Careers at Research Institutes or Think Tanks

Careers in Think Tanks & Research Institute
The University of Georgia Career Center
Clark Howell Hall, 706-542-3375, www.career.uga.edu
March 2007

Few people make a career solely in research institutes or think tanks. However, many people start their political careers in hunderds of think tanks in Washington, D.C. or thousands of research centers around the country.

These organizations come in all types of flavors and sizes. Therefore, you shouldn’t have a problem finding one that matches your interest and political preference. Most institutes or think tanks will have websites that provide information about the organization, employment options (including internships) and details about the applications process. Below is a list of some of the most familiar organizations. However, you should conduct your own search (using resources like Career Beam on the Career Center homepage or Career Search on DawgTRAK) to learn about others that might be of interest.

One of the best strategies for getting your foot in the door with a research institute or think tank is to do an internship. From this experience, you can establish a footing that will allow you to move into a full-time position and learn skills valued by the profession. Once individual’s receive their bachelor’s degrees they can expect to find work that is administrative at best. However, some organizations have special year-long programs or fellowships that are catered to recent college graduates.

Master’s candidates can expect to be considered for a research assistant position. Because most senior positions require a PhD, research assistant positions do not generally lead to a career with the organization. In fact, the lifespan at most organizations for those with a BA/BS or MA/MS is just two-three years. Moreover, it is standard form to have five or six different jobs over a twenty-year period, with each opportunity leading to new responsibilities and a higher salary.

Resource Listing:

• American Council for Voluntary International Action / Washington, DC – www.interaction.org
• American Enterprise Institute / Washington, DC – www.aei.org
• American Foreign Policy Council / Washington, DC – www.afpc.org
• American Institute for Contemporary German Studies / Washington, DC – www.aicgs.org
• Amnesty International / New York, NY – www.amnesty.org
• Arms Control Association / Washington, DC - www.armscontrol.org/
• Asia Society / New York, NY – www.asiasociety.org
• Aspen Institute / Washington, DC – www.aspeninstitute.org
• Association on Third World Affairs, Inc. / Washington, DC – http://atwa.org/
• Atlantic Council of the United States / Washington, DC – www.acus.org
• Atlas Economic Research Foundation / Fairfax, VA – www.atlasusa.org
• Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies / Montreal, Canada – www.biu.ac.il/SOC/besa
• Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy / Berkeley, CA – http://brie.berkeley.edu/BRIE
• British American Security Information Council / Washington, DC – http://www.basicint.org/
• Brookings Institution / Washington, DC – www.brookings.org March 2007
• California Budget Project / Sacramento, CA – www.cbp.org
• Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs / New York, NY – www.carnegiecouncil.org
• Carnegie Endowment for International Peace / Washington, DC – www.ceip.org
• Carter Center / Atlanta, GA – www.cartercenter.org
• Cascade Policy Institute / Portland, OR – www.cascadepolicy.org
• Cato Institute / Washington, DC – www.cato.org
• Center for American Progress / Washington, DC – www.americanprogress.org
• Center for Defense Information / Washington, DC – www.cdi.org
• Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) - www.cdt.org
• Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO) - www.ceousa.org
• Center for Global Development / Washington, DC – www.cgdev.org
• Center for International Earth Science Information Network - www.ciesin.org
• Center for International Private Enterprise / Washington, DC – www.cipe.org
• Center for National Policy / Washington, DC – www.cnponline.og
• Center for Nonproliferation Studies / Monterey, CA – http://cns.miis.edu/
• Center for Politics - www.centerforpolitics.org
• Center for Strategic and International Studies / Washington, DC – www.csis.org
• Center for Women Policy Studies - www.centerwomenpolicy.org
• Center of International Studies / Princeton, NJ – http://www.wws.princeton.edu/~cis
• Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) - www.cbpp.org
• Center on International Cooperation / New York, NY – http://www.cic.nyu.edu/
• Century Foundation / New York, NY – www.tcf.org
• Chicago Council on Foreign Relations / Chicago, IL – www.ccfr.org
• Civicus / Washington, DC – www.civicus.org
• Committee for Economic Development / New York, NY – www.ced.org
• Commonwealth Institute / Cambridge, MA – www.comw.org
• Consensus Council, Inc. / Bismarck, ND – www.agree.org
• Council on Foreign Relations/ New York, NY – www.cfr.org
• Demokritos Society of American / Alamo, CA – www.demokritos.org
• Discovery Institute / Seattle, WA – www.discovery.org
• Earth Policy Institute / Washington, DC – www.earth-policy.org
• East-West Center / Honolulu, HI – www.ewc.hawaii.edu
• East West Institute / New York, NY – www.ewi.info
• Economic Growth Center / New Haven, CT – www.econ.yale.edu/~egcenter/
• Economic Policy Institute / Washington, DC – www.epinet.org
• Economic Strategy Institute / Washington, DC – www.econstrat.org
• Employee Benefit Research Institute / Washington, DC – www.ebri.org
• Ethics and Public Policy Center / Washington, DC – www.eppc.org
• Eurasia Foundation / Washington, DC – www.eurasia.org
• Federation of American Scientists / Washington, DC – www.fas.org
• Foreign Policy Association / New York, NY – www.fpa.org
• Foreign Policy Research Institute / Philadelphia, PA – www.fpri.org
• Freedom Forum / Arlington, VA – www.freedomforum.org
• Fund for Peace / Washington, DC – www.fundforpeace.org
• Heritage Foundation / Washington, DC – www.heritage.org March 2007
• Hoover Institution / Washington, DC – www.hoover-stanford.edu
• Hudson Institute / Washington, DC – www.hudson.org
• Human Rights Watch / New York, NY – www.hrw.org
• The Independent Institute / Oakland, CA – www.independent.org
• Institute for Defense and Disarmament / Cambridge, MA – www.idds.org
• Institute for International Economics / Washington, DC – www.iie.com
• Institute for Peace / Washington, DC – www.usip.org
• Institute for Policy Studies / Washington, DC – www.ips-dc.org
• Institute for Public Policy Studies / Denver, CO – www.du.edu/mpp
• Institute for Research on Poverty / Madison WI – www.irp.wisc.edu/
• Institute for the Analysis of Global Security / Washington, DC – www.iags.org
• Institute for International Economics - www.iie.com
• Institute for the Future / Palo Alto, CA – www.iftf.org
• Inter-American Dialogue / Washington, DC – www.thedialogue.org
• International Food Policy Research Institute / Washington, DC – www.ifpri.org
• International Center for Energy and Economic Development / Boulder, CO – www.iceed.org
• International Crisis Group / New York, NY – www.crisisgroup.org
• International Institute for Energy Conservation (IIEC) - www.content.asce.org/cefi/HomePage.html
• International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) - www.iiss.org
• Kellogg Institute for International Studies / Notre Dame, IN – http://kellogg.nd.edu/
• Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies / Notre Dome, IN – http://kroc.nd.edu/
• Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies / Washington, DC – www.jointcenter.org
• Mansfield Center for Pacific Affairs / Washington, DC – www.mcpa.org
• Mansfield Foundation / Washington, DC – www.mansfieldfdn.org
• Middle East Institute / Washington, DC – www.mideasti.org
• Middle East Policy Council / Washington, DC – www.mepc.org
• Migration Policy Institute / Washington, DC – www.migrationpolicy.org
• Milken Institute / Santa Monica, CA – www.milkeninstitute.org/
• National Bureau of Economic Research / Cambridge, MA – www.nber.org
• National Center for Policy Analysis / Dallas, TX – www.ncpa.org
• National Endowment for Democracy / Washington, DC – www.ned.org
• National Health Policy Forum / Washington, DC – www.nhpf.org
• National Bureau of Asian Research / Seattle, WA – www.nbr.org
• National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) - www.nber.org
• National Institute on Money in Politics - www.followthemoney.org
• National Security Archive / Washington, DC – www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/
• Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainable Development / Berkely, CA – www.nautilus.org
• Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government / Albany, NY – www.rockinst.org
• New America Foundation / Washington, DC – www.newamerica.net
• Nixon Center / Washington, DC – www.nixoncenter.org
• Northeast-Midwest Institute / Washington, DC – www.nemw.org
• OMB Watch / Washington, DC – www.ombwatch.org
• Peterson Institute for International Economics / Washington, DC – www.iie.com
• Phoenix Center / Washington, DC – www.phoenix-center.org
• Population Council / New York, NY – www.popcouncil.org
March 2007
• Population Reference Bureau / Washington, DC – www.prb.org
• Progressive Policy Institute / Washington, DC – www.ppionline.org
• RAND Corporation / Santa Monica, CA – www.rand.org
• Regional Research Institute / Morgantown, WV – www.rri.wvu.edu
• Reischauer Center for East Asian Studies / Washington, DC – www.sais-jhu.edu
• Resources for the Future / Washington, DC – www.rff.org
• Rockford Institute / Rockford, IL – www.rockfordinstitute.org
• Russell Sage Foundation / New York, NY – www.russellsage.org
• Social Science Research Council / New York, NY – www.ssrc.org
• Southern Center for International Studies / Atlanta, GA – www.southerncenter.org
• Southwest Center for Environmental Research and Policy / San Diego, CA – www.scerp.org
• Strategic Studies Institute / Carlisle, PA – www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/
• Stimson Center / Washington, DC – www.stimson.org
• Tax Policy Center - www.taxpolicycenter.org
• Union of Concerned Scientists / Cambridge, MA – www.ucsusa.org/global_security
• United States Institute of Peace / Washington, DC – www.usip.org
• Urban Institute / Washington, DC – www.urban.org
• US-Japan-China Comparative Policy Research Institute / San Jose, CA – http://cpri.tripod.com
• Vanderbilt Institute for Public Policy Studies / Nashville, TN – www.vanderbilt.edu/VIPPS
• Washington Institute for Near East Policy / Washington, DC – www.washingtoninstitute.org
• Weatherhead East Asian Institute / New York, NY – www.columbia.edu/weai
• Weidenbaum Center / St. Louis, MO – http://wc.wustl.edu
• Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars / Washington, DC – www.wilsoncenter.org
• Worldwatch Institute / Washington, DC – www.worldwatch.org
• World Peace Foundation / Cambridge, MA – www.worldpeacefoundation.org
• World Policy Institute / New York, NY – www.worldpolicy.org
• World Resources Institute / Washington, DC www.wri.org

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