Johanna Mendelson Forman

Johanna Mendelson Forman is a Scholar in Residence at American University’s School of International Service where she teaches Conflict Cuisine: An Introduction to War and Peace around the Dinner Table.

An expert on the post-conflict transition and democratization issues, she has regional expertise in the Americas, with a special focus on the Caribbean, Central America and Brazil. She also has had extensive field experience in the U.S. government on transition initiatives in Haiti, Iraq, and Sub-Saharan Africa. Her deep experience as a policy maker on conflict and stabilization efforts from Haiti to Rwanda led her to this effort to connect food with conflict.

Mendelson Forman is also a Senior Advisor with the Managing Across Boundaries Program at the Stimson Center, where she works on security and development issues, and a Senior Associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Program on Crisis, Conflict, and Cooperation.

Mendelson Forman has written extensively on security-sector reform in conflict states, economic development in postwar societies, gender and conflict, and the role of the United Nations in peace operations. She has also held senior positions in the U.S. government, including helping create the Office of Transition Initiatives and serving as a Senior Adviser for Humanitarian Response, both at the U.S. Agency for International Development. She served as a Senior Advisor to the UN Mission in Haiti.

She holds a J.D. from Washington College of Law at American University, a Ph.D. in Latin American history from Washington University, St. Louis, and a Master’s of International Affairs, with a certificate of Latin America studies from Columbia University in New York.