In Memoriam: George Wallace Grayson

Professor Grayson was a founding SWJ-El Centro Fellow. Doctor Grayson passed away at the age of 76. He was 1938 Professor of Government Emeritus at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia where he taught for 40 years.  An international recognized specialist in Latin American and Mexican politics, he served in the Virginia House of Delegates for 27 years. He was author of several books on Mexico's political situation including: The Cartels: The Story of Mexico's Most Dangerous Criminal Organizations and Their Impact on U.S. Security (Prager, 2013) and The Executioner’s Men: Inside Los Zetas (co-authored with Sam Logan, Transaction Press, 2012): Consequences of Vigilantism in Mexico for the United States (Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2011); Mexico: Narco-Violence and a Failed State? (Transaction, 2010), La Familia Drug Cartel: Implications for U.S.-Mexican Security (Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2010); Mexico’s Struggle with Drugs and Thugs (Foreign Policy Association, 2009); and Mexican Messiah: Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (Penn State University Press, 2007).  Grayson was a Senior Associate at the Center for Strategic & International Studies in Washington, D.C. and an Associate Scholar of the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia. Grayson earned his B.A. at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), his M.A. and Ph.D. at the Johns Hopkins University (Nitze School of Advanced International Studies), and a J.D. at the William and Mary's Marshall-Wythe School of Law.  He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa.