John Ruggie

American political scientist (1944–2021)
John Gerard Ruggie (18 October 1944 – 16 September 2021) was the Berthold Beitz Research Professor in Human Rights and International Affairs at Harvard Kennedy School at Harvard University and an affiliated professor in international legal studies at Harvard Law School. He was an influential scholar in the field of international relations, as well as an influential policy maker in the United Nations. In the field of international relations, Ruggie made contributions to international regimes, constructivism, epistemes, multilateralism, and embedded liberalism. which the UN Human Rights Council endorsed unanimously in 2011. They are also known as the "Ruggie principles" or the "Ruggie framework". and epistemic communities into the international relations field; he adapted from Karl Polanyi the term "embedded liberalism" to explain the post World War II international economic order; and he was a major contributor to the emergence of the constructivist approach to international relations theorizing, which takes seriously the roles of norms, ideas and identities, alongside other factors, in determining international outcomes. A survey in Foreign Policy magazine named him as one of the 25 most influential international relations scholars in the United States and Canada.

Ruggie had a Doctor of Laws (honoris causa) from McMaster; and a Doctor of Letters (honoris causa) from the University of Waterloo. A fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Ruggie received a Guggenheim Fellowship. He also received the International Studies Association's Distinguished Scholar Award and the American Political Science Association's Hubert Humphrey Award for outstanding public service by a political scientist; the AS. K. social science prize from the WZB Berlin Social Science Center; as well as awards from the American Bar Association and the Washington Foreign Law Society, the latter honoring "an individual who has made an outstanding contribution to the development and application of international law."

Ruggie chaired the Board of the nonprofit organization Shift, the leading center of expertise in business and human rights, working with businesses, governments, workers organization, financial institutions and civil society to implement the UN Guiding Principles. He was on the Board of the Arabesque Group, an ESG data provider and asset manager, as well as on Unilever's Sustainability Advisory Council. He was previously the Chair of the Institute for Human Rights and Business (IHRB) from 2012–2016, and served as its Patron until his death in 2021.

John Ruggie died on the 16th September 2021. Ruggie was married to his wife Mary Ruggie. They had one son, Andreas.