Jennifer Freeman is Senior Advisor for Women, Peace and Security at the Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice (Kroc IPJ) and Professor of Practice at the Kroc School of Peace Studies at the University of San Diego. From 2017 to 2019, she was the Kroc IPJ’s Associate Director, overseeing the institute’s domestic and international peacebuilding programmes. Prior to that, she developed and ran the institute’s WPS programming, including the Women PeaceMakers programme, which awards four highly competitive annual fellowships to frontline women peace leaders to document their peacebuilding strategies. She played a leading role in the shifting of the well-renowned Women Waging Peace network from the Institute for Inclusive Security to the Kroc IPJ. She also established partnerships with Symantec, Inc. regarding the digital protection needs to peacebuilders, and with Cigna Healthcare to compare leadership strategies between the private sector and peacebuilders from conflict contexts. 

Freeman previously worked on sexual and gender-based violence, forced migration and peacebuilding programmes on three continents. She led, with Women PeaceMakers, the design and implementation of a three-year initiative examining gendered and alternative approaches to P/CVE, including right-wing extremism.  

Freeman’s current research focuses on the shifting security threats and protection measures for women peacebuilders as compared to women’s human rights defenders, an initiative in conjunction with the International Civil Society Action Network (ICAN). She is also conducting a comparative analysis of donor rationale to support the WPS agenda, between bilateral and multilateral donors, and private foundations.  

Freeman is an advisor to the Inclusivity Working Group of the Network for Religious and Traditional Peacemakers, and a member of the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership. She holds a BA in Political Science and Germanic Studies from the University of Victoria, and an MA (summa cum laude) in Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland, where she studied on a Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholarship. She is currently completing her doctorate at the University of San Diego.