Associate Professor Jean Bogais is a Paris-Sorbonne educated Sociologist (PhD) and Social & Cross-Cultural Psychologist (MA) with over 35-years-experience as an academic and professional working in spaces of violence. His principal research, teaching and practice interests are Systems Thinking, (Behaviour) Ethics, Education, Ideology, Violence, Extremism, Terrorism, and International Security.

Applying systems thinking to his work in international security, Prof Bogais explores interrelationships between “things” to identify patterns rather than static “snapshots”. He sees this as essential to the understanding of the complex asymmetries - political, social, cultural, economic, technological, environmental and strategic – that influence cultures and behaviours globally and in the Indo-Pacific.

He is an internationally recognised expert on Southeast Asia, especially Myanmar, Cambodia, Thailand and The Philippines.

Prof Bogais designs, teaches and evaluates experimental programs to test different ways of thinking in executive education to help civilian and military specialists incorporate ethics in their interaction with sophisticated hardware, some of it co-driven by artificial intelligence (AI) able to make independent decisions. These programs are founded in the view that there is a critical social element in every human interaction with info-technology. He teaches systems thinking and behavioural ethics at all levels of Defence, Foreign Affairs, security organisations (broadly), Information Warfare and Cyber agencies, and business.

He acts as an expert for tribunals (national and international.) Over time, he has created methodologies to develop and maintain lines of communication between parties involved in complex negotiation processes during conflict. His experience goes back to his involvement as a psycho-sociologist (special adviser to the UN) during the negotiations of the Paris Peace Agreement to end the conflict in Cambodia (1991).

Prof Bogais is the program director of the “Systems Thinking, (Behavioural) Ethics, and Innovation Program” at The University of Sydney Business School (Executive Education), which he co-created in 2017 with senior Royal Australian Navy leaders. Most participants in this program – who have been identified as emerging leaders - come from the Australian Defence Force (Royal Australian Navy and Army), security organisations, Information Warfare and Cyber agencies, and business.

Prof Bogais is a Senior Fellow at the S.Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore; a Senior Research Fellow at the German-Southeast Asian Center of Excellence for Public Policy and Good Governance (CPG), Faculty of Law, Thammasat University, Bangkok; and a Senior Associate/Advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Washington D.C., U.S.

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Jean's website: www.jbogais.net