peace Studies (now the Arnold A. Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies), founded in 1951 by university president Dwight D. Eisenhower. Originally housed in a row of brownstones, the school moved into its own 15-story building in 1971.
To meet a growing demand for public service professionals, the school added a second degree, the Master of Public Administration, in 1977. In 1981, the program was renamed the Graduate Program in Public Policy and Administration and the school renamed the School of International and Public Affairs.
In the early 1990s, SIPA began appointing its own faculty, supplementing the distinguished social and natural scientists and humanists with whom SIPA students studied around the university. Within 15 years, SIPA faculty were among the most prominent in their fields, including the one-time director of the U.S. census, a Nobel Laureate in Economics, a judge on the appellate body of the World Trade Organization, economic advisors in both the Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush administrations, a former assistant secretary general of the United Nations, and many distinguished research scholars.
In 1992, with support from the World Bank, the Program in Economic Policy Management (PEPM) was established to provide mid-career finance professionals with the skills required for the effective design and implementation of economic policy, emphasizing the problems of developing and transition economies. Students who complete PEPM's requirements are awarded an MPA degree.
To accommodate the needs of working professionals who could not pursue full-time study, SIPA established the Executive MPA program in 1999 as part of the Picker Center for Executive Education. In 2001 the school introduced an MPA in Environmental Science and Policy (ESP), which condenses the two years into twelve consecutive months, without a reduction in requirements, and provides core courses in management and policy analysis with a concentration in environmental science and earth systems. The ESP MPA program is offered in cooperation with The Earth Institute and the Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory. In fall 2004 SIPA inaugurated its first doctoral program, the interdisciplinary Ph.D. in Sustainable Development, which combines elements of a traditional graduate education in social science, particularly economics, with a significant training in the natural sciences.
Academics
International dual-degree programs
SIPA offers a number of dual-degree programs with other schools of Columbia University and offers international dual degree programs with the London School of Economics and Political Science, Sciences Po, the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin, EAESP-FGV in São Paulo, the University of Tokyo and the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore through the Global Public Policy Network (GPPN).
Concentrations and specializations
In addition to fulfilling all core requirements, MIA and MPA students must also satisfy the requirements of both a policy concentration and a specialization. Students choose one of the following six concentrations: Economic and Political Development; Energy and Environment; International Finance and Economic Policy (includes focus areas in international finance; international economic policy; and central banking); Human Rights and Humanitarian Policy; International Security Policy; or Urban and Social Policy.
Students choose a specialization in one of the following: Data Analytics and Quantitative Analysis; Gender and Public Policy; International Conflict Resolution; International Organization and UN Studies; Technology, Media, and Communications; Management; or regional expertise (8 different regions/countries). Regional specializations are offered in the following areas: Africa, East Asia, East Central Europe, Europe, Latin America, The Middle East, Russia, South Asia, and the United States. The Advanced Policy and Economic Analysis (APEA) specialization was discontinued during the 2018–2019 academic year.
Rankings and reputation
Foreign Policy ranked SIPA fifth in its 2018 ranking of "Top Master's Programs for Policy Career in International Relations". In addition, SIPA was ranked first by U.S. News & World Report Best Graduate Schools in the 2018, 2020, 2021, and 2022 world rankings for International Global Policy and Administration and fifth for Environmental Policy and Management. In 2023, and later in 2025, U.S. News & World Report ranked SIPA 1st in International Global Policy and Administration.
Centers
SIPA is home to seven centers:
Center for Development Economics and Policy (CDEP): Supports microeconomic research to investigate the sources of poverty and to inform practical interventions to address them.
Center for Environmental Economics and Policy (CEEP): Undertakes research into the causes of environmental change, the consequences of this change for humanity, and the policies that can prevent and—where possible—reverse harmful environmental change to ensure sustainable development.
Center on Global Economic Governance (CGEG): Develops, promotes and implements new theories, studies, and policy initiatives that cut across nation-state boundaries and address global economic governance.
Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP): Provides independent, balanced, data-driven analysis to help policymakers navigate the complex world of energy.
Deepak and Neera Raj Center on Indian Economic Policies (CIEP): Promotes economic prosperity in India by improving understanding of the Indian economy through scholarly research, disseminating this knowledge to practitioners and policymakers, and sustaining ongoing dialogues on major policy issues facing India.
Institute of Global Politics (IGP): Drives impact on today's global challenges by convening leading scholars and practitioners, developing policy solutions, and preparing the next generation of leaders on five areas: geopolitical stability, democratic resilience, climate and sustainable development, inclusive prosperity and macroeconomic performance, and technology and innovation.
Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies (SIWPS): Founded in 1951 under the sponsorship of Dwight D. Eisenhower, during his tenure as president of Columbia University, SIWPS was created to promote understanding of the "disastrous consequences of war upon man's spiritual, intellectual, and material progress". The institute has become one of the leading research centers on international relations in the United States.
Publications
Journal of International Affairs was established in 1947 and is the oldest university-affiliated publication in the field of international relations; it is edited by SIPA students.
The Morningside Post is SIPA's student-founded, student-run multimedia news publication. Its content: student-written investigative news about SIPA and the SIPA community, plus world affairs analysis, opinion, and satire.
Conflict Resolution Journal is a dynamic and evolving web-based project founded by SIPA students.
SIPA News is a biannual publication featuring articles by faculty, students, and alumni as well as news about the school.
Notable alumni
Penny Abeywardena, former Commissioner of NYC's Mayor's Office for International Affairs
Alice P. Albright, CEO of the Millennium Challenge Corporation
Madeleine Albright, former United States Secretary of State
Joseph Kofi Adda, Former Member of Ghanaian Parliament for Navrongo Central and Former Ghanaian Minister for Energy
Karen Attiah, Global Opinions editor for The Washington Post
Bill de Blasio, 109th Mayor of New York City and former Public Advocate
Clémence Boulouque, French scholar of political science and professor of Jewish studies at Columbia University
Ibrahim Agboola Gambari, Minister of External Affairs of Nigeria and UN Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs
Jose Ramos Horta (graduate student), President of East Timor (2007–2012; 2022-present); former prime minister; Nobel Laureate
Robert L. Belknap, scholar of Fyodor Dostoevsky, former director of the Harriman Institute, acting dean of Columbia College
Howard Warren Buffett, former policy advisor (for Barack Obama), executive director of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation
Wang Boming, editor-in-chief of China's Caijing magazine
William Clark Jr., former U.S. Ambassador to India
Notable current faculty
Rohit Aggarwala, commissioner of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection
Séverine Autesserre, expert on peacebuilding and peacekeeping
Scott Barrett, professor of natural resource economics
John Battelle, media entrepreneur, co-founding editor of Wired
Chris Blattman, development economist, blogger
Jagdish Bhagwati, trade economist
Richard K. Betts, prominent political scientist and former director of the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies
J. Bowyer Bell, historian, artist, and art critic
Stephen Biddle, author, historian, policy analyst
Akeel Bilgrami, philosopher of language and of mind
Sandra Black, economist, former member of the Council of Economic Advisers
Jason Bordoff, founding dean of Columbia Climate School
Ian Bremmer, founder of Eurasia Group
Howard Warren Buffett, research scholar, grandson of Warren Buffett
Charles Calomiris, financial policy expert
Guillermo Calvo, economist for macroeconomics and monetary economics, famous for Calvo (staggered) contracts
Notable former faculty
Lisa Anderson, former dean of SIPA and a leading expert on the Middle East; former president of the American University in Cairo
Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Advisor under U.S. President Jimmy Carter
David Dinkins, first African American mayor of New York City
Ernst Jaeckh (1875–1959), German-born orientalist and founder of the Middle East Institute
Robert C. Lieberman, former interim dean of SIPA and provost of the Johns Hopkins University
John Ruggie, former dean of SIPA; former Assistant Secretary-General and chief advisor for strategic planning to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He continues to serve as the UN Secretary General's Special Representative for Business and Human Rights
Zalmay Khalilzad, former United States Ambassador to the United Nations
Amina J. Mohammed, Deputy-Secretary-General of the United Nations and former Ministry of Environment of Nigeria
Redmond Kathleen Molz, award winning author on federal library policy.
Notable former international fellows
Michael Armacost, diplomat, Deputy Secretary of State, president of Brookings Institution
Bonnie Erbe, host of the PBS television show To the Contrary
Harold Varmus, Nobel Prize winner, head of National Institute of Health
Jim Hightower, progressive activist
Richard M. Smith, chairman and editor-in-chief of Newsweek
Frederick Kempe, president, Atlantic Council of the United States