Dr. Eligar Sadeh
Eligar Sadeh, PhD is an Aerospace Professional, Consultant, Educator, and TEDx Speaker. He is the CEO and Founder of Astroconsulting International LLC and the nonprofit Astropolitics Institute, and serves as Chief Editor of the academic journal Astropolitics.
An Aerospace Professional since 1982, Eligar is widely described as “The Man Who Wrote the Book” on the human relationship to the space enterprise — a framing he has developed across professorships, consulting engagements, journal editorship, and STEM education spanning more than four decades.
Through Astroconsulting International LLC, which he founded in 2007, Eligar empowers space, defense, and environmental programs with the technology management methods needed to optimize outcomes. His clients have included the Secure World Foundation for the development of a national space strategy for the United States Government, the Brazilian Space Agency for strategic guidance, the University of Colorado for professional education and workforce development, the U.S. Air Force Academy for space and defense studies, the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry for space systems management and export controls, and the Israeli higher education sector for space policy and space strategy development.
In 2019, Eligar founded the Astropolitics Institute, the leading source of research, education, and advocacy for the discipline of astropolitics — the dynamics of the human relationship to the space enterprise across civil, commercial, private, military, and intelligence space activities worldwide. The Institute serves as the institutional home for the peer-reviewed journal Astropolitics: The International Journal of Space Politics & Policy, which began publication in 2003. Eligar has served as Chief Editor of the journal since 2006, leading the international journal of choice for academics, policy-makers, and professionals in the space community. He also sits on the Editorial Board of Space Policy at Elsevier.
Since January 2024, Eligar has been Adjunct Faculty at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs, where he instructs courses for the Master of Engineering in Space Operations program. In September 2023, he delivered The Space Revolution and Humanity’s Future at TEDxBreckenridge, arguing that the ongoing space revolution is essential to addressing the energy and resource demands of modern civilization and to mitigating human-induced global climate change.
Watch The Space Revolution and Humanity’s Future | Eligar Sadeh | TEDxBreckenridge. Listen to his Astropolitics: The Human Relationship to the Space Enterprise webinar with Space Renaissance International, and his interview Jacek Bartosiak talks to Eligar Sadeh on Astropolitics and Space Strategies.
Eligar has authored and edited three major volumes that anchor the field of space politics and policy. Read Space Strategy in the 21st Century: Theory and Policy, an overview of how space strategy coordinates, integrates, and prioritizes space activities across security, commercial, and civil sectors and explores the national space strategies of the United States, Russia, China, Europe, Japan, India, Israel, and Brazil. Read The Politics of Space: A Survey, which surveys the politics of space across national space efforts and national and international organizations. Read Space Politics and Policy: An Evolutionary Perspective, a comprehensive survey of space policy that analyzes historical context, political actors, processes, and outcomes.
He authored the chapter Spacepower and the Environment in the National Defense University Press volume Toward a Theory of Spacepower (2011), and the chapter Obstacles to International Space Governance in the Springer Handbook of Space Security.
Between 2011 and 2014, Eligar served as Assistant Research Professor at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs, developing space professional education and researching space systems management, applied space systems engineering, space systems acquisitions, and space strategy and policy.
Between 2007 and 2010, he served as Principal Scientist and Assistant Professor at the Eisenhower Center for Space and Defense Studies in the U.S. Air Force Academy, where he established and served as editor of the Center’s academic journal Space and Defense. At the Eisenhower Center, he managed programs including the Space Deterrence study for the Secretary of Defense, a Space and Strategy dialogue project with China, the Transatlantic Space Security workshop, the Summer Space Seminar, the National Space Forum, the Space Situational Awareness Data Sharing workshop, and the Future of Space Commerce workshop.
Between 2001 and 2007, he was Assistant Professor of Space Studies at the University of North Dakota, where he directed policy, law, management, and business areas of study for the Master of Science in Space Studies. Earlier, between 1987 and 1990, Eligar worked as a Systems Engineer at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company in Denver, Colorado, where he helped redesign the deployment mechanism for NASA’s Tethered Satellite System, which flew on the Space Shuttle.
Eligar has built parallel careers as an educator and entrepreneurial mentor. He has been a Space Foundation Teacher Liaison since 2018, joining an internationally recognized program supporting more than 400 educators promoting space-based STEM education. Between 2011 and 2020, he was Adjunct Faculty in Business & Management at the International Space University. He has been a Business Mentor at the Watson Institute in Boulder, Colorado since 2018, supporting next-generation entrepreneurs developing social impact ventures, and was a Business Mentor at Techstars from 2019 to 2024.
Eligar developed STEM educational programs incorporating experiential and expeditionary learning modalities for Mars Analog Expedition and Environmental Studies at Western Colorado University from 2022 to 2024, and instructed for the Master of Space Operations at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University from 2023 to 2024.
Since 2010, he has taught professional development courses at the Applied Technology Institute, including Space Operations Ecosystem. He also served between 2004 and 2015 as a Professional Development Instructor for the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and the NASA Academy of Program/Project and Engineering Leadership (APPEL) with a focus on technology management.
Eligar earned his PhD from Colorado State University in 1999. He earned his Master’s degree in International Studies from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1994, and his Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering Sciences from the University of Colorado Boulder.
He has been certified in Career and Technical Education (CTE) in STEM and Business by the State of Colorado since 2016. He has appeared multiple times as a guest on The Space Show with David Livingston, discussing space policy and strategy, the Astropolitics Institute, export controls, and Mars Analog STEM outreach for high school students. Fluent in English and proficient in French, Eligar is based in Boulder, Colorado.
Visit his LinkedIn profile, the Astropolitics Institute homepage, and his Astropolitics Institute team page. Follow him on Facebook and X.