We are delighted to have Dr. Mona Lena Krook, Professor of Political Science at Rutgers and winner of the Grawemeyer World Order Award, as our April speaker. Dr. Krook will speak on the topic of her award-winning book, Violence Against Women in Politics (Oxford University Press, 2020).

For the book, she collected details on the growing attacks against women in politics worldwide and reviewed dozens of previous studies on the issue. Based on her findings, she sorted the violence into five types: physical, psychological, sexual, economic and intimidation through words and images. In all cases, the intent of the behavior was to exclude women from public life, she said.

As she chronicles the stories of women who have been bullied, shamed, threatened, arrested and even murdered while serving in political roles, Krook explains how the phenomenon has caused women to withdraw from politics and has made others reluctant to enter the field. She ends the book with ideas to address the problem.
“Besides harming individual victims, violence against women in politics tramples on human rights, disrupts institutions and undermines gender equity,” she said. “The hostile acts continue with little being done to stop them.”

Dr. Krook has published widely on gender and political representation, particularly on electoral gender quotas and the impact of women in public office. Her first book, Quotas for Women in Politics: Gender and Candidate Selection Reform Worldwide (Oxford University Press, 2009), won the American Political Science Association’s Victoria Schuck Award in 2010 for the best book on women and politics. In 2019, it was further honored with a George H. Hallett Award from the Representation and Electoral Systems Section, recognizing a book published at least 10 years ago that has made a lasting contribution to the literature on representation and electoral systems. She has also written articles appearing in the British Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, Comparative Politics, the European Journal of International Relations, the European Journal of Political Research, the Journal of Politics, Perspectives on Politics, Political Research Quarterly, and Politics & Gender, among others.

Since 2015, Krook has worked closely with colleagues at the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and other global practitioners to recognize and combat violence against women in politics as a distinct form of violence aimed at preventing and undermining women’s political participation. This included, in 2016, launching NDI’s #NotTheCost campaign to stop violence against women in politics. Her most recent book, Violence against Women in Politics (Oxford University Press, 2020), draws on this work to explore rising attacks against women in public life around the globe. With research funded by a National Science Foundation CAREER Award, and a Rutgers University Chancellor’s Scholarship.

Krook’s other awards include an Outstanding Faculty Mentor Award in 2009 from the Graduate Student Senate and Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Washington University; the inaugural Early Career Award in 2012 from the Midwest Women’s Caucus of the Midwest Political Science Association for research accomplishments and contributions to the discipline; and the Emerging Scholar Award in 2015 from the Elections, Public Opinion and Voting Behavior Section of the American Political Science Association for the top scholar in the field who is within 10 years of his or her Ph.D. She also won two best paper prizes with Rutgers Women & Politics graduate students: the 2018 Intergenerational Justice Award from the Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations and the Intergenerational Foundation for a paper co-authored with Mary K. Nugent and the 2015 Best Paper Prize from the Women and Politics Section of the American Political Science Association for a paper co-authored with Juliana Restrepo Sanin.

In 2021, Krook’s work crossing the academic-practitioner divide was recognized with the Rutgers University Chancellor’s Award for Global Impacts. She was named to Apolitical’s 100 Most Influential People in Gender Policy List, honoring and celebrating people of all genders working on gender policy and making the world more equitable, through policymaking, public service, research, philanthropy, advocacy, or activism. She was also presented with the American Political Science Association’s Distinguished Award for Civic and Community Engagement, honoring significant civic or community engagement activity by a political scientist. She continues to inform global debates on violence against women in politics through a Twitter account and a website, capturing ongoing developments in theory and practice to ensure women’s equal rights to participate – freely and safely – in political life around the world.