Dr. Maryann Cusimano Love is a tenured associate professor of International Relations in the Politics Department and a Fellow in the Institute for Policy Research of The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC.  She is also a Fellow at the Commission on International Religious Freedom, where she is writing materials for the Foreign Service Institute, Professional Military Education schools and universities on religious actors and factors in international affairs, particularly in cases of poverty and peace.  USCIRF was created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 to monitor the status of freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief abroad, and to give independent policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State, and the Congress. She teaches graduate and undergraduate International Relations courses at Catholic University and the Pentagon, such as Security, Just Peace, Globalization, U.S. Foreign Policy, Terrorism, and The Problem of Sovereignty.

Her recent International Relations books include Beyond Sovereignty: Issues for a Global Agenda (4th Edition 2010), Morality Matters: Ethics and the War on Terrorism (forthcoming Cornell University Press), and “What Kind of Peace Do We Seek?” a book chapter on peacebuilding, to appear in Notre Dame University’s volume on The Ethics and Theology of Peacebuilding.  She serves on the U.S. Catholic Bishops’ International Justice and Peace Committee, where she advises the bishops on international affairs and U.S. foreign policy, and engages in advocacy with the U.S. government on international issues of concern to the Catholic Church.  She serves on the Advisory Board of the Catholic Peacebuilding Network, a network of practitioners, academics, clergy, and laity from around the world that seeks to enhance the study and practice of peacebuilding, especially by sharing and analyzing “best practices,” expanding the peacebuilding capacity of the Church in areas of conflict, and developing a theology of just peace.  She has served on the board and now serves on the Communications Committee of Jesuit Refugee Services, an international refugee relief and advocacy group active in over 60 countries, with a mission to accompany, serve and defend the rights of refugees and forcibly displaced people. She is a frequent speaker on international affairs issues, as when she addressed the United Nations at the request of the Vatican on the topic of Religious Peacebuilding.

She is a columnist for America magazine, and an alumna of the Johns Hopkins University (PhD), the University of Texas at Austin (MA), and St. Joseph’s University in Philadelpha (BA).  As a former Pew Faculty Fellow and a current consultant for Georgetown’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Dr. Love regularly gives faculty development workshops on case and participatory teaching techniques. She serves on the editorial board of Rowman & Littlefield’s New Millennium book series.  She was a fellow at the U.S. Naval Academy’s Center for Military Ethics 2002-2003, is a former governing board member of Women in International Security, and is the founder of the Political Psychology Section of the American Political Science Association.  She lives on the Chesapeake Bay outside of Washington, DC, with her husband Richard and three young children, Maria, Ricky, and Ava, who inspire her New York Times best-selling children’s books, You Are My I Love You, You Are My Miracle, You Are My Wish, and Sleep, Baby, Sleep.