Désirée Marlen Reder

Désirée Marlen Reder is a Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Conflict Studies, Philipps University Marburg, and a Research Fellow at the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies, German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA), Hamburg. Her work is supported by scholarships from the Foundation of German Business (sdw) and the Claussen-Simon Foundation.

• University: German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA)
• School: GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies
• Academic Rank: Researcher
• Email: desiree.reder@giga-hamburg.de

Reder's research centers on political accountability, participation, peace, and security, with a focus on state repression, violence in democracies, protest movements, and discursive politics. Her regional expertise lies in Central America and Latin America, particularly Nicaragua and El Salvador. She employs critical discourse analysis to examine how authoritarian regimes legitimize violent repression against peaceful dissent.

Her recent publications span academic journals, policy briefs, and media commentary. Key themes include democratization, re-democratisation, security sector reform, and the geopolitical dynamics of Latin America. Her 2023 article Introducing ScrumAdemia innovatively applies agile methodology to PhD research, reflecting her interdisciplinary approach.

• Doctoral scholarship, Foundation of the German Economy gGmbH, Klaus Murmann Study Support Foundation (2019)
• Doctoral scholarship, Claussen-Simon Foundation (2019)

Reder actively contributes to academic and policy discourse through presentations at major conferences such as the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) and the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR). She has advised the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung on Central American politics and regularly provides expert commentary for media outlets like Deutsche Welle and Deutschlandfunk Kultur. She is a member of Women in International Security (WIIS) since 2019, supporting gender equity in international security fields.

She is involved in two major research projects: Context Matters (BMZ, 2023–2027), analyzing politico-economic trends in the Global South, and a prior DFG-funded project on security sector reform and post-war peace stability (2016–2020).

Reder is supervised by Prof. Thorsten Bonacker and Prof. Sabine Kurtenbach. Her dissertation, Legitimizing Violent State Repression Against Peaceful Dissent, reflects her deep engagement with authoritarian legitimacy and political repression.