Dr. Swarna Rajagopalan is an experienced and well-regarded political scientist. Her research areas are gender, security and politics, primarily in the Southasian context. Her individual research record is available here. Chaitanya houses projects involving a research team. At Prajnya, she conceptualised, curated and edited information and research initiatives on gender violence and peace education, working with academics, practitioners and mediapersons. She has overseen research projects under the Rajaram Research Fellowship offered by Prajnya.
Chaitanya is open to joining academic research projects. We are able to conduct qualitative research, manage field teams and handle report-writing. We are also open to doing proposal reviews, manuscript evaluation and substantive editing on research projects.
Recent Research Projects
- Surviving Violence: Everyday Resilience and Gender Justice in Rural-Urban India, a collaborative project supported by the British Academy, 2021-23. Since 2020 when the pilot was conceptualised by the Resilient Futures India Institute at the Queen Mary University London, Dr. Rajagopalan has been a co-investigator on the project. The Chaitanya project team conducted the Tamil Nadu state field research and coordinated advocacy for the project in both the pilot and main phases. Links to our state report and other materials:
‘Stuck in a Circle’: Surviving violence and everyday resilience in Tamil Nadu (Full report), 2023.
‘Stuck in a Circle’: Surviving violence and everyday resilience in Tamil Nadu (Policy brief in English), 2023.
‘Stuck in a Circle’: Surviving violence and everyday resilience in Tamil Nadu (Policy brief in Tamil), 2023.
Extremism and Gender-based Violence in South Asia, a set of desk-based country studies commissioned by the International Movement against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism IMADR and supported by the European Union, 2021-22.
Research consultations on a women and mediation research project, 2020-21.
Guest editor, Civil Society issue , Agenda, November 2009.
Report on the state of security studies in South Asia, Macarthur Foundation, July-August 2006.
Consulting series co-editor, Gender and Non-Traditional Security Project, WISCOMP, January 2005 – May 2006.