Staff & Trustees
The Fetzer Institute employs a "deep engagement" model to govern, organize, and nurture the Institute community. The name reflects the understanding of the relationship between the inner life with action and service, a commitment to nurturing loving relationships within various communities, and a responsibility for leading the process to define the Institute's program strategies. The deep engagement model guides our board in clarifying program priorities; determining how the Fetzer community can live its values; and developing and monitoring strategies to execute the mission.

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Angeles Arrien
Angeles Arrien is an anthropologist, educator, award-winning author, and corporate consultant. She is an adjunct faculty and a consultant to the California Institute of Integral Studies and the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. Her work with multicultural issues, mediation, and conflict resolution has been used by the International Rights Commission and the World Indigenous Council. Angeles’ research and teaching have focused on values and beliefs shared by humanity cross-culturally and on the integration and application of multicultural wisdoms in contemporary settings. She is author of The Four-Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer and Visionary and Signs of Life: The Five Universal Shapes and How to Use Them, winner of the 1993 Benjamin Franklin Award. Angeles is president of the Foundation for Cross-Cultural Education and Research and a Fellow of the Institute of Noetic Sciences.

Carolyn T. Brown
Carolyn Thompson Brown is a director of the Office of Scholarly Programs and the John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress. In that capacity she provides vision and direction to programs that fund the world’s most accomplished and most promising scholars for periods of residency to conduct research in the Library’s collections. She also organizes conferences, seminars, and other scholarly events. Prior to assuming this position, she led the Collections and Services Directorate, overseeing collections development, collections management, reference, and public outreach for the general, special, and Area Studies collections. This followed several years leading the Area Studies collections and the Federal Research Division. She also serves on the Cornell University Advisory Council. Her professional writings examine the interrelationship of literature, culture, and psychology with special focus on modern Chinese literature. Carolyn holds a BA in Asian Studies, an MA in Chinese Literature both from Cornell University, and a PhD in Literature from the American University.

Bruce Carlson
Bruce Carlson, currently retired, directed the Institute of Gerontology and served as professor emeritus in anatomy and cell biology at the University of Michigan. He previously served as chair of the Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology in the Medical School. His research has been in limb development and regeneration and in the regeneration and transplantation of skeletal muscle, with emphasis on regeneration after long-term denervation and during aging. He presently directs a large research project on muscular training in the elderly. In conducting his research, he has lived in Finland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Czechoslovakia, and the former Soviet Union. Along with numerous research papers, he has authored nine books on embryology and regeneration and has edited over a dozen symposium volumes and translations. He is past president of the Association of Anatomy, Cell Biology and Neurobiology Chairpersons, and also of the American Association of Anatomists. An avid fisherman and former fisheries biologist, he also writes articles for fishing magazines.

Janis Claflin
Janis Claflin is president of Claflin & Associates, a counseling and consulting firm in Austin, Texas. She is a psychotherapist in private practice, a management consultant, and an effective public speaker and facilitator. She serves in many areas, including conflict resolution, organizational effectiveness, team building, change management, leadership development, and spiritual formation. She is committed to the facilitation of corporate cultures and individual ways of being that promote creativity, integrity, enhanced productivity, and well being for all parties involved. Janis is the founder of several nonprofit organizations and currently serves on the board of the Texas Capital Value Fund. She holds a master of arts in religion from Yale Divinity School and a BA in English from George Peabody College for Teachers.

Bruce Fetzer
Bruce Fetzer is executive vice president and trustee of the Fetzer Memorial Trust, a trustee and treasurer of the John E. Fetzer Institute, a trustee and member of the Foundation Financial Officers Group (FFOG, an organization of the chief investment and finance officers of the largest 200 foundations in the world), chairman of the FFOG compensation survey, and advisor to other nonprofits. A grand nephew of John Fetzer, he has served the Institute and its founder in various capacities including John Fetzer’s radio, television, and cable enterprises. He has held various financial and program assignments at the Fetzer Institute and is independently developing businesses in consulting and trust management. He holds a BS in chemical engineering and an MBA.

Robert Lehman
Rob Lehman chairs the board of trustees of the Fetzer Institute where he served as president from 1989-2000. Under his leadership as president, the Institute developed a mission in support of mind-body-spirit health, which culminated in an Institute-funded PBS series. The groundbreaking and Emmy Award winning Healing and the Mind with Bill Moyers featured the work of a number of scientists investigating the mind-body connection. The series and an Institute-supported study published concurrently in the New England Journal of Medicine shifted popular perceptions, established the strength and significance of the mind-body-health movement, and fueled new levels of understanding and adoption by mainstream medical institutions. As chairman of the board, Rob oversaw the Institute’s transition to its new mission based in love and forgiveness and has been instrumental in the development of the board’s “deep engagement” model of governance. Before joining the Fetzer Institute, he was vice president for international affairs at the Kettering Foundation, and prior to his association with foundations Rob was an associate professor of law at the Indiana University, Indianapolis Law School. He has a law degree and a master’s degree in theology.

Lawrence Sullivan
Lawrence Sullivan is a professor of theology at Notre Dame University and previously director of the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard University. He carried out his PhD studies in the comparative history of religions at the University of Chicago and later taught on the faculty there. He specializes in the study of ritual and ceremonial performance. Sullivan’s book, Icanchu’s Drum, received best book awards from the Association of American Publishers and the American Council of Learned Societies. He is associate editor of the 16-volume Encyclopedia of Religion, which received the Hawkins Prize and the Dartmouth Medal from the American Library Association for the best work in any category of publishing. The Religions of Humanity book series, which Sullivan wrote with Julien Ries, received the 2000 Hans Christian Andersen Prize for the Best Series in Children’s Literature.

Lynne Twist
Lynne Twist, an author, speaker, and consultant, is the founder and president of The Soul of Money Institute. She and her husband, Bill, are the co-founders of The Pachamama Alliance, working in the Ecuadorian Amazon with indigenous people to preserve the world’s tropical rainforests. A former long-time executive of The Hunger Project, she continues to be an advocate and spokesperson for ending world hunger and empowering women in cultures throughout the world. She serves on the boards of The Global Security Institute, Educating Girls Globally, and the Kudirat Institute for Nigerian Democracy (KIND). She serves as president of The Turning Tide Coalition and is author of the award-winning book, The Soul of Money.

Frances Vaughan
Frances Vaughan is an author and psychologist practicing in Mill Valley, California. Her books include Shadows of the Sacred, The Inward Arc, Awakening Intuition and Paths Beyond Ego. She has been a pioneer in the field of transpersonal psychology, and has studied several spiritual traditions. Dr. Vaughan was formerly on the clinical faculty at the University of California Medical School at Irvine and core faculty at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. She has served as president of the Association for Transpersonal Psychology and the Association for Humanistic Psychology and is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association.