Rafael Fernández de Castro is the Director of the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies and Aaron Feldman Family Chancellor’s Endowed Chair in US-Mexican Studies in Memory of David Feldman at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at the University of California San Diego. Prior to this position, he served as the Chair of the International Studies Department at the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM). He is the founding editor of Foreign Affairs Latin America magazine. From 2008 to 2011, he served as the Foreign Affairs Advisor to the President of Mexico. From August 2014 to June of 2017, he held the Dave Moskowitz Endowed Chair in Mexico-US Relations, Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University. 

He has written, compiled and overseen the publication of close to thirty books on U.S.-Mexico relations, U.S.-Latin American relations and Mexico’s Foreign Policy. Of these, 14 were originally published in English. He coordinated the Human Development Report for Latin America 2013/2014, Citizen Security with a Human Face, UNDP.

Dr. Fernández de Castro holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Georgetown University, a M.A. degree in Public Policy from the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin, and a B.A. degree in Social Sciences from ITAM. He has been awarded two Fulbright scholarships and the Public Service Award from the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs.