Alison Giffen

Senior Associate
  • Future of Peace Operations

Alison Giffen is a senior associate and deputy director of Stimson's Future of Peace Operations program. She leads the Civilians in Conflict project, which aims to increase global preparedness to prevent and respond to violence against civilians, including in its most extreme manifestation: mass atrocity and genocide.

Giffen joined Stimson in 2009 with more than a dozen years of research and advocacy experience related to human rights and humanitarian crises. Giffen previously served as an advocacy and strategy coordinator for Oxfam in Sudan, where she led the design and implementation of the organization's global strategy to secure civilians' rights to protection and assistance. As a policy analyst for the Open Society Institute, Giffen promoted multilateral US foreign engagement and US support of UN reform initiatives. She was project director of a groundbreaking study on ex-combatants in Sierra Leone, and was the founding director of the US Office on Colombia, an international coalition of groups promoting peace and human rights in Colombia.

Giffen received her MA in international affairs from the School for International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, and received her BA in diplomacy and world affairs from Occidental College.

Selected Publications

"UN Integration and Humanitarian Space: An Independent Study Commissioned by the UN Integration Steering Group," (ODI/HPG and Stimson, 2011).

“Addressing the Doctrinal Deficit: Developing Guidance to Prevent and Respond to Widespread or Systematic Attacks on Civilians,” (Stimson, 2010).

"Enhancing the Protection of Civilians in Peace Operations: From Policy to Practice," A Background Paper Prepared for the Australian Government's Asia Pacific Civil-Military Centre of Excellence (Stimson, 2011).

“Challenges of Strengthening the Protection of Civilians in Multidimensional Peace Operations,” (International Forum for the Challenges of Peace Operations, 2010).

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