Board of Directors

Dr. Roger Kotila is a psychologist and peace activist. Receiving a Ph.D. from Washington State University in 1969, he has worked in community mental health, for the State of California, and in private practice. Dr. Kotila served his clinical internship on a Public Health Fellowship at the Palo Alto Veterans Administration Hospital in conjunction with Stanford University's Dept. of Psychiatry. He has been a radio producer (Earthstar Radio, San Francisco), organized and worked with the homeless, and is an advocate/activist in the nonviolent protest movement for safe energy, human rights, and peaceful solutions. Roger is USA Vice President of the World Constitution and Parliament Association whose mission is to build a parallel world body to the United Nations, an emerging Earth Federation with a Provisional World Parliament under the Earth Constitution. A world citizen and world federalist, Roger is married with four children and four grandchildren. He resides with his wife, a tax consultant and musician/composer, in Marin County, California.

Bob Flax, Ph.D. is a licensed psychologist, organization development consultant, activist, and teacher. He has a B.A. in psychology and philosophy from New York University, an M.A. in psychology from Long Island University, an M.A. in organization development from Sonoma State University, and a Ph.D. from Saybrook Institute.

Dr. Flax began his career as a psychotherapist in the late 1970's. His initial work focused on psychotherapy integration and therapist growth and development. He expanded his focus to include larger systems and studied organization development and conflict resolution. He has worked in a wide range of settings, including businesses, non-profits, intentional communities, and over 16 years with the California State Prison system. Moving to still larger systems, he turned his attention to the way we work together as citizens of the world. Bob has participated in international citizen diplomacy projects and is currently designing a course in World Federalism for Saybrook University, where he has been on the faculty for over 18 years.

Dr. Flax lives in a cohousing community in the San Francisco Bay Area and enjoys outdoor adventure activities, swing dancing and meditation.

Shariar Sharei received his B.S. in Business Administration from U.C. Berkeley in 1976 and his M.S. in Computer and Information Science from San Jose State University in 1977. From 1978 to 1992, he worked mostly in the computer field, eventually becoming the Manager of Micro Systems in International Trade for Bank of America. In 1992, he moved to his birthplace, Iran, and founded SAC, a computer networking company with such clients as the UN Human Rights Commission in Iran. He was SAC’s Managing Director until 2000 and is still on its Board of Directors. In 2000, he founded Synergix International L.L.C.

Shariar was exposed to the World Citizen’s Association in 1980 and subsequently became involved. He helped start the newsletter, One World Times, and helped begin the international holiday, Earth Day / World Equinox Day. For one year, he served as President of the World Citizens Foundation. During this time, he also became involved with the World Federalist Association, the Campaign for UN Reform, Amnesty International. He is currently a member of UNA/USA, a Councilor for the World Federalist Movement, and a Vice President of DWF.

Mr. Neumann has been fascinated by world government for close to 50 years and an active member of the World Federalist movement since the 1970's. Although he left it unpublished, Mr. Neumann completed an original book of poetry on arguments centered on the need for World Government. He completed his B.A., M.A., and graduate work in the fields of History and Political Science. He taught as a secondary school teacher for 22 years and became a General Contractor in his 50's. In 1992 both he and his wife retired and set out on a grand ten-year world adventure on their 47-foot sailboat. After his travels, Mr. Neumann returned to California in 2002 to resume contracting work and D.W.F. activities.

Dr. Robert Hanson is emeritus Professor of Recreation at San Diego State University, where he was on the faculty for 23 years. He is and has been a leading member of many activist groups including the United Nations Association, Citizens for Global Solutions, Amnesty International, Peace Action West, Common Cause, United for Peace and Justice, and others. He is also a member of the Green Party. A World Federalist for over 40 years, he is also a contributer to Toward Democratic World Federation.

Mary Harris received her BA from San Francisco State College (now University,) and went on to receive her MA from the California Institute of Integral Studies. She continued on with her studies and completed post-graduate work at U.C. Santa Cruz, at U.C. Berkeley, at Kaohsiung Medical College in Taiwan, in Sasebo, Japan, and in Paris, France. She received her life-time teaching credential from Laguna Salada School District. Mary taught at an elementary school level in California from 1955 to 1960 and from 1968 to 1983. During the interim period, she taught at schools overseas. In 1983, she became an art teacher and taught at the Sanchez Cultural & Art Center then at the Community Center in Pacifica until 2003.

Mary was Secretary of the A. Philip Randolph Institute of San Mateo County. She became active with the World Federalist Association of Northern California in the 1980’s, eventually becoming Secretary and is now the Secretary of the Democratic World Federalists. She is a member/supporter of the A.C.L.U., Greenpeace, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Sierra Club, KQED, KPFA, and others. She is also on the Board of Directors of the Sanchez Art Center and the Art Guild of Pacifica.

Paul was first exposed to the concept of world federation while in high school after reading excerpts from The Anatomy of Peace by Emery Reves. He is particularly impressed by the message of some of the earlier advocates of world federation (Reves, Einstein, Cousins, Shoghi Effendi, etc.) who emphasized that we are at a critical juncture in the political evolution of our world. Directly related to this, he is interested in the factors that may influence the all-important modification of public opinion. He is currently active in the World Citizens Party of Massachusetts.

A graduate of Oxford, Peter Bailey worked as an economist in London for several years and then lived in the Austrian Alps pursuing personal philosophical interests for a few more, before moving to Canada. There he joined a Canadian federal agency as an international economist, becoming assistant chief economist and head of the country risk assessment department. In that capacity, he traveled throughout the world to many countries in every continent, and regularly served on official Canadian delegations to international aid conferences and innumerable multilateral debt rescheduling and debt forgiveness negotiations.

Always a European federalist, he attended his first international world federalist conference in Amsterdam in 1966. However, he remained a closet world federalist until his retirement, when he joined WFM-Canada. He is now a member of the WFMC National Council and President of the World Federalist Foundation of Canada on top of his position on the Board of the Democratic World Federalists.

Tad Daley is a political author, an international policy analyst, and an activist for enduring world peace. He holds a bachelor's degree in political science, a master's degree in international studies, a Ph.D. in public policy analysis ... and a law degree to fall back on if neocon Republicans stay in power forever. He's served as a political advisor to Congresswoman Diane Watson (D-Cal, 2001-Present), the late U.S. Senator Alan Cranston (D-Cal, 1969-1993), and Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio, 1997-Present). He ran for U.S. Congress himself in a 2001 special election to represent mid-city Los Angeles.

He spent many years at the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California, the world'slargest think tank. He focuses his research, writing, and advocacy on abolishing nuclear weapons, ending genocide forever, and reinventing the United Nations. He's published about 75 newspaper, magazine, and journal articles on positive future visions and the politics of hope. He's a dynamic public speaker and is presently serving as a Writing Fellow for International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, winner of the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize.

Fred Duperrault served in the U.S. Army Air Force from 1944 to '46. He received his B.S. in Education from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, in 1959. From 1970 to 1990, he was a political activist in Wisconsin, during which time he also worked as a member of U.S. Sen. William Proxmire's staff (1972-1989.) In the late 70's, he became an active World Federalist. He was a member of the national WFA Board during much of the 80's and 90's and a member of the Wisconsin Governor's Commission on the U.N. in the mid 80's. During the late 80's, he became president of the Milwaukee WFA Chapter. He moved to California and became president of WFA’s Northern California chapter.

Fred co-founded the Action Coalition for Global Change and was its President from the mid to late 90's. He also co-founded the Silicon Valley Impeachment Coalition, which is still active. Currently, he is a Board Member of Citizens for a U.N. People's Parliamentary Assembly, a Green Party activist, an anti-war activist in Veterans For Peace and Mountain View Voices for Peace, and the Vice President of DWF. He and his wife Lois have been married since 1949 and have two daughters and two sons.

Dr. Ronald Glossop is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, where he was also Coordinator of Peace Studies for 25 years. He has authored over 50 articles in professional journals plus three books: Philosophy: An Introduction to Its Problems and Vocabulary (1974); Confronting War (1983; 4th ed. 2001); and World Federation? A Critical Analysis of Federal World Government, (1993). He is Chair of Citizens for Global Solutions/St. Louis Chapter and also serves on the CGS national Board of Directors as well as the DWF Board. He is VP of UNA-St. Louis, President of the American Association of Esperanto Instructors, and Director of the Esperanto organization "Children around the World." He is active in various organizations such as International Philosophers for Peace, Concerned Philosophers for Peace, and the Peace and Justice Studies Association. Glossop is a member of the honor societies Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi.

Dr. Glen T. Martin is Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Radford University in Virginia and Chairperson of the Radford University program in Peace Studies. He has published or edited eight books and many articles related to philosophy of law, democracy, and democratic world government. His most recent book is The Earth Federation Movement: Founding a Social Contract for the People of Earth.

Martin is President of the World Constitution and Parliament Association (WCPA, www.wcpa.biz) that coordinates the work of people in 120 countries worldwide on behalf of establishing non-military democratic world government under the Constitution for the Federation of Earth. He is also a Professor and President of the Institute on World Problems (IOWP), holding seminars in different locations around the world to train future leaders to deal with global problems in the light of democratic world government.

Debbie first heard about World Federation in the early 80's when she lived in San Francisco for 4 years, but didn't rediscover it until the early 90's, when she saw a blurb in the Milwaukee paper saying "Peace Through World Law.” She immediately became involved.

In 1997, she moved to Washington DC and worked as Executive Assistant to the President for the World Federalist Association. In 2001, she moved back to Milwaukee and soon became President of the Milwaukee WFA chapter.

Debbie has also produced three different cable TV shows on the subject, interviewing Milwaukee's former World Federalist Mayor for one. Her main objective is to simplify the message for the masses, attract a younger crowd and get mass media coverage, probably through finding celebrity spokespeople. She has attended international meetings in France, England and Canada and recently became a member of the DWF Board.

Plancarte graduated from Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico and earned a masters degree in comparative jurisprudence from NYU. He now works as a corporate and tax attorney in Guadalajara. Since 2001 he has been founder and president of Planetafilia, A.C., an organization that promotes, among other things, United Nations charger review and reform. Plancarte is also the founder of the World Alliance to Transform the UN (WATUN). In 2009 he was the featured speaker for the D.W.F. Good Government Luncheon Lecture.

John O. Sutter earned his first two degrees at Washington University after serving in combat and military government in Germany, experiences that led to his starting a dissertation on a United States of Europe. In the U.S. Foreign Service, he helped close the American Consulate General in Shanghai and open the Consulate in Surabaya. Indonesian language and area studies, followed by a stint as economic officer in the American Embassy, Jakarta, resulted in his doctoral dissertation on political influences on the Indonesian economy (Cornell U.). He married a wonderful woman, Doris, and during three decades with The Asia Foundation he worked with the people and governments of Malaysia, Indonesia, and Pakistan in addition to serving in the San Francisco home office.

Since joining the [U.S.] World Federalist Association in 1987, John has served as Editor of the Northern California World Federalist (1987-91) and its renamed Toward Democratic World Federation (1996-- ); he also held the offices of Treasurer, Vice President, and President, first of W.F.A. of Northern California and subsequently of Democratic World Federalists, which now has supporters from around the world. He helped organize the San Francisco Hearing of the U.S. Commission on Improving the Effectiveness of the U.N. in 1993.

He also served on the Board of the W.F.A. (1989-2003) and its policy committee, and headed its liaison committee for the [global] World Federalist Movement. He served on the Council of the W.F.M. (1991-2007), headed its committee on Federalism and the Right of People to Self-Government, and in 1995 organized its World Congress in San Francisco with its symposium on "Restructuring the United Nations: Achieving Democratic Global Governance for the 21st Century."