Research areas

Current Research

Karmen Tornius' (PhD) research is part of the DIIS Ukraine Initiative and focuses on the work of Ukrainian women's organisations. She examines the relationship between state institutions and women's organisations in a context of conflict and seeks to understand how women's organisations can and attempt to have policy influence in Ukraine. Her research examines how conservative views on gender roles, progressive aspirations of gender equality and the demands of active conflict shape women's organisations work and engagement with policymakers. The women, peace and security architecture is central to this line of enquiry, however, Tornius also examines interconnected policy areas like gender in humanitarian response, conflict-related sexual violence and gender-responsive recovery and reconstruction. Her qualitative research is embedded in fieldwork in Ukraine.

Primary research areas

Karmen Tornius’ research encompasses different dimensions of gender politics, ranging from understanding the construction of gender policy architectures to historiographies of global gender equality norms or challenges of implementing gender equality commitments. Theoretically, she works with feminist security studies, critical and decolonial perspectives on gender and development, practice theory and localisation. In doing so, Tornius pursuits approaches which allow bringing the global and local dimension of gender politics.

Previous research

Her previous research  focused on different African policy contexts, like the African Union’s gender governance, the ‘women, peace and security’ agenda in Kenya, Ethiopia and Mali, and the role of Kenyan women and critical pan-African feminist organisations in shaping global agreements on gender and development.