CTP Symposium 2021 Speakers

Zeina Afif, Senior Social Scientist, Mind, Behavior & Development Unit (eMBeD), The World Bank

Working on applying behavioural insights to improve women’s access to finance and jobs, reduce youth unemployment, promote social cohesion, and improve access to public services and programs.

Saugato Datta, ideas42

Saugato Datta is a Managing Director at ideas42, where he oversees work on the application of behavioural science in low- and middle-income countries in South and Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa in partnership with government agencies, multilateral organizations, NGOs and firms focused on low-income populations. His current work spans violence reduction, bureaucratic behaviour, education, labour markets, agriculture, and cash transfer/social protection programs. He has also worked on behavioural interventions in public health and around resource conservation. Before joining ideas42, Saugato spent three years writing about economics at The Economist in London, and as a researcher at the World Bank in Washington, DC. Saugato has a Ph.D. in economics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and undergraduate and Master’s degrees from Cambridge University and the University of Delhi.

Ali Schmidt-Fellner, Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth

Ali Schmidt-Fellner leads the knowledge management efforts at the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth. In this capacity, she manages key think tank relationships, develops cutting edge research agendas, and builds the Center's knowledge assets on the future of financial inclusion, the digital economy, and inclusive economic mobility. She ensures actionable insights reach public and private sector leaders, helping them to make more informed decisions towards building an inclusive economy. Prior to joining the Center, Ali worked for the World Bank in the Disruptive Technologies for Development division and the Global Wildlife Program.

John Gachigi, Ministry of Labour & Social Protection

John Gachigi (HSC), Director, Directorate of Social Assistance, Ministry of Labour & Social Protection. His functions involve policy & programme development, implementation of Consolidated Cash Transfer Program; coordination of targeting, enrolment and recertification of beneficiaries; management of payment delivery systems; maintaining the Management Information System; coordination of grievances and change management and also of implementation of COVID-19 interventions through cash transfers. Mr. Gachigi is a trained facilitator on social protection and knowledge management and has participated and presented papers in several international conferences and forums. Mr. Gachigi is a Doctoral student in Development Studies with background in Social Protection.

Lisa Gennetian, Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University

Dr. Gennetian is the Prizter Professor of Early Learning Policy Studies at Duke Sanford School of Public Policy and an applied economist whose research focuses on child poverty with a particular lens toward identifying the causal impacts of poverty reduction on children’s development. She is a co-PI on the first multi-site multi-year randomized control study of a monthly unconditional cash gift to low income mothers of infants in the U.S. called Baby’s First Years.

UGO GENTILINI, THE WORLD BANK

Ugo Gentilini is Global Lead for Social Assistance with the Social Protection and Jobs Global Practice at the World Bank. His interests encompass research and practice on social protection from high-income countries to fragile states. With a PhD in economics, he has published extensively on social assistance, including recent books such as Exploring Universal Basic Income (2020), Adaptive Social Protection (2020), and the 1.5 Billion People Question (2017). Since 2016, he has been producing a weekly newsletter on social protection reaching thousands of subscribers.

Dean Karlan, Northwestern University

Dean Karlan is the Frederic Esser Nemmers Distinguished Professor of Economics and Finance, and co-director of the Global Poverty Research Lab at Northwestern University. His research focuses on development and behavioural economics, typically using experimental methods to examine questions about poverty and behaviour change. He is the Founder and President of Innovations for Poverty Action, a research and policy non-profit that discovers and promotes effective solutions to global poverty. He is on the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors of the M.I.T. Jameel Poverty Action Lab.

Katie Kwang, The Reach Alliance

Katie is a mixed-methods researcher with experience in multiple disciplines – including psychology, neuroscience, public policy, and international development. She finished her penultimate year at the University of Toronto in fall 2020 and has spent the last year researching mass resilience and culture-building with the Singaporean government. She will return to Toronto in the fall to complete her undergrad along with several publications on online Islamophobia in China and the psychological effects of area-level inequality. In her spare time, Katie is an avid consumer of bad reality TV and the soapiest dramas China has to offer.

Joel McGuire, Happier Lives Institute

Joel McGuire is a researcher at the Happier Lives Institute. He works on advancing meta-science, finding the most cost effective ways to increase well-being and is dedicated to finding the best ways to improve people’s lives. He received a M.A. in economics and data science from the University of Oklahoma. 

Paul Niehaus, University of California, San Diego

Paul Niehaus is Associate Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego, where he works with governments in emerging markets to improve the implementation of social programs. He is a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), a Fellow at the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development (BREAD), an Affiliate of the Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), and an Affiliate at the Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA). He is also co-founder and chairman of GiveDirectly, currently a top-rated nonprofit by GiveWell.

Laura B. Rawlings, Human Capital Project, World Bank

Laura B. Rawlings is a Lead Economist with the Human Capital Project, a global effort to accelerate more and better investments in people for greater equity and economic growth. In her career, Laura has led numerous project and research initiatives in the areas of cash transfers, public works, social funds, early childhood development, behavioural incentives and social protection systems. She was the team leader for the Africa Human Capital Project, the World Bank’s Social Protection and Labor Strategy 2012-2022, Manager of the Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund (SIEF) and Sector Leader for Human Development in Central America.

Frank Schilbach, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

Frank Schilbach is an Associate Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His research focuses on the intersection of behavioural and development economics. Frank's primary research examines factors associated with poverty, including sleep deprivation, mental ill-health, financial strain, and loneliness. He seeks to understand the role of these factors in the lives of the poor by studying their impacts on cognition, decision-making, productivity, and well-being. Frank also studies the generation and diffusion of information within and across households. He received his PhD in economics from Harvard University. 

Stacia West, University of Tennessee College of Social Work

Stacia West is an Assistant Professor at the University of Tennessee College of Social Work and the co-Founder and Director of the Center for Guaranteed Income Research at the University of Pennsylvania. She is the co-PI of the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration, the first modern city-led guaranteed income experiment in the US. Her research focuses on universal basic income, unconditional cash transfers, women’s poverty and wealth inequality, and the affordable housing crisis.

Claire Elizabeth Williams, Foundations for Social Change (FSC)

Claire Elizabeth Williams is the Co-Founder and CEO of Foundations for Social Change (FSC), a charitable organization whose mission is to advance social change through evidence-based research and innovation. She is the driving force behind the New Leaf Project, North America’s first direct-giving pilot with people experiencing homelessness, which has made an impact on the global stage. 

Inspired to be a positive force for change, Claire is dedicated to cultivating compassionate communities and advancing new models of leadership. In 2021 she was named one of the Top 25 Women of Influence™, an award that recognizes the extraordinary accomplishments of Canada’s diverse women role models.

Joseph Wong, Munk School of Global Affairs

Professor Joseph Wong is Vice-President, International, the Ralph and Roz Halbert Professor of Innovation at the Munk School of Global Affairs, and Professor of Political Science in the Faculty of Arts and Science at the University of Toronto. He is the author of many academic articles and several books. Inspired by the Sustainable Development Goals, in collaboration with the MasterCard Center for Inclusive Growth, Professor Wong developed the Reach Alliance, a model for student-led, faculty-driven, multi-disciplinary research dedicated to investigating the pathways to success for innovative development programs that are reaching the world’s most marginalized populations: http://reachalliance.org/what-is-reach. 

Jiaying Zhao, University of British Columbia

Dr. Jiaying Zhao is the Canada Research Chair and Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Zhao uses psychological principles to design behavioural solutions to address financial and environmental sustainability challenges. Dr. Zhao received her PhD in cognitive psychology from Princeton University.