LISD's Program on Religion, Diplomacy and International Relations began its 2009 Spring Lecture Series with the talk, "Faith-Based Diplomacy: Bridging the Religious Divide," by Douglas Johnston, President of the International Center for Religion and Diplomacy. The lecture was held at at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 5, 2009 in Bowl 2, Robertson Hall on the Princeton University campus.

Johnston is a distinguished graduate of the US Naval Academy and holds a Master's degree in Public Administration and a PhD in Political Science from Harvard University. He has a broad range of executive experience in government, academia, the military, and the private sector, starting with ten years in the submarine service where, at the age of 27, he was the youngest officer in the US Navy to qualify for command of a nuclear submarine.

Among his assignments in government, Johnston was a planning officer in the President's Office of Emergency Preparedness, Director of Policy Planning and Management in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy. In academia, he taught international affairs and security at Harvard University and was the founder and first director of the Kennedy School's Executive Program in National and International Security.

Most recently, Johnston served as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). Among his other duties, he chaired the CSIS programs on maritime studies and on preventive diplomacy.

Johnston has edited and authored several books, including Religion, the Missing Dimension of Statecraft (Oxford University Press, 1994); Foreign Policy into the 21st Century: The U.S. Leadership Challenge (CSIS, 1996); and Faith-based Diplomacy: Trumping Realpolitik (Oxford University Press, 2003).