Passent Moussa

Passent Moussa, PhD, is a human rights researcher and international development professional based in Germany, with over 15 years of experience in human rights programming, governance, gender equality, and civil society strengthening across the Middle East and North Africa. She has worked with international organisations and development partners, including the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the Goethe-Institut, as well as regional human rights organisations.

Her work combines programme management, policy research, and monitoring, evaluation and learning, with a focus on understanding and advancing social and political change in complex and politically sensitive contexts. Her research explores authoritarianism, the sociology of human rights, subject formation, and the politics of the Middle East, with particular attention to Egypt. She holds a PhD in Sociology and an MA in the Theory and Practice of Human Rights from the University of Essex. Her doctoral research examined authoritarianism and subject formation in post-independence Egypt through a dialogue between Egyptian literature and Western social theory.

Moussa was named runner-up for the 2024 Leigh Douglas Memorial Prize, awarded by the British Society for Middle Eastern Studies for outstanding doctoral research on the Middle East in the social sciences or humanities. Her publications address human rights, gender reform, political power, and the future of human rights in the Middle East. Alongside her research, she advises and supports civil society initiatives that use storytelling to strengthen grassroots engagement, amplify marginalised women’s voices, advance gender justice, and foster new forms of political participation.