Raymond Alan Rosenfeld (1947- ) was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and was the youngest of three children born to Tillye Beatrice Bach (1916-2006) and Bernard Rosenfeld (1911-1971). Bernard Rosenfeld was murdered in 1971 during a robbery at Rosenfeld Steel Co., Inc., which he partially owned. The family were members of the Ahavath Achim Synagogue in the Buckhead neighborhood. Raymond Rosenfeld graduated from Northside High School in 1965, and from Emory University with a Bachelor of Arts in 1969 and a doctorate in political science in 1973. His doctoral dissertation was titled Points of Coalescence of Ad Hoc Issue-Oriented Organizations: Desegregation in Atlanta. While pursuing his graduate degree, he worked as a research assistant at Georgia State University in the Atlanta Urban Observatory's evaluation of Atlanta Model Cities. From 1972 to 1973, Rosenfeld worked for the Community Council of the Atlanta Area in the Research Evaluation Center conducting and publishing research on social services projects. He later pursued a career in academia at the University of Tulsa, Oklahoma; Eastern Michigan University, Yspsilanti; and Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia. During that time, he published scholarly articles and books on political science and economic development.