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Senior Staff Biographies
Jeffrey Riedinger
Dean, International Studies and Programs
209 International Center
(517) 355-2352
ispdean@msu.edu
Jeffrey Riedinger is Dean, International Studies and Programs; and Professor, Department of Community, Agriculture, Recreation, and Resource Studies at Michigan State University. He has leadership and administrative responsibility for MSU's diverse international programming efforts including: facilitating and catalyzing multi-disciplinary, multi-college international research and project collaborations and proposals for external funding; developing and sustaining strategic partnerships with higher education and other institutions abroad to advance collaborative research, teaching, and engagement activities that positively impact critical issues of local, national, and global importance.
As a comparative political scientist, Riedinger has a developing area focus, with special emphasis on Southeast and East Asia. For three decades, He has worked on issues of rural development, land tenure and agrarian land reform; and the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in formulating and implementing economic development policies. Riedinger’s research is intended to guide policymaking through applied policy analysis.
Riedinger is currently involved in a long-term applied research project on land tenure security in China with colleagues in the U.S. and China. Chinese policy makers drew upon their research findings and policy recommendations to develop the 2003 Rural Land Contracting Law. This law substantially improves the security of agricultural land use rights for China’s 200 million rural families.
His research is informed by a significant program of empirical fieldwork: Australia, Bangladesh, China, Costa Rica, Egypt, El Salvador, Germany, Ghana, Greece, India, Indonesia, Malawi, Nepal, Nicaragua, Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan and Tanzania.
Adedayo Oluwakayode Adekson
Assistant Dean, International Studies and Programs
209 International Center
(517) 884-2140
adeksona@msu.edu
As the Assistant Dean for Administration, Adedayo Oluwakayode Adekson undertakes administrative and research tasks including, inter alia, the management of international initiatives, collaboration with directors of area studies, thematic and service-oriented centers on strategic planning and pertinent matters, administration of partnership agreements with institutions outside the United States and oversight of information technology operations. He also is ISP's coordinator for MSU Institutional Diversity: Excellence in Action and represents the unit on several university-level committees.
Prior to joining Michigan State University, Adedayo Adekson worked as a Program Officer at The Great Lakes Colleges Association/Global Liberal Arts Alliance where his remit was primarily global in scope. He also has served in research, administrative and/or teaching capacities within several entities, including the Academy for Educational Development, World Bank's Development Research Group, Costa Rica-based United Nations-mandated University for Peace and the UNESCO Centre in Northern Ireland.
He was born in the United States and raised in Nigeria, and took a BA and an MA in International Studies and International Development respectively at American University's School of International Service, and a masters and doctorate in Political Science from the University of Maryland, College Park. Adekson is the author of The 'Civil Society' Problematique: Deconstructing Civility and Southern Nigeria's Ethnic Radicalization (New York; London: Routledge), among other peer-reviewed publications.
