Laura Wise

Laura Wise is a Senior Research Fellow with the Peace and Conflict Resolution Evidence Platform (PeaceRep).

Laura’s research explores the margins of peace processes and conflict-affected societies and their intersections with the politics of inclusion. She is particulary interested in women, peace and security, local peace processes, process design, and ceasefires.

As a Co-Investigator of the PeaceRep consortium, Laura is leading research projects investigating inclusive peace process implementation, and local peace processes in fragmented conflicts. This research is funded by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO). Her work on gender perspectives in peace processes regularly informs governmental and inter-governmental policymaking, including the UN Secretary General's annual report on women, peace and security.

Laura is a Thematic Lead for PeaceRep's Myanmar work exploring opportunities for peace, led by the University of Stirling in partnership with the Rotary Peace Centre, Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, Chulalongkorn University. She is part of the team behind the PA-X Peace Agreements Database, a dataset of all peace agreements globally from 1990 to 2023, and a co-creator of PeaceFem, a mobile phone app that illustrates women’s inclusion in peace processes around the world. 

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Laura led research for the Covid Collective to investigate PeaceTech methods of understanding pandemic ceasefires. From 2020-2022, she collected and analysed responses to the UN Ceasefire Call as a co-creator of the "Ceasefires in a time of Covid-19" interactive tracker, and has published multiple resources on vaccination ceasefires during public health emergencies.

Laura co-leads PeaceRep's continuing education programme, which supports the development of peacebuilding professionals, conflict advisers, and students. She is course organiser of 'Gender and Peace Processes in a Changing World', and a frequent contributor to the Beyond Borders Women in Conflict 1325 Fellowship Programme. She is an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. 

Laura holds a BSc Econ in International Politics and the Third World from Aberystwyth University and an MA in Comparative Ethnic Conflict from Queen's University Belfast. As part of the PeaceRep team, she is a 2023 recipient of the RSE Mary Somerville Medal which recognises exceptional achievement in research in teamwork and collaborative endeavour within Scottish Higher Education Institutes. 

• Peace agreements and peace processes
• Women, peace and security
• Local peace processes
• Ceasefires