Sara Hellmüller

Welcome!

I am a Research Professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute specialized in Peace Studies.

I am currently leading a five-year research project entitled “Yes I Do: Belligerent Consent to UN Peace Missions”, which is funded through an SNSF Starting grant.

Together with my team, we established a comprehensive dataset on UN Peace Missions. We have also developed the UN Peace Missions App (download here for Apple and here for Google).

I am also the co-investigator of a project that academically documents Switzerland’s first membership on the UN Security Council from 2023 to 2024 (funded by the Fondation pour l’Université de Lausanne).

My research focuses on UN peace and security engagements, mediation, peacekeeping, local and international peacebuilding (especially in Syria and DR Congo), knowledge production on peace, and Switzerland’s peace policy.

I have over fifteen years of experience conducting research in conflict-affected contexts and I have spent more than a year in eastern DR Congo.

Prior to my current role, I was a Senior Researcher at the Center for Security Studies (CSS) at ETH Zürich, Senior Researcher at swisspeace, and Lecturer at the University of Basel. I have also held visiting positions at the University of Oxford, University of Montreal, Columbia University in New York, and the University of Bunia in DR Congo.

I am deeply committed to transformative science by combining in-depth empirical research with the application of my expertise in practice. I have completed mandates for international, regional, and non-governmental organizations as well as the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs in support of peace processes in Darfur, DR Congo, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, and Libya.