About Aili Mari Tripp
I have been a professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison since 1992. I have always had a distinctly global outlook on life. I was born in the United Kingdom to a Finnish mother and American father originally from Wisconsin and have dual citizenship in the United States and Finland. I grew up in Tanzania, and in 1974, I moved to the United States to attend college. I received my BA (1981) and MA (Middle East Studies, 1983) from the University of Chicago and my PhD (Political Science, 1990) from Northwestern University. Throughout my academic career, my research has focused on politics as it relates to gender, women, women’s movements, global feminism, authoritarianism, and the informal economy, primarily in a comparative African context.
I have conducted fieldwork all over Africa and have thoroughly enjoyed interviewing and getting to know everyone from farmers and small-scale entrepreneurs, to parliamentarians, ministers, and women’s movement activists. In my research, in addition to conducting hundreds of in-depth interviews, I have administered surveys, carried out focus groups, and engaged in archival research. I have also conducted cross-national statistical analysis and comparative historical process tracing.
From the start of my career, I have collaborated extensively with scholars from around the world, particularly from Africa, and have regarded those collaborations as essential to promoting excellence in comparative scholarship. I have held visiting research affiliations in twelve countries.
In recognition of my academic contributions, I was elected president of the African Studies Association and have served as vice president of the American Political Science Association. I have also served on the boards of the American Political Science Association, African Studies Association, National Council for Research on Women, Tanzania Studies Association, University of Wisconsin Press, and numerous other journals and book series.
I have also served as a co-editor of the American Political Science Review, the flagship journal of the American Political Science Association and Politics & Gender. Together with Jacqueline-Bethel Mougoué, I co-edit the new book series, Women and Gender in Africa, for the University of Wisconsin Press.
One of my main ambitions has been to work on projects that enhance research capacity among junior scholars in Africa. In addition to co-authoring books and articles with African scholars from across the continent, I have served for many years on the steering committees of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies as they sought to develop their dissertation and postdoctoral fellowship programs in Africa (ACLS). I have co-edited a book series with University of Wisconsin Press (Women in Africa and the Diaspora), which published a large number of award-winning books by African and other scholars. I have led/participated in grantwriting workshops run by the ACLS in Tanzania, Uganda, Nigeria, and Ghana and coordinated training workshops with the American Political Science Association on gender and politics in Tanzania, United Arab Emirates, and Morocco.
In my free time I enjoy hiking, weaving tapestries, reading, traveling, and spending time with my two grandsons.
