Dr Erin Saltman is currently the Director of Programming for the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT). She was formerly Facebook’s Head of Counterterrorism and Dangerous Organizations Policy for Europe, the Middle East and Africa; working with multi-sector stakeholders and building out CVE programs for Facebook in partnership with international NGOs.
She has worked in academic, NGO and private sector roles developing innovative research and programmatic approaches for counter-extremism and counterterrorism efforts – and had the honour of discussing her work for a TED X Talk.
In her NGO work she has produced a range of action-oriented research and developed programs on preventing and countering violent extremism (PVE and CVE)
; promoting youth activism in challenging hate speech and extremism, as well as analysing gender dynamics in processes of radicalisation. Publications include:
- The mainstreaming of far-right extremism online and how to counter it: a case study on UK, US and French elections (Chapter 1 in Trumping the Mainstream: The Conquest of Politics by the Populist Radical Right)
- Youth Innovation Labs: A Model for Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism
- Guidance for International Youth Engagement in PVE and CVE: Youth Responses to Resolution 2250 and the UN Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism
- ‘Till Martyrdom Do Us Part’: Gender and the ISIS Phenomenon.
- Islamic State: The Changing Face of Modern Jihadism
- Jihad Trending: A Comprehensive Analysis of Online Extremism and How to Counter it
Dr Saltman completed her PhD in Political Science at SSEES at University College London (UCL), where her thesis focused on contemporary processes of post-communist political socialization and radicalization, looking at youth activism in Hungary. Dr Saltman completed an International Masters in Economy, State and Society with a dual degree from UCL and Corvinus University as an Erasmus Mundus Scholar. She holds a BA in International Relations from Columbia University with a concentration in Francophone studies (directed research at Sciences Po).
She continues to participate in international conferences and events, speaking and presenting research to both government, practitioner and civil society audiences around the world.
