Abebe Gellaw, the Peter and Frances Duignan Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution, was named a Young Global Leader for 2010 by the World Economic Forum. The honor, bestowed each year by the Forum, recognizes and acknowledges up to 200 outstanding young leaders from around the world for their professional accomplishments, commitment to society, and potential to contribute to shaping the future of the world.
Gellaw holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and international relations from the Addis Ababa University and a postgraduate diploma in law from London Metropolitan University. Gellaw began his career in journalism in 1993 as a freelance writer focusing on human rights and political issues. He worked for various print and online publications, including the Ethiopian Herald, the only English daily in the country. Abebe is also a founding editor of Addisvoice.com, a bilingual online journal focusing on Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa.
His recent articles have appeared in the Far East Economic Review and Global Integrity’s The Corruption Notebooks 2008, a collection of essays on corruption and abuse of power written by leading journalists around the word. Gellaw is working on a book project titled Ethiopia under Meles: Why the Transition from Military rule to Democracy Failed.
The Peter and Frances Duignan Distinguished Fellowship Gellaw holds is named for Hoover senior fellow emeritus Peter J. Duignan and his wife, Frances, and is available to visiting scholars who have distinguished themselves through their research and writing about Africa, the Middle East, and Western Europe, all areas in which Duignan focused during his career at the Hoover Institution.
In addition to his fellowship at Hoover, Gellaw is a visiting scholar at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Originally from Ethiopia, Gellaw came to Stanford as the 2008–9 John S. Knight Fellow for Professional Journalists.
