Academic
I am a comparative politics scholar. My first book "Under authoritarian eyes: Feminist Solidarity and Resistance in Russia and Serbia" is forthcoming with Oxford University Press.
I investigate how (de-)democratization and gender influence each other through the lens of feminist social movements, governments and political parties. To do so I use qualitative methods, including critical discourse and narrative analysis, interviews, case studies and focus groups. Regionally, I specialise in Russia, Ukraine and the Western Balkans.
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My research has received over 1,9mio € funding and multiple awards: the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) Joni Lovenduski PhD Prize in Gender and Politics, an honorary mention by the Swiss Association for Gender Studies as well as the Young Scholar 2022 Award by the Walter Benjamin Kolleg.
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Currently, I am a advanced postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Political Science at the University of Bern, where I lead my own 3-year project as well as co-direct the Horizon Europe project UNTWIST. I am also research affiliate with ZOiS - Centre for East European and international Studies in Berlin.
I defended my DPhil in autumn 2020 at the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford, during which I also did five visiting fellowships. Between 2020 and 2022, I worked as senior researcher and gender advisor at swisspeace.
© Florian Spring
I am an ardent lecturer and have designed and taught 11 courses across levels from undergraduate, postgraduate to professional education.
Analyst
Advisor
​I take on short-term consultancies and offer tailor-made trainings. My areas of expertise lie in Feminist Foreign Policy and the UN Women, Peace and Security Agenda with specialisation in women's political participation in peace processes, in authoritarian contexts, and times of anti-gender movements as well as gender-based violence, masculinities and gender-sensitive reconstruction.
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Recently, I have given expert input to the Centre for Feminist Foreign Policy, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Pax for Peace and the European Peacebuilding Liaison Office.
I acquired the bulk of my practical experience during my time as gender advisor at the practice and research institute swisspeace. In this capacity, I shaped the gender unit, doubled the team, built bridges between feminist civil society and political decision-makers, gained new important donors and acquired over 800K funding for applied research projects. The derived policy-recommendations were used to advise foreign ministries, international organisations and civil society actors.
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An important part of my work was capacity-building through courses like Gender, Conflict and Peacebuilding and Masculinities, Marginalisation and Militarism. Both regularly attracted over twenty international peacebuilding practitioners and policy-makers.
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Advocate
I have had the privilege to have meaningful jobs. Whenever possible, I have also pursued unpaid work to contribute to making the society I live in a fairer and more feminist place.
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I am an active member of the Swiss Action Four Quarters and collected 700 signatures for their federal democracy initiative to make the acquisition of Swiss citizenship fairer. I am also an active member of the Swiss Socio-Democratic Party, in particular with the party's Women's Caucus. I ran for cantonal elections in March 2022 and have been active in various campaigns, such as against the increase of women's retirement age, for a Yes to the Protection against Hate as well as an Only Yes Means Yes campaign on consent.
All of this was preceded by active years of political campaigning during my time in the UK. For four years I was an active member of the Women's Equality Party that was founded in 2015.