Reimagining Development: Reflections and Ways Forward

Savita Bailur

SIPA

Dr. Savita Bailur is a socio-technical research and evaluation leader specializing in gender, AI and digital development. She is a Core Collaborator at the MERL Tech Initiative, where she serves as the Gender and AI Research Lead, and she is a Senior Associate at Caribou, leading the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Collective.  She also serves as an Actor Behavior Policy Expert Board Member at Meta, where she advises on policy frameworks related to platform governance, account moderation, and the Actor Behaviour Framework. She is also an Adjunct Professor at Columbia SIPA, teaching User Experience (UX) & Digital Development.

With previous roles at the World Bank Group, Microsoft Research India, and the World Wide Web Foundation, Dr. Bailur brings over two decades of experience at the intersection of technology, policy, and international development.  She has also taught at the London School of Economics and the University of Manchester. She has a PhD and MSc in information systems from LSE, and other degrees from the University of Cambridge and Kings College London.

Paige Granger

Managing Director

Grants Management at The Rockefeller Foundation

Paige Granger is the Managing Director of Grants Management at The Rockefeller Foundation, where she oversees $100–300 million in annual grantmaking and leads strategic improvements across the foundation’s grants lifecycle. She has played a central role in strengthening operational infrastructure, redesigning grant approval processes, and implementing scalable systems aligned with institutional strategy, compliance, and impact goals.

With over 15 years of experience in philanthropy and international development, Paige previously held senior roles at Open Society Foundations, where she managed multimillion-dollar global grant portfolios and advanced cross-functional operational excellence. Earlier in her career, she worked with organizations including Food Bank For New York City, CARE International, FXB International, and Americares, gaining experience in research, monitoring and evaluation, program management, and nonprofit leadership.

Paige holds a Master of International Affairs from Columbia SIPA, and is passionate about building transparent, data-driven grantmaking systems that maximize institutional effectiveness and social impact.

Benjamin Kumpf

SIPA

https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminkumpf/

Benjamin Kumpf is the Head of the Innovation and Digital Transformation Facility of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), where he leads efforts to advance innovation and digital transformation across the organization. In this role, he works at the intersection of public policy, innovation systems, and digital governance, helping governments design and scale transformative solutions. 

Previously, he was Head of Innovation at the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and led the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Innovation Facility, where he helped embed innovation approaches across the agency globally. He also serves as an adjunct faculty member at Columbia SIPA, where he teaches courses on innovation in development, and he has held teaching roles at IE University and Sciences Po. 

With extensive experience spanning the OECD, FCDO, UNDP, and other international development organizations across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, Benjamin brings deep expertise in innovation policy, knowledge management, and digital transformation in the public sector.  He holds graduate degrees in political science and psychology from the University of Heidelberg.

Elizabeth Mendenhall

Strategic Advisor

The Solarium Group LLC

Elizabeth Mendenhall is a Strategic Advisor at The Solarium Group LLC and an executive and leadership coach, bringing over 20 years of experience at the intersection of international development, foreign policy, and national security. In her advisory and coaching work, she supports senior leaders in navigating complex decisions, driving organizational change, and building high-performing teams.

Elizabeth previously served for 16 years at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), most recently as Director of the Office of Policy Implementation and Analytics. In that role, she oversaw enterprise-level policy formulation, strategic planning, and data integration efforts across the Agency. She also held senior leadership positions in Indonesia, Colombia, Afghanistan, the Dominican Republic, and Washington, DC, managing large teams and overseeing billion-dollar portfolios.

Earlier in her career, she worked with The Brookings Institution, CARE International, Club of Madrid, and served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ukraine. Elizabeth holds a Master of Strategic Studies from the U.S. Army War College and a Master of International Affairs from Columbia SIPA.

Camilla Nestor

MCE Social Capital

Camilla Nestor is the Chief Executive Officer of MCE Social Capital, where she leads efforts to unlock impact investing capital in support of global financial inclusion and economic opportunity. With over two decades of experience in international development and emerging markets, she has built and scaled high-performing organizations dedicated to advancing social change.

Prior to MCE, Camilla served as CEO of MIX and held senior leadership roles at Grameen Foundation, where she oversaw global financial inclusion programs and impact investing initiatives. She has also worked at Citigroup and Catholic Relief Services, structuring financing solutions and supporting microfinance institutions across Asia, Eastern Europe, and emerging markets.

In addition to her executive leadership, Camilla is an Adjunct Professor at Columbia SIPA, where she teaches courses on financial inclusion.  She has an MIA from Columbia SIPA and an MBA from Columbia Business School.

Cesar Zucco

Cesar Zucco is the Lemann Family Foundation Professor of Brazilian Studies and Professor of International and Public Affairs. He previously served for twelve years as Professor of Politics and Public Policy at FGV/EBAPE in Rio de Janeiro and as Assistant Professor at Rutgers University, and has held visiting or temporary appointments at Nuffield College, Princeton University, Yale University, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and IUPERJ (now IESP-UERJ). His research focuses on Latin American politics, with particular emphasis on voting behavior, the measurement and meaning of ideology, and the political economy of public policy in Brazil and in comparative perspective. His work combines observational and experimental methods and has been published in leading political science journals, including American Journal of Political Science, The Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, and Comparative Political Studies, as well as in leading area studies journals.

Zucco is the author of two books published by Cambridge University Press. The Volatility Curse (2020), coauthored with Daniela Campello, examines how economic volatility-particularly in commodity-and capital-flow-dependent economies-leads voters to misattribute responsibility for economic outcomes, thereby undermining democratic accountability. His first book, Partisans, Antipartisans, and Nonpartisans (2018, with David Samuels), analyzes the development and political consequences of partisanship and antipartisanship in Brazil. In addition to ongoing extensions of this work and new research on culture and politics, Zucco co-coordinates, with Timothy Power, the Brazilian Legislative Surveys, a three-decade initiative tracking the attitudes and behavior of Brazilian legislators.