Forum Agenda and Participant Biographies - Brookings Institution

Averröes’s Premier of the Jurist: Synopsis and Commentary.
He recently translated Archbishop Rowan Williams’s
Islam, Christianity, and Pluralism into Arabic.
He is a founding member of the International Union
of Muslim Scholars and was the Founding Director of
Al-Maqasid Research Center in London. Jasser Auda
has a Ph.D. in Systems Analysis from the University
of Waterloo and a Ph.D. in Theology and Religious
Studies from the University of Wales.
durriya Badani
UnIted StateS
Durriya Badani is Deputy Director
of the Project on U.S. Relations
with the Islamic World at the
Saban Center at Brookings. Prior
to her tenure with Brookings,
Badani was appointed as Senior
Associate for Government Affairs for Dawate-Hadiyah
(America). As a Presidential Management Fellow,
she also served as policy advisor for the Near East and
South Asia for the President’s Interagency Council on
Women, as a speechwriter to U.S. Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright, and as an Economic Officer at
the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad for the U.S. Department
of State. Badani served in the U.S. Peace Corps
in Yemen and, in 2008, was appointed by Governor
Martin O’Malley to the Commission for Middle
Eastern American Affairs for Maryland. Badani is the
co-author of the Brookings publication “The Role of
Religious Leaders and Religious Communities in Diplomacy”
and the author of “Forty Years of Female
Rule in Yemen: The Reign of-al-Sayyida bint Ahmed
al-Sulayhi.” She completed her M.A. in Arabic and
Islamic Studies from the University of Texas at Austin.
Manilee Bagheritari
FRanCe
Manilee Bagheritari is an independent gender consultant
specializing in women’s rights living in the Middle
East and North Africa. She has worked with UN
OHCHR, UNESCO, UNAIDS, and UNICEF, as well
as local NGOs. She has published and spoken widely
about the advancement of women’s socio-legal and economic
status as a vector for development worldwide,
particularly in Iran and Afghanistan. Bagheritari holds
a master’s degree from the London School of Economics
(LSE) and a bachelor’s degree from the University of
California at Berkeley. Her academic research at LSE
examined the socio-legal impact of multiculturalism
2011 U.S.-ISLAMIC WORLD FORUM
Y e A R OF ChAnge
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laws and discourse in the European Union for gender
equality and Islamic minorities. Her current research
looks at the impact of international educational policies
and programs for women, focusing on the Middle East
and North Africa region.
hossam Bahgat
eGypt
Hossam Bahgat is the Founder
and Director of the Egyptian Initiative
for Personal Rights (EIPR),
a Cairo-based independent human
rights organization which seeks to
protect and promote the personal
rights and freedoms of individuals and communities.
Since 2002, EIPR has used research, advocacy,
and litigation to promote and defend the rights to privacy,
religious freedom, health, and bodily integrity.
With training in political science and international
human rights law, Bahgat is also the Vice President of
the Egyptian Association against Torture, an Advisory
Board Member of Egypt’s New Woman Foundation, a
Board Member of the International Network for Economic,
Social, and Cultural Rights, and a Member of
the Board of Directors of the Fund for Global Human
Rights. Bahgat is the recipient of 2010 Alison
Des Forges Award for Extraordinary Activism from
Human Rights Watch.
Mickey Bergman
UnIted StateS
Mickey Bergman is Director of
Middle East Programs at the Aspen
Institute and President of Solel
Strategic Group (SSG). At Aspen,
Mickey directs several programs,
including Partners for a New Beginning,
U.S.-Palestinian Partnership, Emirate-Aspen
Partnership, North Africa Partnership for Economic
Opportunity, and U.S.-Lebanon Dialogue. Current
and past clients of SSG include the Clinton Global
Initiative, the Aspen Institute, former Governor Bill
Richardson, Robert Redford Center at Sundance, and
the Elders. Mickey also teaches at the Elliott School for
International Affairs at George Washington University.
Mickey has published articles and opinion pieces in the
Boston Globe, Foreign Policy online, Huffington Post, Ynet,
Daily Star, Aspen Magazine, and the Middle East
Bulletin. Mickey received his masters in Foreign Service
from the Walsh School at Georgetown University.