Michael has spent much of the past decade working in conflict-affected environments, mostly as an adviser for FCDO and USAID OTI programs in locations including Uruzgan and Syria. He also served as the civilian stabilization adviser to the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Syria/Iraq Stabilization Review in 2017. In 2020 he led the startup team…
Jaclyn Grace is a Programme Technical Manager in Chemonics’ United Kingdom Division. She is concurrently pursuing her MPhil in Development Studies at the University of Oxford, focusing on conflict and stabilisation in West Africa. Her ongoing academic research undertakes a comparative analysis of evolving conflict dynamics across Malian and Burkinabe borderlands. At Chemonics, she most…
Syria Regional Program II (SRP II) operated with the goal of achieving a moderate, inclusive, and stable Syria. The project maintained and increased the influence of strategic moderate entities, strengthened communities to better resist extremism, and enabled the early recovery of newly liberated areas from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) by providing…
When many people think of the concept of trauma, they imagine a specific and singular event that causes overwhelming stress for the person affected. In reality, trauma can be understood as an experience, a series of events, or set of circumstances that can have lasting and adverse effects on individual and community physical, social, and…
Chemonics is pleased to announce Sahar Tabaja as its new Peace, Stability, and Transition Practice (PST) director. Ms. Tabaja is an accomplished stabilization expert with more than 10 years of experience in governance, conflict prevention, and managing capacity building programs in conflict-affected and fragile environments. Prior to this role, Ms. Tabaja served as a stabilization…
Sahar Tabaja is a conflict specialist with more than 15 years of experience designing and managing stabilization, governance, P/CVE, and peacebuilding programs in the Middle East. Her work has focused on exploring how youth, women, civil society, and local actors can positively change governance practices, alter conflict systems, and enable societal peace in fragile environments.…
Communities in Burkina Faso’s remote northern and eastern regions have long felt spurned by the central government in Ouagadougou. Following the end of President Blaise Compaoré’s 27-year rule in 2014, Burkina Faso entered a period of socio-political instability and has struggled to coordinate its response to the growing insecurity brought on by armed militant and…
Exposure to violent and radical ISIS ideologies has damaged Syrian children’s mental health. In areas touched by violent extremism, transforming classrooms into mental health positive spaces that deliver psychosocial support can kickstart the healing process.
Michele Bradford currently serves as Chief of Party for the Libya Economic Acceleration Project (LEAP). Previously, she was the Team Leader for the RISA (Research and Innovation Systems for Africa) Fund, a regional program in Africa focused on research and innovation ecosystem strengthening. Michele is a governance specialist with more than 20 years designing, managing,…
Mohammad Youssef is an expert in information security with 15 years of experience across the Middle East region and in conflict environments, including Syria, Turkey, Egypt, and Algeria with a variety of local and international companies in different sectors. He currently leads implementation in Syria to provide modern education support, stabilization, counter-violent extremism, and governance…
This post was adapted from an interview between Elisabeth Dallas, Chemonics’ Peace, Stability and Transition Practice director, and Todd Diamond, a conflict, stability, and security director in Chemonics’ U.K. Division. For the full interview, watch the video below. How are violent extremism and gang violence — and the development community’s approaches to them — similar?…