Dr. Rouba Mhaissen is a Syrian-Lebanese economist, community mobilizer, and development practitioner who works on development issues in the MENA region, particularly om forced migration and the Syrian refugee crisis. 

She is the Founder and Director of Sawa for Development and Aid (founded in 2011), a civil society organization that supports Syrian refugees in Lebanon, and Sawa Foundation UK (founded in 2016) that supports forced migrants in Europe and the Middle East. 

She received her BA in Economics from the American University of Beirut, her MSc in Development from the London School of Economics, and an MPhil/PhD in Gender and Economic Development from the School of Oriental and African Studies. 

She also holds two degrees in Exponential technologies from Singularity University (Silicon Valley). She has taught at SOAS University of London and the American University of Beirut. 

She is the recipient of numerous awards of which the Queen Elizabeth Award (2011), the FCO Marsh Award for Peacemaking and Peacekeeping (2016), The AUB Most Distinguished Alumni Award (2017), and the Forbes 30Under30 list for Policy and Law (2017), the Rafto Prize (2019) and the DVF award for Human Rights (2021). Most recently, she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize (2022) for her work in Syria.