Lobsang Sangay

Lobsang Sangay (born 1968, Darjiling, India) is a Tibetan scholar and political leader who became prime minister in the Tibetan Central Administration, the Tibetan government-in-exile, in 2011. He was both the first non-monk and the first person born outside Tibet to hold the position.

Sangay was born in a refugee camp for Tibetan exiles. His father, a former Buddhist monk, kept livestock and managed to save money to send his son to school. Sangay studied at the University of Delhi, earning a Bachelor of Laws degree; there he joined and soon became an executive with the Tibetan Youth Congress, a group of exiles advocating Tibetan independence. Upon graduation from Delhi in 1994, Sangay won a Fulbright scholarship to study in the United States at Harvard Law School, from which he earned a Master of Laws degree in 1996. He was awarded subsequent fellowships and contributed to reports on Tibetan issues for several nongovernmental organizations, including the International Commission of Jurists and the Pacific Basin Research Center. He then returned to Harvard for study toward a Doctor of Juridical Science degree, which he completed in 2004.

While a doctoral student, Sangay organized a conference of mainland Chinese and Tibetan scholars, which was attended by the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, who at the time was both the spiritual and the political head of the Tibetan government-in-exile. Sangay remained at Harvard after graduation as a research fellow with the law school’s East Asian legal studies program. In addition to performing research on human rights issues, Sangay testified on human rights abuses in Tibet before the U.S. Congress and, in 2009, organized a second conference of mainland Chinese and Tibetan scholars, again including the Dalai Lama, who also met with 100 Chinese scholars at Harvard University. He also became prominent within the Tibetan Buddhist community in nearby Medford, Massachusetts.

In 2009 Sangay was nominated by Tibetan exiles as a candidate in the 2011 election for the office of kalon tripa, or prime minister, in the Tibetan Central Administration. The significance of the election, held on March 20, 2011, was increased by the Dalai Lama’s declaration earlier that month that he would devolve his role as head of state in the government-in-exile to the prime minister. Sangay campaigned by traveling to Tibetan exile communities in several countries, prompting comparisons to U.S. Pres. Barack Obama for his youthful charisma and his ability to inspire confidence in his constituents. Moreover, his campaign message reassured those Tibetan exiles who had been uneasy about the prospect of the first government-in-exile not administered by the Dalai Lama, as Sangay promised to maintain the latter’s “middle way” of pursuing Tibetan autonomy within the People’s Republic of China rather than political independence from it.

Sangay easily won the election, garnering 55 percent of more than 49,000 votes cast from among the approximately 83,000 Tibetan exiles who were eligible to vote. Sangay succeeded Lobsang Tenzin as the second directly elected kalon tripa in an inauguration ceremony that was held on August 8, 2011.