RESEARCH. Ruth is an international award-winning policy scholar and activist. As a doctoral candidate in the School of Public Policy at Central European University (CEU), she works on disability, political representation and participation, equality policy, intersectionality, and employment. Her dissertation examines the political representation of underrepresented and marginalised groups in parliaments, in particular disabled people. She is a Research Affiliate at the Democracy Institute, as part of the Inequalities and Democracy research group, Ruth is also a member of ECPR Standing Group on Parliaments, the Political Studies Association 'Parliamentary Studies is for Everybody' working paper group, the Motherscholar Collective Research community. She has worked as a Researcher for the SUPERA project (Supporting the Promotion of Supporting the Promotion of Equality in Research and Academia European initiative), working on initiatives related to gender equality, pregnancy, maternal and parental support, and sexual harassment. She has published research, op-eds and blogs on inequality, policy, academia, and accessibility.
Before joining CEU, Ruth studied in Edinburgh, Leiden and London; she also spent several years working on government research projects. Her previous research experience is very varied and includes ethnographic studies in Northern England, Arctic Sweden, and the Basque Country; comparative European legal initiatives on parental leave, flexible employment practices, electoral access etc.; quantitive and fiscal studies into costs and benefits related to decentralisation, cross-sector working; and multi-annual participatory research into welfare, policy design etc. She also has a special interest in devolution and local policy-making, particularly equality policy and paradiplomacy.
TEACHING. Ruth has teaching and supervisory experience at the University of Glasgow, ELTE and CEU. She is currently a Visiting Professor at ELTE and an Affiliate Professor at Glasgow University. She has supervised 15 graduate thesis for MA in Politics and MSc in Global Economic Policy covering topics from the gender pay gap in international accounting firms to UN policy development.
At CEU, she has taught for courses on Research Methods, Institutions and Actors in the Policy Process, and Legal and Institutional Approaches to Minority Protection. As a Global Teaching Fellow at ELTE university in Budapest, she taught courses on UK Politics, and Disability Policy. She has been invited to give guest lectures at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), RHEA - Centre of Expertise on Gender, Diversity and Intersectionality, the OSF Roma Access Program, the International Association of Maternal Action + Scholarship, and POLEMO (Research group on political, legal, and moral philosophy).
Ruth is a graduate of the CEU Centre for Teaching & Learning Program for Excellence in Teaching. She is a fan of experiential learning and has designed parliamentary simulations, mock elections, role plays, theoretical game-playing etc. She is also committed to promoting accessibility and has co-authored academic and guides to improve accessible teaching and learning for universities and other organisations, e.g. Council of Europe.
PROFESSIONAL. Prior to (re)joining academia, Ruth worked for almost a decade in the public sector, holding posts at local, regional, national and European level. She has wide-ranging policy experience in relation to equality and inclusion: she has worked on government research programmes, drafted and amended legislation, assisted in parliament, designed and delivered major public sector funding initiatives, and held front-line roles. Ruth has contributed to major legislative reforms - including the EU Referendum Act 2015, the Scotland Act 2016 and the Wales Act 2017. She has also worked on Select Committee inquiries, assisted the running of the Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission, overseen the delivery of a £230 million government transformation project, and supported the devolution and redesign of Scotland's £2.4 billion social security capacity. As a civil servant, she received the Exceptional Performance Awards three years running.
Ruth was also a senior elected trade union officer in London and Scotland – running a departmental union branch, holding national posts and being involved in the youth, women and disabled wings. She also completed a professional diploma in Employment Law.
SERVICE. As the founding Chair of the CEU Family Committee, Ruth spearheaded a campaign to entirely rework family policy at CEU. This led to the introduction of paid maternity leave, paid partner leave, extended parental leave and an annual childcare grant. Her contributions resulted in her being awarded first place in the International Association of Maternal Action and Scholarship) 2021 MoMA awards in 2021. Ruth was also a key member of a community-led initiative to secure additional funding for 400+ doctoral students during the pandemic – negotating a 3.1 million EUR grant. She also instigated major institutional reforms to student representation – founding the PhD Student Committee and supporting the foundation of a BA Student Committee.
PERSONAL. Ruth is a road running, sea swimming, Hard of Hearing (HoH) mother to two small children. She aspires to improve her sign languages and her spoken Hungarian. She is a lifelong trade unionist since joining a union on her first day of work as a teenager. Ruth enjoys polar nature, especially penguins.