Lafayette A. Barnes is director of the Office of Partnerships and Grant Services (OPGS) in the Executive Office of Mayor Adrian Fenty in the Government of the District of Columbia where he is responsible for facilitating a variety of philanthropic partnerships. Lafayette oversees the District’s competitive grants development and grant-making process as well as directs the government’s policies and procedures for soliciting and accepting private donations.  Lafayette is a graduate of Georgetown University’s Masters of Science in Foreign Service School, Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government Program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government, Management Concepts’ Grants Management Certificate Program, and the National Forum for Black Public Administrators’ Executive Leadership Institute.  Lafayette is also a member of the International County/City Managers Association’s International Academy, Leadership Greater Washington Inc., Washington DC Chapter of Concerned Black Men Inc., and African American Unity Caucus.

Ramon E. Daubon is the President of the Esquel Group where he focuses on local and community-based development, philanthropy and corporate social responsibility, and democratic citizenship.  He previously served as the Vice President for Programs at the Inter American Foundation.  He has served in boards and in advisory capacities to the Inter American Democracy Network, the International Institute for Sustained Dialogue, the Hispanic Council for International Relations, the Esquel Group Foundation, the Canadian Foundation for Latin America (FOCAL), the Georgetown University Caribbean Studies Program and the Values in Decisions on Risk (VALDOR) Forum in Stockholm.  He has been Executive Director of the Caribbean Environment and Development Institute in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Deputy Assistant Administrator of USAID for its Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean, and Representative of the Ford Foundation for the Andean and Southern Cone Countries of South America.  A native of Puerto Rico, he holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Pittsburgh.  He has published extensively on topics about Latin America and the Caribbean, and the connection of economic and social development with democracy and the culture of civic engagement.

Larry Diamond is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, founding coeditor of the Journal of Democracy, and codirector of the International Forum for Democratic Studies of the National Endowment for Democracy. He has also advised the U.S. Agency for International Development (whose 2002 report, Foreign Aid in the National Interest, he coauthored), the World Bank, the United Nations, the State Department, and other governmental and nongovernmental organizations. His book The Spirit of Democracy: The Struggle to Build Free Societies Throughout the World (Times Books, 2008) explores the sources of global democratic progress and stress and the future prospects of democracy.  Larry is a professor of political science and sociology at Stanford University, where he teaches courses on democratic development and coordinates the democracy program of the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. 

Paul Graham is the Executive Director of Idasa.  Paul joined Idasa as the Regional Director of the KwaZulu/Natal office in 1988 and was Director of the Training Centre for Democracy in Johannesburg between 1992 and 1996.  At Idasa, Paul has been responsible for developing an election support program, public education projects, various conflict prevention, mitigation and resolution activities, and establishing Idasa’s local government center.  Paul is a member of the management committee of the African Democracy Forum and the International Steering Committee of the Community of Democracies NGO process.

Shaila is currently a staff member of the United Nations working in the area of strategic planning and budgeting. In her current role, she is responsible for putting in place a planning and budgeting system that is aligned with the UN’s strategic goals and to monitor and adjust the planning assumptions and administrative budget allocation on a regular basis.  She provides regular budget oversight on administrative expenditures within headquarters and nine regional offices. Prior to her role with the UN, she worked as a Consultant with Deloitte Consulting and Deloitte’s Emerging Markets Group working with clients such as USAID and MCC in the area of public sector management.  She received her B.A. and M.P.A. from Syracuse University.

Hawes joined IBP in June of 2008 as its associate director. He is responsible, in collaboration with the IBP management team, for developing, refining, and implementing organizational management systems; as well as IBP's relations with the donor community. He also plays an active role in the Partnership Initiative's learning agenda. Prior to joining the Center, Hawes spent 12 years as a Ford Foundation program officer responsible for grant making in the governance and civil society fields, first in the Philippines and then in Southern Africa. Hawes has also taught comparative political economy at the University of Michigan and Ohio University, and holds a Phd in political science from the University of Hawaii.

Ivor Jenkins is the Managing Director of Idasa.  Ivor joined Idasa in 1991.  He acts as the head of portfolio and project development.  He also manages the Citizen and Community Empowerment Program and the Safety and Security Program.  In addition to managing Idasa’s Kutlwanong Democracy Centre, Ivor is a board member of the South African Special Olympics and the International Civil Society Consortium.

Art Kaufman, Director – World Movement for Democracy, National Endowment for Democracy

Alycia is the U.S. Director for Idasa.  In this position, Alycia facilitates strategic partnerships with nonprofit organizations, liaises with donors and works with the United States Government to build support for Idasa and its programs.  In addition to her position with Idasa, Alycia is legal counsel for the Grassroots Business Fund, a nonprofit that invests in social enterprises in the developing world.  As counsel, Alycia helps to structure investment transactions and drafts all legal documentation to implement GBF deals.

Prior to Idasa and GBF, Alycia consulted for FINCA International on microfinance regulatory issues in Amman, Jordan and worked as an international project finance attorney at Dewey & LeBoeuf, LLP. Alycia holds a law degree from Georgetown University, a master’s degree in human rights and democratization from the University of Witwatersrand, and a bachelor’s degree in political science from Yale University.

Alycia serves on the boards of the South Africa Washington Internship Program (SAWIP) and Friends of Idasa.

Warren Krafchik is the Director of the International Budget Partnership at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. The Partnership works to enhance the effective participation of civil society organizations in public budgeting in developing and transition countries. Krafchik has worked with the IBP over the past 8 years, assisting budget organizations in Africa, Latin America and Asia by providing training and technical support and designing research programs. Krafchik joined the IBP in February 2001 after nine years at Idasa, where he founded the Budget Information Service (BIS) in 1995. Since its inception, BIS has conducted cutting-edge work to produce analytical and accessible materials on national and sub-national budgets, with a particular emphasis on how these budgets affect disadvantaged groups. Krafchik has a Master’s degree in macro-economics, awarded with distinction, from the University of Cape Town and is the author of numerous publications on the role of the parliament and civil society in the budget process, the development of methodologies to track the impact of budgets on low-income and poor people, and international economic development.

Mahmood is a Professor at Columbia University.  His current work takes as its point of departure his 1996 book, Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism. He focuses on the intersection between politics and culture, and the politicization of culture in the making of political identities, with a core interest on colonial and post-colonial Africa.  In particular, his research concentrates on the reform/reproduction of colonially-crafted identities through the definition of citizenship in the post-independence period.   Mahmood has done extended research in South Africa, Rwanda, Uganda, Nigeria and Sudan.

Since leaving the government in 1981 after a 25-year career, Harold H. Saunders has conducted sustained non-official dialogues to transform relationships among conflicting parties in the Cold War, in former Soviet Republics, and in the Middle East. From that experience he has conceptualized the process called Sustained Dialogue. In government on the National Security Council Staff and in the State Department, he was intensively involved in the Arab-Israeli peace process from 1974-1981, flying on the Kissinger shuttles and, as Assistant Secretary of State, a principal drafter of the Camp David accords in 1978 and mediator of the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty. He serves concurrently as Director of International Affairs at the Kettering Foundation.

Witney Schneidman is the President of Schneidman & Associates International, a Washington-based consulting firm that works with American companies and NGOs active in Sub-Saharan Africa.  Witney has an extensive background in African affairs and economic development. He served in the Clinton Administration as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs where he was responsible for economic and commercial issues in Sub-Saharan Africa and had regional responsibility for Southern Africa. Among his activities was ensuring the passage and implementation of the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act, the establishment of the US-SADC Forum, the US-Angola Bilateral Consultative Commission and the US-Nigeria Joint Economic Partnership Committee. He received a Ph.D. in International Relations from the University of Southern California, an M.A. in International Relations from the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and his B.A. (Cum Laude) from Temple University in history.