SPAN Lebanon 1963

About the Book

SPAN had begun in 1948 as a consortium between the University of Minnesota and about a dozen colleges that cultivated international understanding through practical academic research. Each year four (sometimes three) countries were selected as destinations. It was— and is, because SPAN continues today—a self-financed program through voluntary donations by businesses in the Upper Midwest as well as by contributions from the participants themselves (known as SPANners). The program was oriented toward upper classmen (in that age of gender insensitive terminology) so applicants were usually students in their Junior (or third) year of undergraduate studies.

About the Author

James Warner Björkman, educated in political science at the University of Minnesota (BA summa cum laude 1966) and Yale University (MPhil 1969: PhD 1976), is Professor of Public Policy and Administration at the Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, as well as Professor of Public Administration and Development at Leiden University. Previously faculty member at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Executive Director of the International Institute of Comparative Government in Lausanne, Switzerland, he has held appointments in Sweden, England, Pakistan and India. He has published nine books and approximately seventy articles and chapters in journals and/or edited volumes.