Dr. Mona Tajali, PhD

Dr. Mona Tajali is Associate Professor of International Relations and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Agnes Scott College. Her areas of expertise are gender and politics, human rights, and social movements in Muslim countries. She is the author of Women’s Political Representation in Iran and Turkey: Demanding a Seat at the Table (Edinburgh University Press 2022), which investigates how religious and cultural norms, attitudes, institutional structures, and voter behavior affect the representation of women and quality of democracy in Muslim contexts, with a comparative focus on Iran and Turkey. Dr. Tajali has also been a long-term collaborator with the research wing of the transnational feminist solidarity network, Women Living Under Muslim Laws (WLUML) and as of 2019, serves as member of their executive board. Her first book, Electoral Politics: Making Quotas Work for Women, co-authored with Homa Hoodfar and published by WLUML, has been translated into Persian and Arabic, and is widely used as a training manual for those advocating for women’s increased political representation across the Muslim world. She publishes her research findings in both academic and popular outlets, among them, the Middle East Journal, Politics & Gender, Journal of Women, Politics and Policy, The Conversation, Jadaliyya, The Nation, and The Washington Post.

Sub-specialties:
Gender and Politics in the Middle East, especially Iran, Turkey, and Afghanistan.
Women and Politics
Middle East Politics and Societies
Human Rights
Women's Rights Movements in the Middle East