Alia Dharssi

Class of 2014

FGJ 2014, Covering Poverty and Development

M.Phil. (Development Studies)

Alia is a development studies scholar who came to the fellowship from graduate school at the University of Oxford, where she’d researched a social movement for housing rights in Mumbai’s slums. As a global correspondent, she wanted to place development issues on the public agenda. Alia spent eight months covering economic development and human rights issues for our media partners and, with Ashley Renders, spearheaded a major investigation for Reuters-affiliate Trust.org into the way big oil companies manage royalty payments around the world. Alia is now a William J. Clinton Fellow at the America-India Foundation.

“The fellowship honed my ability to find great story ideas, sharpened my investigative skills and significantly improved my writing. The best part of the program was the opportunity to be mentored by talented journalism veterans. Discussing my work with my mentors over the course of eight months helped me to build solid reporting skills and transformed how I analyze important issues in my beat. I’ve learned to look at my academic expertise with the mindset of a journalist.“

Clippings

  • 2014
  • The New York Times

Teaching Children Regardless of Grade

  • 2014
  • Calgary Herald

How the temporary foreign worker program is shaping Canada’s underground economy

  • 2014
  • Calgary Herald

Canada faces big questions about the future of immigration

  • 2015
  • The Guardian

How football moved the goalposts for girls in rural India

  • Corporate Knights

Fatal explosions, toxic spills and other commercial catastrophes in 2014

  • Global Urbanist

The City Effect: rapid urbanisation raises questions about how much urban government is enough

  • 2014
  • Global Urbanist

Cities are places where the powerless can shape history: the Right to the City in the 21st century

  • 2014
  • Global Urbanist

Good managers and dedicated streets: what Indian cities can learn from Bogota

  • 2014
  • Global Urbanist

LSE Urban Age: Spatial planning one of few clear solutions for climate change

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council

Harnessing People Power

  • 2014
  • Vice 
  • Vice Magazine

Canada’s Foreign Aid Strategy Should Prioritize Condoms

  • 2014
  • Vice 
  • Vice Magazine

Canada Is Far from Breaking the Glass Ceiling Over Women in the Workplace

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council
  • OpenCanada

Using the Internet to Save Lives in Iran

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council
  • OpenCanada

How the World Bank Got Over the Curse of Knowledge

  • 2014
  • Vice 
  • Vice Magazine

I Was Sniffed for Explosives by Guard Dogs at Prime Minister Harper’s Maternal and Child Health Summit

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council
  • OpenCanada

Canada’s Selective Approach to Development

  • 2014
  • OpenCanada

Pushing for Change in the Garment Industry

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

US oil firm prosecutions show need for transparency – activists

  • 2014
  • Vice 

Canadians Are Doing Very Cool Shit to Save the Lives of Moms and Babies Around the World

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Sugar’s sticky trail: Coke and Pepsi work to clean up their supply chains

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Big oil firms accused of cheating on royalties lead fight to limit US disclosure rules

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Some NGOs in Nepal do more harm than good say experts

  • 2014
  • National Post
  • PostMedia

New seeds of conflict: 20 years post-genocide, there are fears than Rwandan schools ferment hate

  • 2014
  • Vice 

Meet the Investigators Who Risk Their Lives to Take Incriminating Documents Out of Syria

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council
  • OpenCanada

The Solutions to Climate Change are Solutions for the 99 Percent

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

It takes a village to protect women’s land

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

It takes a few good women to fight for a secure home in Brazil’s slums

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Can you save animals without sacrificing people?

  • 2014
  • National Post
  • PostMedia

Saskatchewan band becomes first of First Nations to take full control of natural resource royalties

  • 2014
  • National Post

PDAC 2014: Miners keen to buy local in bid to dampen hostility to new projects

  • 2014
  • National Post

PDAC 2014: Anti-corruption laws in focus for miners

  • 2014
  • National Post

PDAC 2014: Kinross confident it can operate through turmoil in Russia

  • 2014
  • National Post

Third World Lessons in healthcare: How ‘reverse innovation’ could revolutionize Canada’s medical landscape

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Fate of U.S. agency rule on extractives hangs in the balance as two SEC regulators tilt toward industry

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Charity’s cellphones help remote villagers monitor their rulers

  • 2014
  • OpenCanada

Where Human Rights Law Meets Globalization

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Credit Suisse ignored own human rights commitments -watchdog

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Journalist to use stories from sex trafficking survivors to educate children

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Q+A – Afghanistan lacks political will to improve women’s rights, says country’s human rights chief

  • 2014
  • National Post

‘Stunt headed nowhere’: Activists decry plan to use drones to secretly film forced labour in India

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

City dwellers seek to transform debate on urban poverty

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Negotiation, not confrontation, is way to bring change to Arab region – expert

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Society must pressure govts to stop human trafficking-expert

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Maternal health must focus more on girls-Christy Turlington

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Activists protest mining industry’s harmful impact on women

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council
  • OpenCanada

CSR Norms: From Principle to Practice

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Canada learns from Bangladesh about ways to tackle poverty

  • 2014
  • Thomson Reuters Foundation

Canada has trouble counting its poor, highlighting a global problem with data

  • 2014
  • Canadian International Council
  • OpenCanada

Sustaining Development