UB Professor, Global Planner and Futurist Ibrahim Jammal Dies at 77

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Ibrahim M. Jammal of Buffalo, 77, associate professor emeritus and former chair of the Department of Environmental Design and Planning in the University at Buffalo School of Architecture and Planning, and a major force behind the study of globalization in the field of planning, died Nov. 13 in the Oakwood Health Care Center in Amherst after a long illness.

"Jammal was the inspiration behind the environmental design and the urban and regional planning programs at UB and nurtured them over many years with authority and compassion," said Brian Carter, dean of the School of Architecture and Planning.

"He was a central figure in our school," Carter says, "and played a major role in the advancement of professional education in the field. In addition, his global perspective ensured that our program had a truly international outlook -- one that continues to energize the work of our students and research of the faculty today."

Jammal, a member of the UB faculty from 1969 until his retirement in 1999, was an author, teacher and speaker in the field of complex problem solving in planning and design, the application of futures studies and forecasting methods to planning and policy, long-range planning, planning in developing countries, and negotiation and conflict resolution.

Niraj Verma, chair of the school's Department of Urban and Regional Planning, says, "It is widely recognized within the urban and regional planning academic community that Ibrahim Jammal was the major force behind the study of globalization within the field of planning.

"In fact," Verma says, "the Global Planning Education Interest Group, which today counts a large and distinguished group of academic members, was started pursuant to a meeting of nationally prominent academics that was organized in Buffalo by Professor Jammal."

In recent years, Jammal participated in The Millennium Project, commissioned in 2002 by the United Nations secretary general as a global participatory futures research think tank of futurists, scholars, business planners and policy makers. The group has since galvanized unprecedented efforts by all of the

world's countries and leading development institutions to reverse, by 2015, the grinding poverty, hunger and disease affecting billions of the world's poorest people.

Jammal was born in 1930 in Cairo, Egypt, of Lebanese descent, and earned a bachelor of science degree from Cairo University before receiving master's degrees in both planning and architecture from the University of Pennsylvania in 1962. He also earned certification by the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Washington in computer application to planning analysis.

He joined the faculty of the UB School of Architecture and Planning in 1969 and from 1970-79 served as chair of the Department of Environmental Design and Planning, where he initiated the undergraduate program in 1970 and the graduate program in urban planning in 1976. At that time, they were the only degree-granting programs of their kind in the SUNY system. In 1979 he was appointed director of the school's Comparative Studies in Developing Planning Education Program.

He also directed the Minority Training Program in Planning sponsored by the UB Office of Urban Affairs, served as designated director of the UB Institute for Economic Development and Planning and from 1975-80 directed the UB interdisciplinary Graduate Group in International Development and Environmental Planning.

During his academic career, Jammal participated in many invited professorships, lectures, international seminars and conferences throughout Europe and the Middle East. He organized dozens of conferences here and abroad related to global development planning, futures analysis and other issues in his field.

A member of the American Institute of Certified Planners, he also was a consultant for USAID and UNICEF, chair of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning Commission on Global Approaches to Planning Education and vice chair of the American Planning Association International Division.

Jammal was an Arab speaker and Francophone and served as president of Buffalo's French Cultural Center. In 1992 he was elected vice president for academics in the Buffalo Center Chapter of United University Professions, the SUNY faculty and professional staff union.

His consultant work in urban planning took him from Buffalo, Cheektowaga and Genesee County to Washington, D.C., Washington state, Jordan, Zaire, Egypt and Bahrain, where in 1985 he was involved in the planning and design of the new island town of Fasht Al Adham.

In 2001, Jammal and his wife established the Ibrahim Jammal Fellowship Grant Program in the UB School of Architecture and Planning to permit the school's American and foreign students to broaden their vision beyond the specific cultures of their mother countries.

In Spring 2007, the school's inaugural Ibrahim Jammal Lecture was delivered by author Saskia Sassen, a distinguished economist, urban sociologist and expert on the effects of globalization.

An avid reader, photographer and gardener, Jammal was known as well for his culinary skills, which he frequently demonstrated to delighted guests by preparing exotic dishes he had encountered during his extensive travels.

Jammal is survived by his wife, Viviane; a sister, Mona Kaminski; and a brother, Nabil. A mass of Christian burial will be offered at 10 a.m. Saturday in St. Rose of Lima Church, Parkside and Parker avenues, Buffalo.