The Foreign Service Institute (FSI) welcomed 2015 with the appointment of Professor Maria Anna Rowena Luz G. Layador as Division Chief of the Institute’s Center for International Relations and Strategic Studies (CIRSS) on 1 February 2015.

Prof. Layador has been Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science of the University of the Philippines Diliman and, prior to her appointment as CIRSS Head (with the rank of Chief Foreign Affairs Research Specialist), was also a Research Fellow at the Institute for Strategic and Development Studies (ISDS) Philippines. She holds the degrees of Master in International Studies from UP Diliman and Master in Regional Integration from the Asia-Europe Institute, University of Malaya, Malaysia.

Prof.  Layador contributed “10 Years of ASEM: A Philippine Assessment” in ASEM in Its Tenth Year: Looking Back, Looking Forward, together with Prof. Herman Joseph Kraft, Dr. Carolina G. Hernandez, and Liza G. Lansang. It is a report published by the Japan Center for International Exchange and the University of Helsinki Network for European Studies. Her other published works include “Civil Society and Civilianizing the State: The Case of Security Sector Reform in the Philippines”(coauthor with Mr. Allan de los Reyes)  and “The Emerging ASEAN Plus Three Process.” She is also country researcher on “Chinese Cultural Diplomacy toward ASEAN Countries and Its Socio-Political Impacts.”