Zvisinei C. Sandi is a graduate of the University of Zimbabwe and the New School of Social Research's Democracy and Diversity Summer Institute. Zvisinei was a journalist in Zimbabwe, where she was assaulted and persecuted for her views. She has successfully won the lawsuit against the state machinery for unfair labor practices and human rights violations. She also taught Social and Political Philosophy at the Zimbabwe Open University as well as Masvingo State University. She was the Secretary General of the human rights watchdog, the Society for Gender Justice. She was elected into the executive council of the lecturers union where she led a strike that virtually paralyzed the State owned University system between February and June of 2007. Because of her pro-democracy activities, she was captured and tortured by the notorious War Veterans militia. Zvisinei is currently a visiting scholar at CDDRL, after initially coming to Stanford as one of our Summer Fellows 2007.

Weitseng Chen, a Fulbright scholar, will receive his JSD from Yale Law School in October 2007. His recent research focuses on China's foreign direct investment and property rights transition, the economic behaviors of ethnic foreign investors in China, and a China-Taiwan comparison on their rule of law transition. Prior to his Yale education, Chen practiced law in Taiwan in diverse fields such as Internet and information technology industry, the private sector and public interest affairs, governmental reforms, and international NGO affairs.

Weitseng Chen's recent publications include "East Asian Model and Rule of Law (with Randall Peerenboom, a to be published book chapter)", "WTO: Time's Up for Chinese Banks - China's Banking Reform and Non-Performing Loans Disposal" (Chicago Journal of International Law), "State, Market, and the Law: Law and Development in Taiwan" (Chinese) (Journal of the Humanities & Social Science), and a book titled "Law and Economic Miracle: Interaction between Taiwan's Economic Development and Economic & Trade Laws after WWII." (Chinese).

Nozima Kamalova, a human rights defender and lawyer, is the director of the Public Defense Office of the Tashkent Board of Lawyers and the founding chair of the Legal Aid Society of Uzbekistan, a nongovernmental organization that works with international human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, to safeguard and promote the rule of law. Kamalova has been instrumental in the revision of several Uzbek laws related to torture and human rights, and her lobbying activities have influenced much policy and legislation adopted both internationally and in Uzbekistan. She has served as a chief consultant to agencies of the United Nations, and in since 2002, she submitted a number of alternative reports to the United Nation's Committees on human rights violations and concerning the use of torture in her country.

In 2005, Kamalova was awarded the Chevening Fellowship by the United Kingdom's Foreign and Commonwealth Office. In 2003, she completed an advanced course on human rights in Poland at the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, and in 1999, she was an International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) Fellow. She holds a diploma with highest honors in law from Tashkent State University.

During her fellowship at CDDRL (2007-09), Kamalova continued her research on how Western antiterrorism policies limit civil liberties and freedoms in less-developed, transitional countries. She studied the impact of the war against terrorism on authoritarian countries, with Uzbekistan as an example, and will develop recommendations for legislation and practice.

Luz Marina Arias was a graduate student in the Department of Economics at Stanford University before coming to CDDRL. She was born and raised in Mexico City and completed her undergraduate studies in Economics in Mexico, at ITAM. Her research interests lie at the intersection of economics, political science, and history. She is interested in the impact on economic and political development of institutions that organize and coordinate economic and political behavior. Her current project focuses on one such central institution, the state, and studies the factors that lead to the emergence of the state as an entity centralizing coercive power. She studies Latin American history and in particular the experience of colonial Mexico in the transition to such a form of state.

Greg Domber received his A.B in History and Philosophy from Lafayette College in 1997 and recently completed his Ph.D. in History at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. His dissertation, "Supporting the Revolution: America, Democracy, and the End of the Cold War in Poland, 1981-1989,"utilized a multi-archival, international history research approach combined with numerous oral history interviews to take a sober accounting of American and Western influences on Poland's democratic transformation from the declaration of martial law in December 1981 through the creation of the Mazowiecki government in August 1989.

At CDDRL, Greg continued his research on international influences on Poland's transformation during the 1980s, focusing further work on the role played by non-governmental actors, particularly labor unions, émigré groups, humanitarian organizations, and American business interests.

Feng Luo is a visiting pre-doctoral fellow from Peking University, pursuing his study in the United States on a scholarship awarded by the China Scholarship Council of the Ministry of Education. Feng entered the doctoral program at Peking University in the Fall of 2006. His dissertation will focus on US democracy promotion policy. Before this, Luo Feng conducted research as Research Assistant at Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, and he took participation in several research programs and issued some papers in the field of international relations. Luo Feng earned his BA degree at Henan University and his MA degree at Peking University.

Olena Nikolayenko is a recepient of the 2007-2009 post-doctoral fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Her research interests include comparative democratization, public opinion, social movements, youth, and corruption. In her dissertation, she analyzed political support among the first post-Soviet generation grown up without any direct experience with communism in Russia and Ukraine. She has a PhD from the University of Toronto, Canada.

At CDDRL, she examined why some youth movements are more successful than others in applying methods of nonviolent resistance to mobilize the population in non-democratic regimes. She has recently conducted fieldwork in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Serbia, and Ukraine.

Selected Publications

• 2008. "Contextual Effects on Historical Memory: Soviet Nostalgia among Post-Soviet Adolescents." Communist and Post-Communist Studies 41(2): 243-259
• 2008. "Life-Cycle, Generational and Period Effects on Protest Potential in Yeltsin's Russia." Canadian Journal of Political Science 41(2): 437-460
• 2007. "The Revolt of the Post-Soviet Generation: Youth Movements in Serbia, Georgia, and Ukraine." Comparative Politics 39(2): 169-188
•  2007. "Web Cartoons in a Closed Society: Animal Farm as an Allegory of Belarus." PS: Political Science and Politics 40(2): 307-310
• 2004. "Press Freedom during the 1994 and 1999 Presidential Elections in Ukraine: A Reverse Wave?" Europe-Asia Studies 56(5): 661-686