Rama Mani

Dr. Rama Mani is a transformative leader, peacebuilder, poet and performance artist whose life, work and art are devoted to human and global transformation. She was awarded the Peter Becker Peace Prize in 2013 in Marburg, Germany, for the combined impact of her scholarship and advocacy for peace. Dr. Rama Mani is the Founder of Theatre of Transformation Academy, whose purpose is to champion and support the creative power of humanity to shape our shared future. She is the Convenor of the Enacting Global Transformation Collaborative Initiative at the University of Oxford’s Centre for International Studies, which seeks to redefine paradigms of power, and shape creative and humane responses to current global crises. Both initiatives are grounded in the Theatre of Transformation artform and methodology, developed by Rama, based on her 25 years of expertise in peacebuilding, leadership and governance, with inputs from diverse scholars and decision makers. All Rama’s programmes create circles of solidarity between diverse people and cultures, raise funds for her peace missions, and support the Academy’s grassroots partners. Rama is the Co-Founder of Rising Women Rising World, together with Prof. Jean Houston and Dr. Scilla Elworthy, a global group of women leaders whose aim is to ‘co-create a world that works for all’. Rama is a Councilor of the World Future Council, and served on the Jury of the ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’ or the Right Livelihood Award. She was the Director of the Global Peace and Security Course for senior diplomats, military officers and international policy makers at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy. She is on the Faculty of the M.A. in Transitional Justice and teaches a course in Transformative Justice at the Geneva Academy for Human Rights and IHL, at the Graduate Institute and University of Geneva. Rama was earlier Executive Director of the International Centre for Ethnic Studies, Sri Lanka’s pre-eminent policy and research centre addressing conflict, peace and human rights. She served as Oxfam GB’s Africa Strategy Manager, addressing conflicts across the continent while based in Addis Ababa and Kampala. She was the Senior External Relations Officer to the Commission on Global Governance, responsible for integrating international, civic and academic inputs to its report, Our Global Neighbourhood (OUP 2005) and for preparing the report’s global launch at the UN’s 50th anniversary. Rama is regularly invited by the United Nations and numerous international organisations to collaborate, perform and offer Theatre of Transformation seminars. She has served on the Board of prestigious international foundations including Foundation for the Future, Academic Council of the United Nations and UNESCO-International Centre for Human Sciences. Rama authored “Beyond Retribution: Seeking Justice in the Shadows of War” (Polity/Blackwell: 2002/2007) and co-edited “Responsibility to Protect: Cultural Perspectives from the Global South” (Routledge: 2011). Rama has a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Cambridge, UK, an M.A. in International Affairs from Johns Hopkins University, USA, and a B.A. from Bryn Mawr College USA in Politics and French Literature. She is a French national and an Indian Overseas Citizen, having grown up in India.