Harvey Kushner

Harvey Wolf Kushner (born December 9, 1941) is an American scholar of global terrorism. Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, The Roosevelt School, Long Island University, Brookville, New York. Author of numerous writings and five books on terrorism including the multi-award winning Encyclopedia of Terrorism (SAGE Publications). Chairman of the Praesidium and Academician of the European Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Member of the international editorial board of the American Behavioral Scientist.

Kushner was born in 1941 in New York City, NY; son of Albert and Iryne (Fieman) Kushner. He graduated from Queens College of the City University of New York in 1969 with a B.A. in political science. He received his M.S. degree in 1970 and his Ph.D with distinction in political science in 1974 from New York University.

In 1974, he joined Long Island University, where he held various administrative positions ranging from the Coordinator of Graduate Studies for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences to the Director of the Homeland Security and Terrorism Institute.

As professor and chair of the Department of Criminal Justice and longtime director of the Homeland Security and Terrorism Institute, Kushner has always been an innovator in curricula development for his students. Decades ago, before other institutions of higher learning thought it important, he brought in two agents of what may be the most hated form of law enforcement, the Internal Revenue Service, to teach a course on financial investigations. As the New York Times wrote, "It's a course designed to teach snoops-in-training to shine the cold light of the law on the murkiest corners of Form 1040 or the most subtly laundered ill-gotten gains."

In more recent times, Kushner has emphasized the importance of cyber technologies and their impact on society and criminality. He has called for more cooperation between the public and private sectors. He has been a strong advocate for this within the media. Kushner believes through money and education we can address the issues brought about by the cyber age.

In addition to his innovative course development and his desire to meet technological progress head on, Kushner has always organized numerous symposia on national security and criminal justice topics to both educate and train the academic and professional communities alike. His students have gone on to head, for example, the New York State's Office of Public Safety after the September 11 attacks and one of the largest county police agencies in the United States, i.e., the Nassau County Police Department.

Prior to the September 11 attacks and continuing until today, Kushner advised, educated, and trained police personnel throughout the State of New York. He has held terrorism training seminars for law enforcement agencies within New York State including the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police, New York State Crime Prevention Coalition, Mid-Hudson Crime Prevention Association, Long Island Association of Crime Prevention Officers, New York State Park Police, New York State Police, Orangeburg Police Department, Nassau Сounty Police Department, Suffolk County Police Department, Freeport Police Department, Rockville Centre Police Department, Old Brookville Police Department, Hempstead Police Department, Port Washington Police District to name a few. Kushner currently serves as the Education Advisor for the Nassau County Municipal Police Chiefs Association, a post he has held since 1991.

Prior to the September 11 attacks, Kushner had close ties to a number of federal agencies. In 1993, Kushner was retained by the Federal Aviation Administration to identify transnational and international terrorists that might target civil aviation. In 1998, he advised the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit on identifying and developing a protocol to identify transnational terrorist threats within the United States. In both 1995 and 1997, he trained the staff of the U.S. Probation Department of the Eastern District on how to identify possible terrorists under their supervision. In 1996, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration had him train their agents on drug trafficking and its relationship to terrorism.