Professor Karl Blanchet has been appointed as CERAH’s new director, effective 1 December 2019.
Professor Blanchet has been working in health systems research at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine since 2010 and was appointed as co-director of the Health in Humanitarian Crises Centre in 2016. He has a management and public health background and brings his extensive experience in humanitarian contexts as a relief worker and a researcher to CERAH.
In his new role, Professor Blanchet will provide vision and guidance to strengthen CERAH’s role as a global centre for academic excellence rooted in humanitarian practice, providing high quality education and training, and serving as a global policy hub for the humanitarian sector thanks to a reinvigorated, applied research portfolio based on relief agencies’ priorities.
I look forward to taking CERAH into the next chapter of its life.
In the coming months, CERAH will further invest in its educational offer to make sure that top quality courses, adapted to the changing needs of the humanitarian community, are delivered both in Geneva and in conflict-affected countries.
“It is already a highly respected institution, but we will take this to new levels, ensuring our courses and research projects are dynamic and relevant to our students and partners", said Professor Blanchet. "Never has it been more important to strengthen and improve humanitarian action, in a world where it is often threatened”.
Professor Blanchet’s research focuses on resilience issues in global health, specifically in post-conflict and conflict-affected countries. He has developed innovative research approaches based on complexity science and system thinking, and his current focus is on developing and testing people-centred methodological approaches for refugee populations in the Middle East.
Professor Blanchet succeeds Professor Doris Schopper, who has led CERAH for the past 11 years. Under Professor Schopper’s leadership, CERAH grew and established itself as a unique academic and research platform. It unites academia and humanitarian organisations to offer postgraduate courses for the humanitarian sector, to develop research and to strengthen reflection in humanitarian action.
Professor Antoine Flahault, Director of the Institute of Global Health of the University of Geneva, will be the Interim Director of CERAH from 1 October to 30 November 2019.