Abstract

In-person! Drinks reception to follow after talk! Sign up: https://www.tickettailor.com/events/centreofgovernanceandhumanrightsuniversityofcambridge/1184649#

Dr. Comfort Ero assumed the role of Crisis Group’s President & CEO in December 2021, following her tenure as the organization’s West Africa Project Director since 2001. She progressed within the organization to serve as Africa Program Director and later as Interim Vice President starting in January 2021.

Throughout her career, Dr. Ero has dedicated herself to addressing conflicts in various capacities, including as Deputy Africa Program Director for the International Centre for Transitional Justice from 2008 to 2010 and as Political Affairs Officer and Policy Advisor to the Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Liberia from 2004 to 2007. She holds a PhD from the London School of Economics, University of London, and is involved in multiple boards and advisory bodies.

Dr. Ero’s expertise lies in conflict prevention, mediation, peacekeeping, transitional justice, and the politics and international relations of Africa. Her professional background includes roles such as Research Fellow at the Conflict, Security & Development Group, Centre for Defence Studies, King’s College, London, and Research Associate at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, London. She is fluent in English and proficient in French.

Practitioner Series:

CGHR runs a Practitioner Series each year in Lent term, which often features rights activists, aid practitioners and journalists etc. Our speakers relate stories about their own experience — how they came to work in the field that they are in — with details about what the work itself involves. The session thus offers a combination of substantive discussion of the speaker’s work and critical views on the challenges of working in their area, as well as personal and practical insights into how they ended up doing what they do and how they would advise others thinking about practice/policy as a possible future after studies/research. CGHR ’s Practitioner Series provides students (both undergrads and postgrads) and researchers with the chance to ask questions of people that they might not normally have access to.