Silja Paasilinna

Silja Paasilinna is the Senior Country Director for the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) in Sri Lanka and Senior Advisor for Southeast Asia. Ms. Paasilinna has also served as chief of party in Mozambique, and prior to that, as IFES’ chief of party in Bangladesh. 

Ms. Paasilinna has 25 years of international experience in leadership, management, and technical roles in democratic governance, political transitions, electoral assistance, and capacity building. She has a track record of forming broad-based coalitions of governance stakeholders, building consensus, and shaping platforms to advocate for democratic reforms. She has made significant contributions in the field of democracy and governance; e.g., democracy support in closing spaces, electoral systems and quotas, electoral reforms, women’s political participation and representation, money in politics, domestic and international election observation, and inclusion of marginalized groups. 

Drawing on her technical skills and international comparative experience, Ms. Paasilinna has written research papers, international best practice documents, guidelines, analyses, assessments, and other publications. She is a highly experienced accrediting-level facilitator in the Building Resources in Democracy, Governance and Elections (BRIDGE) curriculum, with the practical skills to build the capacity of both state institutions and civil society networks. Ms. Paasilinna has overseen projects in countries undergoing political transitions where she has taken leadership roles in crisis management, keeping in mind a Do No Harm approach, and she has ensured compliance with industry standards and donor regulations for programs with budgets of up to $150 million. 

Ms. Paasilinna has lived, studied, and worked long-term in 12 countries and completed short-term assignments in dozens more across Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, and the Middle East. Ms. Paasilinna holds a master’s degree in political science from Lund University, Sweden with prior studies at the National University of Singapore. She is fluent in English, Finnish, Swedish and Portuguese.