Bama Athreya

Bama Athreya, PhD (she/her) is the Director of Global Advocacy and based in ICRW’s US office. She brings a wealth of experience from government, philanthropy, and NGOs across a range of issue areas that are critical to ICRW’s mission.

Prior to joining ICRW, Bama served as Deputy Assistant Administrator in USAID’s Bureau for Inclusive Growth, Partnerships and Innovation where she managed global portfolios related to gender equality, child protection, youth in development and ensuring development benefits reach marginalized and underrepresented populations.

She has been a senior leader in the public and nonprofit sectors and has led interagency and multilateral engagement and represented the US government in delegations to the UN General Assembly, Commission on the Status of Women, G20 and COP28. Under her leadership USAID advanced important new work to strengthen care infrastructure globally and to promote gender-equitable digital development, including work to mitigate technology-facilitated gender-based violence.

She previously held an Economic Inequality Fellowship with Open Society Foundations focused on the digital economy, and served as a senior advisor for gender, equity and inclusion to Laudes Foundation. Past positions include a previous stint at USAID Senior Specialist for Labor, where she worked on new policy guidance and developed global programming to advance labor rights and women’s economic empowerment, and serving for several years as the Executive Director of the International Labor Rights Forum. She has developed and led multi-stakeholder initiatives with global corporations and has served as a spokesperson with Congress and media outlets. She holds a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from the University of Michigan.