Dommen, Arthur J. 1934–2005

(Arthur John Dommen)

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born June 24, 1934, in Mexico City, Mexico; died of cancer, December 15, 2005, in Washington, DC. Journalist, economist, and author. Dommen was a former New York Times bureau chief who covered the Vietnam War before becoming an economist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Brought to the United States by his family when he was a child, he studied in Switzerland during the late 1940s and earned a degree from Cornell University in 1955. He then served in the U.S. Army for two years before becoming a reporter for United Press International in New York City. A short time later, he was named bureau chief in Saigon, and then, from 1961 to 1963, in Hong Kong. For a time, Dommen took a break from journalism and published his first book, Conflict in Laos: The Politics of Neutralization (1964; revised edition, 1971). He then returned to his profession by joining the Los Angeles Times staff in 1965. His knowledge of Asia led to his being named bureau chief in New Delhi, India, after which he covered the Vietnam War from 1968 to 1971. Dommen completed a Ph.D. in agricultural economics at the University of Maryland in 1975 and was hired by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as an economist. He worked for the government until his retirement in 1996, producing important reports on agricultural matters in Africa and Central America. Among his other books are Laos: Keystone of Indochina (1985), Innovation in African Agriculture (1988), and The Indochinese Experience of the French and the Americans: Nationalism and Communism in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam (2001).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Los Angeles Times, December 23, 2005, p. B10.

Star-Ledger (Newark, NJ), December 23, 2005, p. 57.

Washington Post, December 27, 2005, p. B4.

Washington Times, January 5, 2006, p. B2.