Dr. Sylvia Maier is Academic Director and Clinical Professor in the Center for Global Affairs where she leads the MSGA Concentration in Global Gender Studies, the annual Global Field Intensive to the United Arab Emirates, and serves as faculty adviser to the MSGA Gender Working Group. Sylvia’s principal fields of interest and expertise are women’s rights and gender equality and with a particular focus on Western Europe, Latin America, the United Arab Emirates and wider GCC, Iraqi Kurdistan, and Afghanistan, where she has taught and conducted extensive field research. Sylvia is especially interested in the protection of LGBT rights as well as gender-inclusive urban planning and design, as well as the politics of gendered integration and multiculturalism in Western Europe, chiefly the legal responses to honor-based violence against women. She has spoken extensively and published on these and related subjects. Her co-edited book, titled EU Development Policies: Between Norms and Geopolitics was published by Palgrave Macmillan in February 2019. She is currently working on a field research-based project on feminist and gender-inclusive urban design in global cities (Vienna, Berlin, Tel Aviv, Abu Dhabi, and New York), on a field research project on biotrade, food security and women’s empowerment in Perú with her CGA colleague Jens Rudbeck, and, with another CGA colleague, Christopher Ankersen, on a book manuscript on Monarchies in Global Affairs. 

Sylvia’s teaching interests bridge the fields of gender studies and international politics and include Gender and International Affairs: Sex, Power and Politics, Gender and Migration, Women’s Rights in the Middle East and GCC Countries, International Relations Theory, The Geopolitics of Afghanistan, Ethics in International Affairs, and Analytic Skills. 

Sylvia is actively involved in faculty governance and leadership, having served as the Chair and Vice-Chair of the SPS Faculty Council, the SPS Senator to the Continuing Faculty Senate Council (CFSC) and on its Steering Committee, as well as on numerous university and school-wide committees and initiatives, including the SPS Intersectionality Lab, and the NYU Graduate Program Committee.

Complementing her academic work, Sylvia was the co-founder and deputy editor-in-chief of Women Across Frontiers, a digital women’s rights magazine, and currently serves as VP and Director of Education Programs as well as on the board of The Peace Project, Inc.

Prior to joining the CGA, Sylvia Maier was on the faculty of the Center for European and Mediterranean Studies at NYU and the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, where she worked on Islam-state relations and the politics of integration and multiculturalism in Western Europe. 

Sylvia received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Southern California in 2001.

Publications

• Sustainable Empowerment: An Assessment of EU Women¿s Capacity-Building Programs in Afghanistan in the Context of UNSR Resolution 1325 By FIU Jean Monnet Center Conference (Feb 23 2016)
• ¿Leaning In ¿ A Global Perspective.¿ 2014. Max Weber Conference Working Paper Series, New York University. July By Max Weber Conference Working Paper Series (Apr 04 2014)
• ¿The Shari¿a in German and French Courts: Much Ado About Nothing?¿ 2009. New York Consortium for European Studies Newsletter. February Issue. By New York Consortium for European Studies Newslette (Feb 15 2009)
• Sylvia Maier. ¿Honor Killings and the Cultural Defense in Germany,¿ in Multicultural Jurisprudence: Comparative Perspectives on the Cultural Defence (Oñati International Series in Law &Society). Eds. Alison Renteln and Marie-Claire Foblets By Hart Publishing (Feb 03 2009)
• Sylvia Maier and Usha Nair-Reichert. 2008. ¿Empowering Women Through ICT-Based Business Initiatives: An Overview of Best Practices in E-Commerce Projects.¿ By Information Technologies&International Development (Dec 20 2007)
• Sylvia Maier and Michael L. Best. 2007. ¿Women and Internet Use in Five South Indian Villages: Obstacles and Opportunities.¿ Gender, Technology and Development 11(2): 137-156. By Gender, Technology and Development 11(2) (Dec 19 2007)
• Sylvia Maier and Frank Schimmelfennig. 2007. Shared Values: Democracy and Human Rights,¿ in Governing Europe's Neighborhood: Partners or Periphery? Eds. Katja Weber, Michael Smith, and Michael Baun By Manchester University Press (Nov 01 2007)
• Lifting the Veil in the Middle East.¿ 2006. Op-Ed, International Herald Tribune, 19 June. By International Herald Tribune (Jun 19 2006)