Amra Sabic-El-Rayess
Associate Professor of Practice; Project Director, Center for Benefit-Cost Studies in Education (Teachers College, Columbia University)
Dr. Amra Sabic-El-Rayess is an interdisciplinary scholar who leverages fields of economics, sociology, and political science to address the questions of radicalization, social mobility, corruption, and exclusion of women. She works on concrete ways to facilitate women’s social mobility through better financial inclusion and access to financial services. Her work also examines the role of informal educational practices and formal institutions in creating new societal dynamics, norms, and behaviors. Dr. Sabic-El-Rayess’ current research examines how ultraconservative groups leverage education, both informal and formal, to instigate changes in social norms, values, and behaviors. Salafism, in particular, has developed innovative and transformative educational capacities that inject new social norms and ultraconservative beliefs into previously unreceptive societies. Even initially unreceptive populations are often transformed into supporters and eventually self-conformers to the new ideological platform and belief system. How education aids this path towards radicalization is at the core of Dr. Sabic-El-Rayess’ upcoming book on Salafism.