Ariana Harner, S-CAR MS Student

Ariana Harner is a second-year Masters student at S-CAR who is very much into outdoor activities such as hiking and camping as well as equally passionate about preventing complex political and social disputes that lead to intractable conflict. “Being able to escape into nature helps me to recharge and resume my professional work with renewed hope and optimism." Before she became a student at S-CAR, Ariana worked with the Genocide Prevention Program (GPP), an affiliate of S-CAR, where she contributed to a project that supported an emerging regional genocide prevention system in the Great Lakes Region of Africa. As she indicated, “I was very impressed with the knowledgeable team members I worked with on the project. It was a great feeling to collaborate with people who share my enthusiasm and devotion to genocide prevention, and I immediately wanted to be a part of that community.” Ariana’s work at S-CAR has been focused on prevention, specifically researching mechanisms, such as systems of early warning and proper responses, which confront emerging conflicts early enough to prevent outbreaks of violence. She spent the past two semesters working with an APT team on genocide prevention and integration, with a specific focus on Kenya and the Great Lakes Region of Africa. Ariana and the team monitored and reported on the 2013 Kenyan elections during the spring semester and then developed a guidebook on preventing electoral violence during the summer. Also with the support of APT colleagues, she coauthored two policy briefs, one on the U.S. Atrocities Prevention Board and one on the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR). The briefs outlined ways in which the two national and regional bodies can cooperate, collaborate, and strengthen systems of atrocities prevention globally. Ariana will start an internship in the fall of 2013 at the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations at the U.S. State Department where she will work in the policy office. She explains, “Working with the State Department will be an incredible opportunity for me to gain a deeper understanding of the field of conflict analysis and resolution. S-CAR has been preparing me to face such challenges with confidence."