Swati Parashar

Swati Parashar is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Global Studies, University of Gothenburg, Sweden and Adjunct Senior Research Fellow, Gender, Peace and Security Centre, Monash University, Australia.

Swati has previously held full time academic appointments at the School of History and Politics, University of Wollongong in Australia and at the Department of Politics and Public Administration, University of Limerick in Ireland.

Before her academic career took off in 2006, Swati worked in public policy think tanks as Research Analyst with the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) at the Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Singapore and as an Associate Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi, where she coordinated the International Terrorism Watch Programme. She was a Fulbright Fellow on a national security programme at the Institute of Global Conflict and Cooperation, University of California, San Diego, US, in Jan-Feb 2006.

Swati is interested in understanding and theorising the nature of political violence and wars in South Asia, particularly women as perpetrators and survivors of violence. Her interest in political violence is based on experiences of growing up in an India in the last two decades when state and non-state violence have been on the rise while political spaces have been marked by intense contestations among various actors.

Her ongoing projects include a critical assessment of the Maoist insurgency in India and the ‘securitisation’ of development. She is also working on the politics of ‘difference’ and ‘location’ in feminist IR and post colonial approaches.

She is a prolific social and political commentator on South Asia, terrorism and gender and has contributed to print and electronic media in Australia and India. She has published articles in the Asia Times; Straits Times, Singapore; Daily Mirror, Colombo; Sri Lanka Guardian; ABC Drum Opinion; South Asia Analysis Group; E-IR Journal and on various blogs and websites.

She loves listening to Indian classical music and Urdu ghazals. She is a devoted cricket fan who relishes the 5 day test format of the game, particularly the Ashes series. She is happy to be in Australia, where they love cricket and AFL.