Mr. Rabih Shibli
Director, Center for Civic Engagement and Community Service (CCECS), American University of Beirut (AUB)
Lebanon
Mr. Rabih Shibli, architect and designer of the Ghata structure, is the Director of the Center for Civic Engagement and Community Service (CCECS) at the American University of Beirut (AUB) in Lebanon. At AUB, Rabih develops programs and strategies that create a nexus between the university, stakeholders, and targeted communities with an overarching objective of fostering relief, reconstruction, and recovery processes in complex settings
His passion for community development was sparked following the July 2006 War, when he founded and directed Beit Bil Jnoub (“House in the South”), a non-governmental organization that was heavily involved in the reconstruction process in partnership with UN-HABITAT and three unions of municipalities in South Lebanon. Since then, he has continued to conceptualize and implement innovative development projects and authored publications reflecting the impact of participatory design as a process to induce hope in marginalized and contested landscapes. Under his leadership, the AUB-CCECS was awarded the Most Civically Engaged University Campus in the Middle East and North Africa region (MENA) by Ma'an Alliance, and the MacJannet Prize for Global Citizenship from Tufts University for interventions engaging refugees and host communities within the sectors of education, shelter, sanitation, psychosocial wellbeing, and food security. Rabih holds a BA in Architecture, MA in Urban Design, and a Program Certificate in Refugee Trauma.