Professor Dunbar was an American diplomat and Ambassador in the Middle East (1962-1993), President of the Cleveland Council on World Affairs (1993-2001), the U.N. Secretary-General's Special Representative for Western Sahara (1998), and Warburg Professor in International Relations at Simmons College (2001-2004).

Ambassador Dunbar has published scholarly articles and chapters in edited volumes on American foreign policy, the Western Sahara, Yemen, and Afghanistan and is writing a book on Western Sahara. His "op-ed" articles have appeared in The Boston Globe and The Cleveland Plain Dealer.