Ryan McCannell

Ryan McCannell is the director of the Office of Conflict Management and Mitigation at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). As part of the world’s premier bilateral development agency, CMM advances U.S. national security by improving the capacity of countries to prevent and mitigate sources of fragility, instability and conflict.

From 2016-2018, Mr. McCannell served as the USAID faculty instructor at the U.S. Army War College and senior advisor to the Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute (PKSOI) team at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania. Previously, he served as a democracy specialist, senior advisor, and division chief for Conflict, Peacebuilding and Governance in the USAID Bureau for Africa. Before joining USAID in 2004, Mr. McCannell spent eight years supporting African political development programs at the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) in Washington D.C. In 2002-03, he served as NDI’s chief of party in Benin and Togo, where he organized training for political parties prior to elections in those two countries.

Mr. McCannell has been a member of the Civil Affairs Association Board of Directors since 2018. He received a bachelor’s degree and certificate in African Studies from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service; a master’s in Geographic and Cartographic Sciences from George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia; and a master’s in Strategic Studies, with distinction, from the U.S. Army War College.