Giselle Bosse awarded €800,000 NWO grant for research on women and everyday democracy

Prof. Giselle Bosse has been awarded an €800,000 NWO SSH Open Competition L grant for a new five-year research project entitled Invisible Heroines: Women and the Democratisation of Everyday Life in the EU’s Eastern Neighbourhood.

The project investigates the often under-recognised role of women in sustaining democratic life in Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia and Armenia. Whereas conventional analyses of democratisation tend to focus on formal institutions, elections and political reforms, this project shifts attention to how democracy is lived and practised in everyday settings such as families, neighbourhoods, workplaces and communities.

In close collaboration with academic and civil society partners across the region, the project will develop a new gendered perspective on democratisation. It will also pioneer participatory “everyday democracy” indicators, co-created with women in the region.

The research is designed to contribute to academic debates on democracy and democratisation, while also informing Dutch and European policies on democracy support.

Based at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, the project will fund two PhD positions, offering early-career researchers the opportunity to contribute to cutting-edge research on democracy and democratisation, gender and EU democracy support policies in eastern Europe. 

Commenting on the award, Giselle says: “Women are often at the heart of democratic resilience, yet their contributions frequently remain invisible. At the same time, many continue to face structural barriers, discrimination and violence. This project seeks to make both their experiences and their agency visible, and to rethink how we understand and measure democratisation.”