I am a doctoral candidate in the Political, Societal and Regional Change programme experienced in qualitative research and implementation of development cooperation projects in Finland and Latin America. My doctoral research focuses on how the focus of women’s empowerment shifts when Finland’s development aid has been increasingly transferred from traditional development cooperation to the private sector through cross-sectoral partnerships with Kenya. My professional work has been focused on using research to inform project design and implementation in development cooperation initiatives for gender-based violence, gender equality, peacebuilding, psychosocial support, and migration. Previously I have conducted research on Women, Peace and Security, and feminism in Colombia, and refugees, agency, and gender-based violence in Norway.

I am a doctoral researcher in peace and conflict studies at Tampere Peace Research Institute, Tampere University. My doctoral research focuses on transnational women’s rights activism, solidarity, and working across differences in the case of Iran. My professional work has been focused on women’s rights activism in Iran and in the diaspora from the feminist peace studies and intersectionality perspective. Previously I have conducted research on the characteristics of the Iranian women’s movement and the peaceful transformation of Iranian society. Besides, I am a journalist, and I have been working as a journalist for more than 10 years. I am a co-founder of the first news agency for Persian-speaking immigrants in Finland.

I am a  PhD student in Human Geography, in the department of Geographical and Historical Studies at UEF. I am originally a political scientist and I do my research on Geopolitics and International Relations. However my PhD dissertation is The Finnish Influence on International Peacebuilding, where I will be focusing on two cases of conflicts "Russo-Ukrainian War and Palestinian Crisis" 

My research focuses on global mobilities, solidarity practices and gender/intersectionality.

Jutta Martens is writing her PhD research with to Tampere University, Tampere Peace Research Institute Tapri with a working title "Conflicting Norms in Peace Processes – Faith-based Leaders’ Perspectives and Roles in Achieving Lasting Peace". The PhD will be article-based. Ms. Martens has received funding for her study from Suomen Kulttuurirahasto, Tampere City Tiedeapuraha and from Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission FELM. Currently Ms. Martens is working as Programme Coordinator for Sub-Saharan Africa at Finn Church Aid. The idea is to conduct the PhD research also in collaboration with FCA.

Dr. Tiina Seppälä is a university lecturer in Global Development Studies at the University of Helsinki and adjunct professor of International Development Studies at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland. She has engaged with women’s rights and slum activists in Nepal and Bangladesh, anti-eviction movements in India, asylum seekers in Finland and anti-war activists in the UK. She is interested in development, displacement, social movements, post/decolonial and feminist theory, ethnographic research and arts-based methods.

Projects

Governance, Resistance and Neoliberal Development: Struggles against Development-Induced Displacement and Forced Evictions in South Asia

I am a doctoral researcher interested in segregation, everyday peace and coexistence in socially mixed urban neighborhoods. Methodologically, I am interested in urban ethnography and spatial analysis.

Research work centers around water diplomacy and transboundary water governance, with a particular focus on understanding and strengthening technical-political tracks from a conflict sensitive and positive peace point of view. This includes looking at risk, decision-making and implementation, trust and trustbuilding and institutional resilience as well as multistakeholder and multitrack engagement.

My PhD research intertwines Feminist Peace Research, Sociological neoinstitutionalism and sociology of measurement. I study the measurement practices embedded in National Action Plans (NAPs) for the UN Resolution 1325 on Women Peace and Security (WPS), and particularly, the construction and use of indicators. Indicators have become an increasingly important mechanism of governance, as well as knowledge production, and in my study are understood as social practices allowing me to focus not only on what is being measured but also on its effects on the policy field. The project compiled a global dataset of 7500 indicators harvested from all the NAPs adopted between 2005 and 2020, enabling both spatial and linear windows of inquiry. In addition, an ethnography of WPS indicators in Nigeria (conducted during 2020) provides new knowledge about the role of local actors in translating indicators into practice.

Processes of peacebuilding promoted by local agents Female activism in Colombian peacebuilding process.