Sally Sharif, PhD
Welcome! I am Simons Foundation Canada Postdoctoral Fellow at the School for International Studies at Simon Fraser University and part-time Lecturer in Political Science at the University of British Columbia.
Previously, I was a Post-Doctoral Research Associate at the University of Notre Dame. I have a PhD in political science from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (2021).
I am a conflict scholar. My research focuses on state-society relations during and after war. In my published work, I have explained civil war onset and duration, as well as post-conflict consolidation of state power. I lived most of my life under an authoritarian regime and, in my recent work, have explained the complex ways through which repression incites or subdues political violence.
My doctoral dissertation and book project analyzes Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) programs on the macro-, meso-, and micro-levels. Through analysis of three original datasets, I show how DDR is embedded in rebel cohesion and post-conflict political bargaining, and how these two processes shape prospects of post-conflict peace. The dissertation involved extensive field research with ex-combatants of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and employed mixed methods, including natural experiments, simultaneous equations modeling, machine learning, and within- and cross-case process tracing.
My work has appeared in International Peacekeeping; Political Violence and Terrorism; Territory, Politics, Governance; Defence and Peace Economics; Studies in Conflict and Terrorism; Human Rights Quarterly; and the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) Project for Return. My policy analysis has been published by The Washington Post, the Peace Accords Matrix Policy Brief Series, and Political Violence at a Glance. See my Google Scholar page here.
I speak seven languages and have done field research in Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East. Outside academia, I am a triathlete and am deeply concerned by environmental degradation, which is apparent first and foremost in our mountains and lakes.
