Joseph E. Slater (1922–2002), was an economist and intellectual entrepreneur who played a key role in the "de-Nazification" of Germany after World War II.
He was instrumental in making the Aspen Institute an important East-West conduit in the Cold War and authored the original blueprint for the Peace Corps.
"The central purpose of Joe's Slater's life has been "to create a network of institutions and people who can generate and transmit tremors that will ultimately 'change things' in an orderly way.
His family moved in high school to Palo Alto and he attended college at Berkeley where he won Phi Beta Kappa honors and joined the faculty as an instructor in economics.
From 1944 to 1954, Slater had a number of crucial posts in Europe and Washington as postwar European alliances emerged and as Germany became a modern democracy.
With the election of John F. Kennedy he was named deputy assistant secretary of state for educational and cultural affairs where he wrote the blueprint for the Peace Corps.
Under his direction, the Aspen Institute, which had been a small organization that specialized in educational seminars for executives, increased its range and scale, becoming a well-known meeting place for world leaders, scholars, and scientists on international issues.