About me
I was Professor of Gender Studies at the Faculty of Social Sciences at the Tampere University (2017-2022). I joined Centre for European Studies (CES) in the University Helsinki as Professor of European Societies and their Politics in November 2022. I obtained my PhD in Politics at the University of Bristol in 2004 and became Docent in Politics at the University of Helsinki in 2007. I am the Distinguished Visiting Professor of Gender and EU Studies in the University of Tübingen, Germany, (2022-2025).
My current research centres on EU institutions and governance and especially the European Parliament. I study the European Parliament’s political groups from the point of view of equality and democracy in the context of my European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator grant funded Gender, party politics and democracy in Europe: A study of European Parliament’s party groups (EUGenDem) project (2018-2023). I have researched extensively gender and politics in Europe, including gender equality policies in the EU and Finland. I am a member of the recently launched Horizon Europe CCindle project (2022-2026) studying feminist responses to anti-gender opposition in Europe. I was the director of the Academy of Finland (2016-2020) and University of Helsinki Research Funds (2015-2017) funded research project Gender and Power in Reconfigured Corporatist Finland (GePoCo).
My books include Gender and Political Analysis (with Emanuela Lombardo, Palgrave, 2017), Gender and the European Union (Palgrave, 2010) and Feminists Theorize the State (Palgrave, 2006). I have co-edited European Parliament’s Political Groups in Turbulent Times (Palgrave, 2022, with Petra Ahrens and Anna Elomäki); Social Partners and Gender Equality: Change and Continuity in Gendered Corporatism in Europe (Palgrave 2022; with Anna Elomäki and Paula Koskinen Sandberg); The Oxford Handbook on Gender and Politics (Oxford University Press, 2013, with Georgina Waylen, Karen Celis and Laurel Weldon), Gender and the Economic Crisis in Europe: Politics, Institutions and Intersectionality (Palgrave 2017, with Emanuela Lombardo), Tasa-arvopolitiikan suunnanmuutoksia: Talouskriisistä tasa-arvon kriiseihin (Gaudeamus 2020, with Paula Koskinen Sandberg and Hanna Ylöstalo); Tasa-arvo toisin nähtynä: Oikeuden ja politiikan näkökulmia tasa-arvoon ja yhdenvertaisuuteen (Gaudeamus, 2012, with Kevät Nousiainen and Milja Saari) and Changing State Feminism (Palgrave, 2007, with Joyce Outshoorn).
I am the Editor of Palgrave Macmillan’s Gender and Politics Book Series with Sarah Childs.