Grant Program

Grant Program Staff

Program Director and Area Specialists

Steven Heydemann, Vice President, Grant and Fellowship Program

Kathleen Kuehnast, Associate Vice President, Grant Program

Ali Amar, Program Officer (Iraq)

Barmak Pazhwak, Program Officer

Steve Riskin, Senior Program Officer

Taylor Seybolt, Senior Program Officer

Technical, Programmatic, and Administrative Staff

April R. Hall, Director of Grant Administration

Mauna Dosso, Program Specialist

Cornelia Smith, Senior Program Assistant

Dahlia A. Shaaban, Senior Program Assistant

Sonia Eqbal, Program Assistant (Afghanistan)

Steven Heydemann, Vice President, Grant and Fellowship Program

Areas of Specialization: Economics and Development | Governance | International and Regional Organizations | Muslim World | Political Systems and International Relations | Middle East | North Africa

Steven Heydemann serves as vice president of the Grants and Fellowships program and as special adviser to the Muslim World Initiative.

His research and teaching have focused on the comparative politics and the political economy of the Middle East. His interests include authoritarian governance, economic development, social policy, political and economic reform, and civil society. Heydemann has also researched the relationship between institutions and economic development and on philanthropy and the nonprofit sector.

From 2003 to 2007, Heydemann directed the Center for Democracy and Civil Society at Georgetown University. From 2001 to 2003, he was director of the Social Science Research Council’s Program on Philanthropy and the Nonprofit Sector, with additional responsibility for development of new programs. Prior to that, he was a program director at the SSRC, where he ran the Council’s Program on International Peace and Security and its Program on the Near and Middle East (1990–1997). From 1997 to 2001, he was an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Columbia University.

Heydemann has held visiting faculty positions at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies at the European University Institute in Florence (2001) and as a senior fellow at the Yale University Center for International Studies (1997). He has served on the board of directors of the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) of North America and is currently a member of MESA’s Committee on Public Affairs.

Kathleen Kuehnast, Associate Vice President, Grants Program

Areas of Specialization: Europe: East | Asia: Central | Civil Society | Economies of Conflict | Education | Ethnic Conflict | Political Islam | Post-Conflict Reconstruction | Religion, Religious Conflict | Women and Conflict | Culture and Islam | Gender | Youth | International Development | Poverty | Migration | Disabilities | Community Driven Development in Post-Conflict States

Kathleen Kuehnast is associate vice president of the Grants and Fellowships program. She joined USIP in 2008 following a fifteen-year career in international development, where she worked extensively with the World Bank managing international research projects and advising policymakers (government and non-government) on social development concerns. She has also worked in a similar capacity with the Asian Development Bank, the German Technical Cooperation Agency, and the United Nations Development Project. Her ongoing work continues to be focused on the increasing socio-economic disparities in Central Asia and the impact on local level conflicts.

As a recipient of both the Mellon Foreign Fellowship at the Library of Congress (2000) and the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies Fellowship (1999) at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, she has studied and written extensively on the impact of post-soviet transition on Muslim women of Central Asia.

She has been an advisor to the U.S. Department of State on matters concerning Central Asia, including diplomatic briefings for the secretary of state and a number of ambassadors. In addition, she has given in-depth briefings on Central Asia at the U.S. Foreign Service Institute; Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars; U.S. Agency on International Development; Georgetown University; Middle East Institute; National Defense University; and Columbia University.

Kuehnast holds a Ph.D. in socio-cultural anthropology from the University of Minnesota, with an area specialty in Central Asia. Her master’s degree is from the University of St. Thomas in education. She is a member of the American Association of Anthropology (AAA).

Ali Amar, Program Officer (Iraq)

Areas of Specialization: Middle East

Ali Amar has over 15 years’ experience in international development, legal reform, institutional strengthening, and professional training. Prior to joining USIP, he started PRM Consulting. In addition, he has designed, implemented, and managed USAID-funded projects in the Middle East and North Africa. He has worked in democracy and governance, institutional strengthening, legal empowerment, and economic development, and served as strategic adviser to non-governmental organizations working in the MENA region.

A former adjunct professor at Georgetown University and the College of William and Mary, he is fluent in Arabic and French. Amar has also served as a contributor to Tel Quel magazine (Morocco) and Al-Qabas (Kuwait). He has also been a guest analyst for the BBC, Radio Sawa, and Voice of America.

Barmak Pazhwak, Program Officer (Afghanistan)

Areas of Specialization: South Asia

Barmak Pazhwak is an international development specialist with more than 18 years of experience of work in the management of international humanitarian relief and socio-economic development programs. Pazhwak has worked in senior management positions for a number of prominent international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in South and Central Asia, Great Lakes Region of Africa and the United Kingdom. As a staff member of United Nations Development Program (UNDP) until most recently, Pazhwak worked as the senior international advisor to the Minister of Rural Rehabilitation and Development of Afghanistan.

Pazhwak has a master’s degree (with distinction) in rural social/international development from the University of Reading, United Kingdom. The dissertation of his MA degree was a study of the role of NGOs in situations of armed conflicts and political emergencies with particular reference to Afghanistan. Through his international development career, Pazhwak has initiated programs in food security and agriculture, micro-credit and savings, vocational training and rural entrepreneurship, conflict resolution, human resource and institutional capacity development, mine awareness and public health.

Pazhwak has a good understanding of the current international political issues with particular focus on South and Central Asia and the Middle East. As an Afghan-American he is well versed in the political history as well as the cultural and traditional heritages of Afghanistan and has a native command of Dari and Pashto languages, including good understanding of literature and folklore. Pazhwak has attended numerous Afghanistan related international conferences and seminars on a variety of topics including civil society, community level peacebuilding and conflict resolution, and most recently co-authored a paper on "a social justice rights-based approach to disability in Afghanistan," presented to the Tri-lateral International Conference in Calgary, Canada.

Pazhwak has recently moved from Tucson, Arizona to Fairfax, Virginia. He worked as a teacher for a local college in Tucson in between his international assignments.

Steven Riskin, Senior Program Officer

Areas of Specialization: Middle East Arab-Israeli Relations | Human Rights | Ethnic Conflict | Conflict Resolution

Steven Riskin is a senior program officer in the Grants and Fellowships program and a Middle East specialist with particular expertise on Arab-Israeli affairs. He is also responsible for the Institute’s Solicited Grant Initiative on Iran. He came to the Institute from the Ford Foundation, where he was a New York–based program officer and consultant on Middle East issues. He was responsible for program development and grantmaking in Israel, designing and implementing programs in the areas of human rights, social justice, and conflict resolution. With the foundation’s Cairo office staff, he also engaged in program development in the Arab world. He has traveled extensively throughout the region.

Riskin has been a consultant to the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights and several foundations seeking to advance social justice and peace in the Middle East. He was a researcher at the Brookings Institution, a foreign affairs analyst at the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress, and a cofounder of an international network of foundations and other donor agencies funding in the human rights field.

He holds a B.A. in political science from the University of California and an M.A. in Arab studies from Georgetown University.

Taylor Seybolt, Senior Program Officer

Areas of Specialization: Humanitarian Intervention | Peacekeeping and Peace Enforcement | Conflicts in Africa | Especially the Great Lakes Region | International Relations Theory

Taylor Seybolt comes to the Institute from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), in Stockholm, Sweden. He spent almost three years there as the leader of the conflicts and Peace Enforcement project. During that time he received a grant from the U.S. Institute of Peace to write a book on humanitarian military intervention. Before working at SIPRI, Seybolt was a research fellow for two years at Harvard University's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Kennedy School of Government. He received his Ph.D. in political science from MIT in 1999. In addition to humanitarian intervention, Seybolt has research interests in the transnational spread of internal conflicts, ethnic conflict, and peace operations.

April R. Hall, Director of Grant Administration

Program and Technical Contact: Application Procedures and Processes | Eligibility Criteria | Budget Questions | Notification of Awards | Post Award Contracting Issues | Financial Management and Administration, Audit | Federal and Program Reporting Requirements | Award Disbursements | Program Statistics | Fiscal Year Oversight

April R. Hall joined the Institute in 1988 as grant administrator. Previously, she worked as program specialist in the Fellowships division of the National Endowment for the Humanities where she coordinated the activities of the Summer Seminar for College Teachers and Summer Seminar for Secondary School Teachers programs. Since 1988, she has served as grant administrator in the Grant Program. She holds a B.S. degree in political science and history from Davis & Elkins College, Elkins, West Virginia.

Mauna Dosso, Program Specialist

Administrative Contact: Grantee Reporting ( Narrative and Financial,) |Grant Agreements, Budgets | Contracts| Compliance| Application Processes.

Mauna Dosso joined the Institute in May 2007. Previously she worked at the National Endowment for Democracy and at the United Nations Foundation as a grants administrator. She holds a BA in french literature from the University of Maryland and a MA in african studies from Howard University.

Cornelia Smith, Senior Program Assistant

Clerical and Technical Contact: Mailing List for Application Material | Web Download Problems | Deadline Information | Receipt of Application Material | Time Frame for Notification | Application Processes | Travel

Cornelia Smith joined the Grant Program in May 2001. Previously she worked as an administrative assistant for Celinda Lake at Lake, Snell, Perry, and Associates, a political research and polling firm. She has worked for more than five years in the clerical and administrative field.

Dahlia A. Shaaban, Senior Program Assistant

Clerical and Technical Contact: Administrative, Budgetary, and Computer Support for Grant Program’s Iraq Projects | Grantee Reporting (Narrative and Financial) | Receipt of Application Material | Application Processes | Award Documentation and Processes

Dahlia A. Shaaban joined the Institute in April of 2006, where she works under the supervision of the Iraq Program Officer and senior grants administrative staff. Previously, she worked as a Program Assistant for Counterpart International, Inc., a Washington-based international development NGO, in its Community and Humanitarian Assistance Programs. She holds a B.A. in Religion and Political Science from Colgate University in Hamilton, NY.

Sonia Eqbal, Program Assistant (Afghanistan)

Grants, Rule of Law, Professional Training, Afghanistan and Pakistan Working Groups

Mahmoda Sonia Eqbal joined the USIP in June 2007 after graduating from Juniata College in Pennsylvania with a B.A. in Peace Studies and International Politics. She speaks Dari, Pushtu, Urdu, English and French. Prior to joining USIP she worked with the UNICEF Afghanistan Country Office in Islamabad and Kabul and volunteered with the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan. Eqbal also taught English at schools and private courses in Peshawar, Pakistan. Eqbal will be assisting the program officer for Afghanistan on all Afghanistan related grant-making activities and will work on Afghanistan related projects throughout USIP. Please contact her for general questions and application materials.