MSc student in Evidence-Based Social Intervention and Policy Evaluation
Ms. Bahija Aliyeva is a development practitioner advocating for advancement of gender equality and women’s empowerment in Azerbaijan. She has a track record of expertise providing advice to the United Nations Country Team and the government for development of legal and policy frameworks to address gender-based violence and harmful traditional practices. Bahija is also one of the co-founders of the Department of Social Work at Baku State University where she developed and led several courses on social work, domestic violence and gender equality. She has been in charge of design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the United Nations Population Fund’s programmes and projects on gender equality and women’s empowerment in Azerbaijan for more than a decade now.
After initial training in History, Bahija specialized in the field of Human Rights during her MA at the University of Essex (UK), which was fully funded in recognition of her academic merit. She is also a recipient of the International Human Rights Fellowship awarded by the International Federation of University Women for her research on gender biased sex selection in Azerbaijan. Her research proposal was selected as the strongest among those submitted by 140 candidates representing 48 countries.
Bahija’s main research interests include exploration of systemic factors affecting implementation of the interventions aimed at establishment of the national mechanisms for advancement of gender equality and prevention of gender-based violence and discrimination in Azerbaijan.
Bahija Aliyeva is a Government of Azerbaijan Scholarship recipient.
