Rani D. Mullen is Associate Professor of Government at the College of William and Mary.  She has a M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School and a M.A. from The Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.  Her research and teaching focus is on democratization and development in South Asia, and democracy and state building in India and Afghanistan in particular.  Rani Mullen worked for the Poverty and Social Policy Department of the World Bank for several years, was a consultant for U.S. Agency for International Development, and a legislative assistant to a member of the German parliament.  Her articles have focused on the linkages between democracy, growth and poverty, the relationship between local governance and social wellbeing, and center-periphery relations in South Asian countries. Professor Mullen was on leave during 2013-14 on a Fulbright-Nehru Senior Fellowship with affiliation at India's only Afghanistan Studies Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia (university). She was on leave 2010-2014 as a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi, India.  She has received multiple grants from The Asia Foundation to research and direct a program on Indian development cooperation and economic diplomacy to other countries.