Associate Director, Research
acooperman@pewforum.org
Alan Cooperman is the associate director for research at the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life. He came to the Pew Research Center in 2009 after a 27-year career in journalism, the last 10 years of which were at The Washington Post.
During his decade at the Post, he worked in many parts of the newsroom, including five years as a national staff writer covering religion. He also served as deputy foreign editor, senior editor of the Post's book review section and national security editor. In the latter capacity, he helped oversee the Post's Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Before joining the Post in 1999, Alan was foreign editor of U.S. News & World Report, where he oversaw eight foreign bureaus and a staff of Washington-based reporters covering the Pentagon, State Department, National Security Council and intelligence agencies.
Alan also spent eight years as a foreign correspondent. Six of those years were in Moscow as a reporter for the Associated Press (1990-1994) and bureau chief for U.S. News & World Report (1994-1996), a period in which he covered the breakup of the Soviet Union, economic upheaval in Russia and the wars in Chechnya and Nagorno-Karabakh. He won numerous awards for his coverage, particularly for a joint investigation (with CBS's 60 Minutes) of nuclear smuggling from the former USSR.
Alan also spent two years (1996-1998) in Jerusalem as Middle East bureau chief for U.S. News & World Report, where he reported from seven countries, including Iraq under Saddam Hussein.
He graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard in 1982 and started in professional journalism at the Berkshire Eagle in Pittsfield, Mass., where his reporting led to the investigation and conviction of the Berkshire County treasurer for embezzlement.
He lives with his wife and two sons in Washington, D.C.