About the Founder and Former Executive Director
BONNIE D. JENKINS
FOUNDER AND FORMER EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 2017-2021
It all started in 2017, when Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins started an organization of women of color working in the areas of peace and security, many who felt isolated and whose voices were not being heard. Jenkins wanted to encourage those women, and actively develop leadership and the network of women of color in areas that affect them most globally: peace, security, and conflict transformation.
With this vision, Ambassador Jenkins embarked on a journey to establish an organization for women of color by women of color, including programs and initiatives, chapters and working groups, that focuses on bringing girls and women of color into the fields of peace and security and provides a network, platform, and structure so these women remain in the fields through mentorship and pipeline programs. Jenkins wanted to ensure that women of color no longer felt isolated as they dedicated their lives to work that is so important to them and the global community. She also wanted a space for young girls of color to be able to find role models they do not normally see in the media or in their everyday spaces, but women who do exist, and to make this a global entity for girls and women of color around the world.
On July 18th, 2021, Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins was confirmed as the Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security (“T”). Undersecretary Jenkins is the first African-American to be an Undersecretary of State, and therefore also the first African American to be T, which is the Bureau at State that covers areas of “hard security” that have been so elusive to people of color for so many years. Being an African American leading on all issues of international security at the Department of State (DOS) is a position that places Jenkins in a position of continuing to be a role model for both young and seasoned women and people of color.
Undersecretary Jenkins is the Founder and Former Executive Director of Women of Color Advancing Peace, Security and Conflict Transformation (WCAPS) from its inception in 2017 to April 2021, then serving as a Special Advisor to the new Executive Director until July 2021. Jenkins also Chaired the WCAPS Board of Directors. She founded Organizations in Solidarity in June 2020 and Chaired its Steering Committee until April 2021. In addition to the myriad programs that Jenkins created under the WCAPS umbrella, Jenkins also founded in 2017 the WCAPS Redefining National Security (RNS) Initiative as well as WCAPS “Every Woman’s Matrix.”
Jenkins was a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and a Senior Fellow at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs. Jenkins Chaired the Committee on Radioactive Sources: Applications and Alternative Technologies of the National Academies of Sciences. She was an Adjunct Professor at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, the Georgetown University Law Center, a Lecturer at the University of Virginia Batten School, and a Professorial Lecturer at the George Washington Elliott School of International Affairs. She was also a Visiting Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania Schools of Nursing and Veterinary Science. She recently served on the Biden-Harris Transition Team on the State Department Review Team and was nominated in January 2021 by President Biden to be the Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. Jenkins also recently served as a Visiting Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perry World House and a Visiting Dignitary at the LBJ School at the University of Texas in Austin. In January 2021, Jenkins and WCAPS were named as the 2020 Arms Control Association’s Persons of the Year.
Jenkins is an expert in the areas of arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation. She was nominated by President Barack Obama in April 2009 and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in June 2009 as Ambassador and Special Envoy and Coordinator for Threat Reduction Programs in the Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation (ISN), at DOS. She served in that position until January 2017. In that position, Jenkins promoted a coordinated U.S. effort on threat reduction globally. She was the DOS lead for the 2010 - 2016 Nuclear Security Summits and the U.S. Representative to the G7 Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction. She led diplomatic efforts promoting the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) and was the U.S. government lead in outreach to the non-governmental sector. In that role, she established the GHSA NGO Consortium, founded the GHSA Next Generation Network. Also at DOS, she was also on the Diversity Governance Council. For her service as Coordinator of Threat Reduction Programs, Jenkins was named the 2016 ISN Nominee for the Secretary's Award for Excellence in International Security Affairs.
Prior to joining the government in 2009, Jenkins worked at the Ford Foundation as the Program Officer for US Foreign and Security Policy, and Conflicts where part of her portfolio also covered diversity in U.S. foreign policy and funding issues of conflicts. Her work at Ford helped establish the Global Access Pipeline. She also served as Counsel on the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (9/11 Commission). She was the lead staff member conducting research, interviews, and preparing commission reports on counterterrorism policies in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and on U.S. military plans targeting al Qaeda before 9/11. She served as General Counsel to the U.S. Commission to Assess the Organization of the Federal Government to Combat the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction and worked at Rand Corporation focusing on Middle East weapons of mass destruction issues. Jenkins began her work in the federal government a Legal Adviser at the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA) where she served as legal advisor on arms control and nonproliferation treaties and treaty implementation bodies including serving as a legal advisor to the Chemical Weapons Convention, the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the Open Skies Treaty, the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty, and the Biological Weapons Convention. She has worked with international institutions such as the IAEA, the WHO, the OPCW, the OSCE, the CTBTO, Interpol, and the BWC-ISU.
Jenkins holds a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia; an LL.M. from the Georgetown University Law Center; an M.P.A. from the State University of New York at Albany; a J.D. from Albany Law School and a B.A. from Amherst College. She was a Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the JFK School at Harvard University at which time she also worked at the Bernard Koteen Office of Public Interest Advising at Harvard Law School where she advised law students on employment in the US government and public entities. Jenkins is a retired U.S. Naval Reserve Officer and received numerous awards for her military service. She is a member of the New York State Bar.