Harvey Sicherman, 65; led foreign policy research unit

Harvey Sicherman, 65, of Overbrook, a former State Department aide who, since 1993, had been president and director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, died of a type of intestinal cancer on Saturday, Dec. 25, at Hahnemann University Hospital.

The institute's website says it is "devoted to bringing the insights of scholarship to bear on the development of policies that advance U.S. national interests."

In addition to publishing a quarterly journal, Orbis, the institute, among other efforts, e-mails a weekly bulletin about a critical international problem to 18,000 people in 85 nations.

At times, it has gone beyond scholarship.

In 2004, it hosted two Iraqi Kurdish women after their visit to the National Constitution Center. At the institute gathering, Dr. Sicherman quipped, "They've been given a tour of the title deeds of American democracy."

In an appreciation of Dr. Sicherman for the National Interest, a bimonthly foreign policy journal, Dov Zakheim, vice chairman of the institute, wrote:

"Harvey was an unabashed Republican, but one of the old school.

"He never personalized policy differences - Democrats and Republicans all felt comfortable around him."

Dr. Sicherman worked as speech writer and analyst, Zakheim wrote, for three U.S. secretaries of state: Alexander Haig, George Shultz, and James Baker.

Among other efforts at the institute, "he sponsored conferences on military personnel issues and regional affairs that had a direct impact on government policy; he started an innovative history program for high school teachers."

And, Zakheim wrote, he had style.

"He wore a homburg, saddle oxfords, and often carried a cane . . .

"And he was funny: he could be as wry, witty, and gently critical about the administration policy of the day as about the Torah portion of the week" at synagogue services.

Born in Detroit, Dr. Sicherman earned a bachelor's degree in history from the University of Scranton in 1966 and a master's degree in political science from the University of Pennsylvania in 1967. He earned his doctorate there in 1971, also in political science.

He held a Salvatori Fellowship in 1969-70.

In 1970, he was a U.S. youth delegate to the 25th anniversary session of the United Nations.

He began his career in 1969, as a research assistant at the institute, before becoming a consultant to the Davis Institute for International Relations at Hebrew University in Jerusalem in 1972-73.

He returned to the Philadelphia institute as a research associate from 1974 to 1978 and as associate director of research from 1978 to 1980.

In 1979, he was a political science lecturer at Penn.

His first Washington job was special assistant to the secretary of state in 1981-82.

He was a consultant to the secretary of the Navy from 1982 to 1987, a job that earned him a 1987 Distinguished Civilian Service Medal, before becoming a consultant to the secretary of state from 1988 to 1990.

His final State Department job was as a member of the secretary's policy planning staff in 1990-91.

He also was a consultant to the successful 1988 presidential campaign of George H.W. Bush.

Since 1992 and while at the institute, he had been an adjunct scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

In 2004, he was a member of that firm's presidential study group as well as a member of the Foreign Service Institute roundtable.

Dr. Sicherman was the author of Palestinian Autonomy, Self-Government and Peace, published by Westview Press in 1993 and coauthor with William R. Kintner of The Crisis of Wishing: Technology and International Politics, published by Lexington Books in 1975.

He was an editor with former Secretary of the Navy John F. Lehman Jr. of America the Vulnerable (2002) and with Stephen Gale and Michael Radu of The War on Terrorism: A Collection of FPRI Essays, 2001-2007, both published by the institute.

In 2007, the University of Missouri Press published Is There Still a West? The Future of the Atlantic Alliance, which Dr. Sicherman edited with William Anthony Hay.

Dr. Sicherman is survived by wife, Barbara; mother Esther; sons Irving, Jonathan, and Zachary; a brother; a sister; and three grandchildren.

The funeral was held on Sunday, Dec. 26.