Sarah Mendelson

Distinguished Service Professor of Public Policy and Head of Heinz College in Washington, DC

Ambassador Sarah E. Mendelson served as the US Representative to the Economic and Social Council at the United Nations until January 20, 2017.

Confirmed by the Senate in October 2015, she was the USUN lead on international development, human rights, and humanitarian affairs. There she oversaw campaigns to get country-specific resolutions passed in the General Assembly and to get NGOs, including the Committee to Protect Journalists, accredited to the UN. She led efforts to elevate the issue of combating human trafficking and was senior lead for the President's Summit on Refugees.

Prior to her appointment as Ambassador, she served as a Deputy Assistant Administrator at USAID from 2010-2014 where she was the Agency lead on democracy, human rights, and governance. A long time policy entrepreneur, she has spent over two decades working on development and human rights as a scholar and practitioner including in Moscow with the National Democratic Institute, on the faculty of the Fletcher School at Tufts University, and over a decade as senior adviser and inaugural director of the Human Rights Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. There she also worked as a senior fellow in the Russia and Eurasia Program where she over saw focus groups, public opinion surveys, and social marketing campaigns in Russia on a range of issues.

A member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of over 70 scholarly and public policy publications, Ambassador Mendelson received her BA in History from Yale University and her PhD in political science from Columbia University.

Courses Taught

90-858 - How Ideas Become Policy
90-864 - Democracy Now & Next
90-883 - Democracy/Human Rights & Sustain Dev in 21st Century

Publications

On Russia and Ukraine
- Human Rights in Russia: The Human Rights in Russia Project tracks, through survey data, the state of political and social development in Russia survey https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russia-fsu/2015-10-06/putin-outs-ngos
- Sarah Mendelson, “How to Fight Putin’s NGO Crackdown,” ForeignAffairs.com, October 6, 2015, available at: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russia-fsu/2015-10-06/putin-outs-ngos
- Sarah Mendelson, “Dark Days for Civil Society, ForeignAffairs.com, March 11, 2015, available at: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2015-03-11/dark-days-civil-society
- Sarah Mendelson “Responding to Putin’s Plan Post-Crimea,” CSIS Commentary, July 24, 2014, with John R. Harvey, https://www.csis.org/analysis/responding-putin%E2%80%99s-plan-post-crimea
- Sarah Mendelson, “Don’t Forget about the Rest of Ukraine,” CNN Commentary (Global Public Square), June 9, 2014, available at: http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2014/06/09/dont-forget-about-the-rest-of-ukraine/
- Sarah Mendelson “Casualty Sensitivity in a Post-Soviet Context: Russian Views of the Second Chechen War, 2001-2004,” with Theodore P. Gerber, Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 123, No. 1 (Spring 2008), 39-68
- Sarah Mendelson, “Anatomy of Ambivalence: The International Community and Human Rights Abuse in the North Caucasus,” Problems of Post-Communism, Vol. 53, No. 6 (November/December 2006), 3-15, available at: Anatomy of ambivalence: The international community and human rights abuse in the North Caucasus - Russian Federation | ReliefWeb; https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.2753/PPC1075-8216530601
- Sarah Mendelson, “Failing the Stalin Test: Russians and Their Dictator,” with Theodore P. Gerber, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 85, No. 1 (January/February 2006), 2-8, available at https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russia-fsu/2006-01-01/failing-stalin-test
- Sarah Mendelson, “Soviet Nostalgia: An Impediment to Russian Democratization,” with Theodore P. Gerber, The Washington Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 1, (Winter 2005-2006), 83-96, abailable at: Soviet Nostalgia: An Impediment to Russian Democratization
- Sarah Mendelson, “Russians’ Rights Imperiled: Has Anybody Noticed?” International Security, Vol. 26, No. 4 (Spring 2002), 39-69, available at: https://www.csis.org/analysis/russians-rights-imperiled-has-anybody-noticed
- Sarah Mendelson, “The Putin Path: Civil Liberties and Human Rights in Retreat,” Problems of Post-Communism, Vol. 47, No. 5 (September/October 2000), 3-12
Other Recent Publications
- How to renew American leadership on SDGs, April 2023
  https://www.brookings.edu/research/how-to-renew-american-leadership-on-the-sdgs/
- Paradigm shift: Creating more just societies with SDGs, human rights, and innovations in higher education, April 2023
  https://www.brookings.edu/research/paradigm-shift-creating-more-just-societies-with-the-sdgs-human-rights-and-innovations-in-higher-education/
- The US is leaving millions behind: American exceptionalism needs to change by 2030, April 2023
  https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/2023/04/10/the-us-is-leaving-millions-behind-american-exceptionalism-needs-to-change-by-2030/
- Congressional Testimony Sustainable Development Goals and Recovery from the COVID-19 Pandemic: Implications for U.S. Policy, September 2022
  faculty-research/profiles/profiles/sarah-mendelson/_files/sarahmendelsontestimonysepttwentytwentytwo.pdf
- Heinz in the Hague, May 2022
  https://www.heinz.cmu.edu/media/2022/July/heinz-in-the-hague
- Amb Sarah Mendelson On Russia's Invasion of Ukraine, March 2022,
  https://www.heinz.cmu.edu/media/2022/March/russia-invasion-ukraine
- The U.S. Withdrawal From Afghanistan And Digital Dinkirk - A 21st Century Public-Private Extraction, December 2021,
  https://www.heinz.cmu.edu/media/2021/December/the-us-withdrawal-from-afghanistan-and-digital-dunkirk-mendelson-reisher
- Room 16 Priorities Emerging from 2021 17 Rooms Exercise, (co-authored with Elizabeth Andersen with input from Room 16 participants), November 2021,
  https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/2021-Room-documents_Room16.pdf
- Reversing the Tide: Towards a New US Strategy to Support Democracy and Counter Authoritarianism, April 2021, https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/2021-04/Democracy_Task_Force_Report_2021_Final4_04132021.pdf
- New Thinking on Democracy at Home and Abroad, April 2021, https://www.americanambassadorslive.org/post/new-thinking-on-democracy-at-home-and-abroad
- If You Build It They Will Come, February 2021, https://www.americanpurpose.com/articles/if-you-build-it-they-will-come/
- Combating Human Trafficking and the Biden Administration, January 2021, https://www.cfr.org/blog/combating-human-trafficking-and-biden-administration
- Room 16 Priorities Emerging from 2020 17 Rooms Exercise, (co-authored with Nancy Lindborg with input from Room 16 participants), November 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/16.pdf
- Carnegie Mellon University 2020 Voluntary University Review, September 2020, https://www.cmu.edu/leadership/the-provost/provost-initiatives/cmu-vur-2020
- Inequalities, the SDGs, and the human rights movement in the US and around the world, June 12, 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/2020/06/12/inequality-the-sdgs-and-the-human-rights-movement-in-the-us-and-around-the-world
- The Virus and the Global Goals: What Could COVID-19 Mean for Sustainable Development, April 7, 2020, https://www.globaldashboard.org/2020/04/07/the-virus-and-the-global-goals-what-could-covid-19-mean-for-sustainable-development/
- The 'SDG Effect': The Emerging Pittsburgh Platform to Deliver the Global Goals Locally, January 30, 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/01/30/the-sdg-effect-the-emerging-pittsburgh-platform-to-deliver-the-global-goals-locally/?utm_campaign=Global%20Economy%20and%20Development&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=83149721
- Foundations Should Invest in Building the Field of Sustainable Development, Winter 2020, Stanford Social Innovation Review, faculty-research/profiles/profiles/sarah-mendelson/ssir_winter2020-viewpoint-mendelson-sdgs.pdf
- How to Get Beyond the Doom and Gloom: Align OGP with the Sustainable Development Goals, Open Government Partnership (OGP), June 20, 2019, https://www.opengovpartnership.org/stories/how-to-get-beyond-the-doom-and-gloom-align-ogp-with-the-sustainable-development-goals/
- US Cities Leading on the Sustainable Development Goals, Brookings, December 19, 2018, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2018/12/19/us-cities-leading-on-the-sustainable-development-goals/
- Young People, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the Liberal World Order: What is to be Done? NYU’s Center on International Cooperation (NYU/CIC), October 9, 2018, https://cic.nyu.edu/blog/young-people-sustainable-development-goals-and-liberal-world-order-what-be-done , Medium.com, https://medium.com/cic-international-insights/young-people-the-sustainable-development-goals-and-the-liberal-world-order-what-is-to-be-done-fc648e3b2d21
- Weaponizing Social Media: Heinz Experts on Troll Farms and Fake News, Heinz College News, October 2018 ( https://www.heinz.cmu.edu/media/2018/October/troll-farms-and-fake-news-social-media-weaponization)
- The Putin Problem: Ambassador Mendelson Talks Policy, Propaganda, and Russian Politics, Heinz College News, October 2018 ( https://www.heinz.cmu.edu/media/2018/October/the-putin-problem)
- We Need An Updated Approach to Combat Human Trafficking, The Hill, June 2018 (http://thehill.com/opinion/civil-rights/394774-we-need-an-updated-approach-to-human-trafficking)
- A Research and Writing Grant As An Inflection Point In A Career, MacArthur Foundation, June 2018 (https://www.macfound.org/press/40-years-40-stories/research-and-writing-grant-inflection-point-career/)

Sarah Mendelson

Distinguished Service Professor of Public Policy and Head of Heinz College in Washington, DC

Courses Taught

CMU's Sustainability Initiative

Publications

Additional Information