Zainab Usman is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Africa Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C. Her fields of expertise include institutions, economic policy, energy policy and emerging economies in Africa. Previously she was Public Sector Specialist at the World Bank, where she worked on the governance and institutions of natural resources management, energy sector reforms, service delivery as well as south–south economic relations. Zainab has worked on policy reforms and social sustainability in Cote d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea, the Republic of Congo, Serbia, Tanzania and Uzbekistan. Zainab is co-author of the book, ‘The Future of Work in Africa: Harnessing the Potential of Digital Technologies for All’. She also contributed to World Bank’s flagship report on Rethinking Power Sector Reforms in Developing Countries. Her forthcoming book, ‘Economic Diversification in Nigeria: the Politics of Building a Post-Oil Economy’, is set to be published by Zed/Bloomsbury Press in November 2021. Her written and broadcast commentary has appeared in Al-Jazeera English, African Arguments, CNN and The Washington Post, among others. She currently sits on the advisory board of the Energy for Growth Hub in Washington, D.C., and on the editorial board of Premium Times in Nigeria.