BARNET, Richard J(ackson) 1929-2004

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born May 7, 1929, in Boston, MA; died of kidney failure December 23, 2004, in Washington, DC. Activist, attorney, and author. Barnet is best remembered as a cofounder of the liberal think tank the Institute for Policy Studies. Educated at Harvard University, he earned his B.A. there in 1952 and a law degree two years later. Admitted to the Massachusetts Bar in 1954, he served in the U.S. Army for three years. A year as a research fellow for the American Law Institute was followed by two years with the Boston law firm Choate, Hall, and Stewart. Barnet then returned to Harvard for a year as a research fellow with the Russian Research Center. He became involved in government work in 1961, when he joined the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency in Washington, D.C., as a special assistant. He was made deputy director there the next year before leaving Washington to return to academia. Barnet worked as a fellow at the Center for International Studies at Princeton University in 1963. That year, along with Marcus Raskin, he founded the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C. Both Barnet and Raskin, having worked in government, felt they could influence federal policy more effectively from outside the bureaucracy. The goal of their think tank was to organize and rally for social change in Washington. Over the years, the group has held stances against the wars in Vietnam and Iraq, pushed for environmental responsibility and against corporate globalization, and advocated other issues of moral and social responsibility. Barnet served as codirector until 1978, and thereafter was senior and distinguished fellow until his 1998 retirement. He also published several books related to his beliefs regarding what constitutes responsible government, including Intervention and Revolution: The United States in the Third World (1968), The Roots of War (1972), The Lean Years: Politics in the Age of Scarcity (1980), and The Rockets' Red Glare: When America Goes to War; The Presidents and the People (1990). In his later years, Barnet spent his time teaching youngsters to play the violin, was active in his church, and cowrote a book with his pediatric neurologist wife, Ann B. Barnet, The Youngest Minds: Parenting and Genes in the Development of Intellect and Emotion (1998). A prolific contributor to national magazines, such as the New Yorker and Harper's, he was a contributing editor for Sojourners until 2000.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Los Angeles Times, December 25, 2004, p. B11.

New York Times, December 24, 2004, p. A16.

Times (London, England), January 12, 2005, p. 57.

Washington Post, December 24, 2004, p. B6.