Dalia Mogahed

Dalia Mogahed is Director of and Senior Analyst for the Abu Dhabi Gallup Center. She is also Executive Director of and Senior Analyst for the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies. Mogahed leads the analysis of surveys of Muslims worldwide, including in the U.S. and Europe. With John L. Esposito, she coauthored the groundbreaking book Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think.

In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Mogahed to the President's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, making her the first Muslim-American woman to hold a position of this seniority. In this role, Mogahed joined other American leaders in offering recommendations to the U.S. president on how faith-based organizations can best work with the government to solve society's toughest challenges. Mogahed was invited to testify before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations about U.S. engagement with Muslim communities, and she provided significant contributions to the Homeland Security Advisory Council's Countering Violent Extremism Working Group recommendations. She also joined Madeleine Albright and Dennis Ross as a leading voice in the U.S.-Muslim Engagement Project. This group of American leaders, which included senior government, military, and business decision makers, produced a consensus report with key policy recommendations for improving America's relationship with Muslims globally - many of which were later adopted by the Obama Administration.

Mogahed is a member of the World Economic Forum's Global Agenda Council on the Arab World, serves on the boards of Freedom House and Soliya, and is a nonresident senior public policy scholar at Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut. In 2010, Arabian Business magazine recognized her as one of the most influential Arab women in the world, and The Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre included Mogahed in its 2009 and 2010 lists of the 500 most influential Muslims. Ashoka named Mogahed the Arab World's Social Innovator of the Year in 2010, and the University of Wisconsin Alumni Association recognized her with its prestigious Forward Under 40 award for outstanding contributions by a graduate of the University of Wisconsin.

In her role as a Gallup scientist, Mogahed is a frequent expert commentator in global media outlets and international forums. She also serves as a Global Expert for the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations. Her analyses have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Foreign Policy magazine, the Harvard International Review, and many other academic and popular journals. Her audiences have included heads of state, parliamentarians from around the world, and religious leaders from every faith.

Mogahed earned her master's degree in business administration with an emphasis in strategy from the Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business at the University of Pittsburgh. She received her undergraduate degree in chemical engineering with a minor in Arabic from the University of Wisconsin. Upon graduation, Mogahed joined Procter & Gamble as a marketing products researcher and later started a cross-cultural consulting organization before joining Gallup.