Child Health and Human Rights (1994)

James P. Grant assumed office as the third Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund and Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations on January 1, 1980, succeeding Henry R. Labouisse.

Mr. Grant draws upon a long and distinguished career in the field of development which began with service in China in 1945 and 1947 for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. He came to UNICEF from the Overseas Development Council, of which he served as President and Chief Executive Officer since its establishment in 1969.

Mr. Grant had previously served with the United States Agency for International Development (AID) as an Assistant Administrator (1967 –1969) and as Director of the AID program in Turkey with the personal rank of Minister (1964–1967). He was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near East and South Asian Affairs (1962–1964) and a Deputy Director of the International Cooperation Administration (AID's predecessor) with responsibility for world-wide programming and planning (1959 –1962). In addition to his work in China and Turkey, his overseas assignments included service as Director of the United States aid mission in Sri Lanka (1956–1958), and Regional Legal Counsel resident in New Delhi for the United States aid program for South Asia (1954 –1956).

Mr. Grant has served as director of a number of organizations involved with development issues, including the Commission on Participation in Development of the World Council of Churches, the International Voluntary Services, the Pan American Development Foundation, the Institute of Current World Affairs, Save the Children and the Foreign Policy Association. He served as President of the

Society for International Development from 1979 to 1983. He was a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation and Johns Hopkins University, and a member of the Trustee Visiting Committee, School of Nutrition, Tufts University.

Mr. Grant received a B.A. from Berkeley in 1943, and a Doctorate in Jurisprudence from Harvard University in 1951. He has also received honorary degrees from the University of Notre Dame and Hacettepe University in 1980, Maryville College in 1981, from Tufts and Denison Universities in 1983 and the University of Maryland in 1986. In 1983 he was awarded an Honorary Professorship from the Capital Medical College of China. He has received a number of awards, including Distinguished Public Service, USAID (1961), Rockefeller Public Service (1980), Gold Mercury International, 1984 by ICC-International Organization for Co-operation, Rome and Lome, the Presidential Citation of the American Public Health Association in 1985, and the Hunger Award from Brown University in April 1989. He was also awarded the Command of the National Order of Mali in October 1989. In 1990, he received the E.H. Christopherson Lectureship Award on International Child Health from the American Academy of Pediatrics; the Diplomatic World Bulletin's 1990 Award of Distinction; and the Leonardo d'Oro Award. He has authored a large number of publications addressing development matters.