Dr. Rama Salla Dieng wins 2025 Paula Kantor Award

We are pleased to name Dr. Rama Salla Dieng as the 2025 recipient of our Paula Kantor Award.

The award honors the legacy of Dr. Paula Kantor, a former ICRW researcher who was tragically killed in 2015 while working in Afghanistan. Dr. Kantor was a leading expert on gender issues, with nearly two decades of experience in policy and program research. She was driven by her passion to improve the lives of women and girls.

Dr. Dieng, a political scientist, independent feminist, and leader, embodies Dr. Kantor’s legacy. Her work is grounded in participatory, intersectional, and decolonial methodologies—centering the knowledge and agency of women and girls.

Her research focuses on African democratic governance; racial capitalism and sustainable development; political economy analyses of land, labor, food; African politics; and feminist and citizen movements in Senegal and Francophone Africa (including the Sahel). She has been published in renowned journals, and insights from her work have informed policy at both national and regional levels.

Beyond academia, she regularly advises international development agencies and civil society organizations on gender-transformative and feminist policies, intersectionality, and decolonization policy design.

Fluent in French, English, and Wolof, Dr. Dieng brings a cross-cultural lens to her work. She mentors emerging scholars, artists, and activists and is deeply committed to bridging research with activism and the creative sectors, producing knowledge that informs structural transformation.

Dr. Dieng holds an MSc and a PhD in Development Studies from the School of African and Oriental Studies (SOAS), University of London; a dual MA in International Cooperation and Development/Risk Management in the Global South from Sciences Po Bordeaux, France; and an MA in Political Science from the University of Bordeaux, France.

SELECT HIGHLIGHTS OF DR. DIENG’S WORK:

• Feminism for the World (August 2025), Pluto Press, UK, Collective Book Co-Authored with leading feminist academics: Zahra Ali, Silvia Federici, Verónica Gago, Lola Olufemi, Djamila Ribeiro, Sayak Valencia, Françoise Vergès
• Decolonize Humxnize (February 2024) co-edited with Dr. Kathryn Toure and Roopal Thaker, Illustrations: Celeste Wamiru, Langaa Research and Publishing
• Dieng, R. S. (2024). Documenter et remembrer l’histoire politique, sociale et économique du Sénégal: Un hommage à MOMAR-COUMBA DIOP, un mentor et un passeur transdisciplinaire et intergénérationnel; With a compilation of testimonials from: Mouhamadou Mbodj, Boubacar Barry, Babacar Fall, Ibrahima Thioub, Fatou Sow, Adebayo Olukoshi, Cheikh Oumar Bâ, Fatoumata Hanne, Hamidou Dia, Serigne Mansour Tall, Ramata Thioune, Ndèye Astou Ndiaye, Hady Bâ, & Ferran Iniesta
• Dieng, R. S. (2024). Racial capitalism and women’s horticultural labour in Senegal: neo-housewifisation and the micro-politics of paternalism, The Journal of Peasant Studies. 52(1), 101–128
• Dieng, R. S. (2024). Speaking out talking back? African feminist politics and decolonial poetics of knowing, organizing, and loving. Review of African Political Economy.
• Dieng, R. S., Haastrup, T., & Kang, A. (2024). Centering Feminists and Feminism in Protests in Africa. Politics & Gender. 2024;20(2):474-477. doi:10.1017/S1743923X22000769
• Special Issue: Food Security, Migration and Agrarian Change in Senegal and Zimbabwe (2023) Dieng, R. S., Vanda, G., & Chambati, W. (Eds.)