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Rebecca Tiessen

{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2024}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Rebecca Tiessen

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| birth_name = Rebecca Lee Tiessen

| birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1970}}

| birth_place = Leamington, Ontario, Canada

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| occupation = Academic

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Rebecca Tiessen (b. 1970) is a Canadian academic whose work focuses on international development and gender. She assisted Global Affairs Canada in developing tools to measure the effectiveness of development projects. Her work typically evaluates whether development strategies utilized by bureaucracies can be transformational or whether change within systems is hampered and requires an outside structure to be effective. She served as chair of international development studies and director of the Centre for African Studies in Halifax, Nova Scotia at Dalhousie University from 1999 until 2007. That year, she became an associate professor of sociology at the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario. She joined the faculty of the University of Ottawa in 2013 and is currently a full professor and director of their Gender, Peace, and Security Collaboratory.

Early life and education

Rebecca Lee Tiessen was born in 1970 in Leamington, Ontario.{{sfn|Tiessen|Huish|2013|p=iv}} Tiessen was the daughter of Erika (née Penner) Tiessen, who had immigrated as an infant in the late 1940s from {{ill|Peckelsheim|de}}, Germany to Canada. Erika's parents, Helen and John Penner were Mennonites and farmed in what is now Point Pelee National Park. Erika married in 1964, divorced in 1981 and raised her daughter and two sons in Leamington.{{sfn|Laucius|2020}} Tiessen obtained a bachelor's degree in political science from Wilfrid Laurier University in 1993.{{sfn|Tiessen|Lough|2019|p=299}} She completed her master's degree in 1995 with a thesis titled Treading Water: Survival Strategies by Smallscale Women Farmers in Zimbabwe from the University of Guelph.{{sfn|Masters Abstracts|1996|p=1035}} Continuing her education, Tiessen completed her PhD at Guelph under the guidance of Belinda Leach in 1999 with a thesis Navigating Gender Terrain: Gender Inequality and Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations (ENGOS).{{sfn|American Doctoral Dissertations|1999|p=660}}{{sfn|Tiessen|1999|p=Abstract}}

Career

After graduating, Tiessen was hired in 1999, as an assistant professor in International Development Studies at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.{{sfn|Foster|2014|p=75}}{{sfn|Tiessen|2015|p=1}} Her research focused on Canadian foreign aid policies, and specifically examined those policies dealing with gender mainstreaming and the HIV/AIDs crisis in Africa. She participated in field research in Indonesia, Kenya, Malawi, Sri Lanka, and Zimbabwe examining the relationships between NGO partners and local populations, and evaluating youth work and study-abroad programs which attempt to promote global citizenship.{{sfn|MacLean|Black|Shaw|2006|p=x}}{{sfn|Goldstein|Pevehouse|Whitworth|2008|p=474}} In 2006, she was promoted to chair of the International Development Studies department and Director of the Centre for African Studies.{{sfn|Tiessen|2015|p=1}}{{sfn|MacLean|Black|Shaw|2006|p=x}} Thiessen left Dalhousie and became the Canada Research Chair of Global Studies at the Royal Military College of Canada from 2007 to 2013. Her research focus remained as gender inequality and people's security in the Global South, global citizenship, and youth volunteer programs. She continued to conduct research abroad, focusing on countries in sub-Saharan Africa.{{sfn|Foster|2014|p=75}}

Tiessen became an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa in 2013, working in global studies and international development.{{sfn|Foster|2014|p=75}} By 2020, she was a full professor and the associate director of the School of International Development and Global Studies.{{sfn|Otto|Paras|2020}} In addition to her work as a professor, Tiessen assisted Global Affairs Canada, the Canadian foreign affairs department, in designing tools which measure the impact of development funding and projects. The goal was to eliminate the practice of counting only the number of participants and funding in empowerment and equality projects, and instead evaluate in a qualitative manner whether target goals were reached. For example, an audit looking at global aid funding in Canada from 2018 to 2021 revealed that funds targeted for development in Africa had been diverted for the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russo-Ukrainian War. The audit also found that poor tracking made it difficult to evaluate funds spent if recipients of aid met more than one development target. In other words, better accounting of funds was needed to see if goals had been reached if a recipient was both disabled and a child, or elderly and a woman, for example.{{sfn|Robertson|2023|p=A3}} As of 2024, Tiessen was serving as director of the University of Ottawa's Gender, Peace, and Security Collaboratory.{{sfn|Aggestam|True|2024|p=ix}}

Selected works

  • {{cite thesis |last1=Tiessen |first1=Rebecca |title=Navigating Gender Terrain: Gender Inequality and Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations (ENGOS) |url=https://www.nlc-bnc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp02/NQ47414.pdf |date=August 1999 |type=PhD |publisher=University of Guelph |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241002163512/https://www.nlc-bnc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp02/NQ47414.pdf |archive-date=2 October 2024 |location=Guelph, Ontario |url-status=live}}
  • {{cite book |ref=none |last1=Tiessen |first1=Rebecca |title=Everywhere/Nowhere: Gender Mainstreaming in Development Agencies |date=2007 |publisher=Kumarian Press |location=Bloomfield, Connecticut |isbn=978-1-56549-238-7}}
  • {{cite book |ref=none |last1=Rao |first1=Aruna |last2=Tiessen |first2=Rebecca |editor1-last=Charlton |editor1-first=Mark |editor2-last=Rowe |editor2-first=Paul |title=Crosscurrents: International Development |date=2008 |publisher=Thomson Nelson |location=Toronto, Canada |chapter=11. Has Gender Mainstreaming Been Effective? |pages=249–272 |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/crosscurrentsint0000unse/page/250/mode/1up?q=Rebecca+Tiessen&view=theater |isbn=978-0-17-610477-1}}
  • {{cite journal |ref=none |last1=Tiessen |first1=Rebecca |last2=Heron |first2=Barbara |title=Volunteering in the Developing World: The Perceived Impacts of Canadian Youth |journal=Development in Practice |date=February 2012 |volume=22 |issue=1 |pages=44–56 |doi=10.1080/09614524.2012.630982 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |location=Abingdon-on-Thames, Oxfordshire |issn=0961-4524 |oclc=9974373808}}
  • {{cite book |editor-last1=Tiessen |editor-first1=Rebecca |editor-last2=Huish |editor-first2=Robert |title=Globetrotting or Global Citizenship?: Perils and Potential of International Experiential Learning |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8rWFAwAAQBAJ&pg=PR4 |date=2013 |publisher=University of Toronto Press |location=Toronto, Ontario |isbn=978-1-4426-4834-0}}
  • {{cite journal |last1=Tiessen |first1=Rebecca |last2=Lough |first2=Benjamin J. |title=International Volunteering Capacity Development: Volunteer Partner Organization Experiences of Mitigating Factors for Effective Practice |doi=10.1080/08039410.2018.1529701 |journal=Forum for Development Studies |volume=46 |issue=2 |pages=299–320 |date=May 2019 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |location=Oxford, Oxfordshire |issn=0803-9410 |oclc=10310041029}}
  • {{cite book |ref={{harvid|Aggestam|True|2024}} |last1=Tiessen |first1=Rebecca |editor1-last=Aggestam |editor1-first=Karin |editor2-last=True |editor2-first=Jacqui |editor2-link=Jacqui True |title=Feminist Foreign Policy Analysis: A New Subfield |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2nQOEQAAQBAJ&pg=PR9 |date=2024 |publisher=Bristol University Press |location=Bristol, UK |chapter=13. Aid and Development |pages=183–198 |isbn=978-1-5292-3946-1}}

References

=Citations=

{{Reflist|30em}}

=Bibliography=

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  • {{cite journal |editor1-last=Foster |editor1-first=Clarke |title=Biographical Sketches |journal=Undercurrent |date=Fall–Winter 2014 |volume=10 |issue=2 |pages=74–76 |url=https://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/201/300/undercurrent/2014/Fall-Winter-2014-3.pdf |access-date=5 October 2024 |publisher=Undercurrent Journal |location=Peterborough, Ontario |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241005154651/https://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/201/300/undercurrent/2014/Fall-Winter-2014-3.pdf |archive-date=5 October 2024 |issn=1712-0934}}
  • {{cite book |last1=Goldstein |first1=Joshua S. |author1-link=Joshua S. Goldstein |last2=Pevehouse |first2= Jon C. |last3=Whitworth |first3=Sandra |title=International Political Economy |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780558131104/page/474/mode/1up?q=%22rebecca+tiessen%22 |edition=Custom for Queen's University |date=2008 |publisher=Pearson Custom Publishing |location=Kingston, Ontario |isbn=978-0-558-13110-4}}
  • {{cite news |last1=Laucius |first1=Joanne |title=The Faces We've Lost: Erika Tiessen 'Knew How To Do or Fix almost Anything' |url=https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/the-faces-weve-lost-erika-tiessen-knew-how-to-do-or-fix-almost-anything |access-date=2 October 2024 |work=Ottawa Citizen |date=23 December 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201218180015/https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/the-faces-weve-lost-erika-tiessen-knew-how-to-do-or-fix-almost-anything |archive-date=18 December 2020 |location=Ottawa, Ontario |url-status=live}}
  • {{cite book |editor1-last=MacLean |editor1-first=Sandra J. |editor2-last=Black |editor2-first=David R. |editor3-last=Shaw |editor3-first=Timothy M. |editor3-link=Timothy M. Shaw |title=A Decade of Human Security: Global Governance and New Multilateralisms |url=https://archive.org/details/decadeofhumansec0000unse/page/n13/mode/1up?q=Rebecca+Tiessen |date=2006 |publisher=Ashgate Publishing |location=Farnham, Surrey |isbn=978-0-7546-4773-7}}
  • {{cite conference |last1=Otto |first1=Jenine |last2=Paras |first2=Andrea |title=Panelists |conference=Understanding the Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on the Canadian Humanitarian and Development Sector: A Presentation of Research Findings, Guelph Institute of Development Studies |url=https://www.caidp-rpcdi.ca/understanding-impact-covid-19-pandemic-canadian-humanitarian-and-development-sector-presentation |publisher=Canadian Association of International Development Professionals |access-date=25 November 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240530155246/https://www.caidp-rpcdi.ca/understanding-impact-covid-19-pandemic-canadian-humanitarian-and-development-sector-presentation |archive-date=30 May 2024 |location=Ottawa, Ontario |date=7 October 2020 |url-status=live}}
  • {{cite journal |ref={{harvid|Masters Abstracts|1996}}|author= |title=Political Science, International Law and Relations |journal=Masters Abstracts International |date=1996 |volume=34 |issue=3–4 |page=1035 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=plEnAQAAIAAJ&q=rebecca+tiessen,+University+of+Guelph |access-date=2 October 2024 |publisher=University Microfilms International |location=Ann Arbor, Michigan |issn=0898-9095 |oclc=13402378}}
  • {{cite news |last1=Robertson |first1=Dylan |title=Disorganized Reporting Means Ottawa Can't Track Feminist Outcomes, Audit: Questions Arise over Foreign Aid for Women |url=https://newspaperarchive.com/ca/manitoba/winnipeg/winnipeg-free-press/2023/03-28/page-3/ |access-date=26 November 2024 |work=Winnipeg Free Press |agency=The Canadian Press |date=28 March 2023 |location=Winnipeg, Manitoba |page=A3 |via=Newspaperarchive.com}}
  • {{cite web |last1=Tiessen |first1=Rebecca |title=Curriculum Vitae: Rebecca Thiessen |url=https://cdn.dal.ca/content/dam/dalhousie/pdf/cfps/staff/research/tiessen-cv-nov12.pdf |access-date=5 October 2024 |date=12 November 2015 |publisher=Dalhousie University |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241005155604/https://cdn.dal.ca/content/dam/dalhousie/pdf/cfps/staff/research/tiessen-cv-nov12.pdf |archive-date=5 October 2024 |location=Halifax, Nova Scotia |url-status=live}}
  • {{cite journal |ref={{harvid|American Doctoral Dissertations|1999}}|author= |title=University of Guelph (Canada): Tiessen, Rebecca Lee |journal=American Doctoral Dissertations |date=1999 |volume=1999-2000 |page=660 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=R90yAQAAIAAJ&q=tiessen |access-date=2 October 2024 |publisher=University Microfilms International |location=Ann Arbor, Michigan |issn=0065-809X |oclc=993334897}}

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{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tiessen, Rebecca}}

Category:1970 births

Category:Living people

Category:People from Leamington, Ontario

Category:Wilfrid Laurier University alumni

Category:University of Guelph alumni

Category:Academic staff of Dalhousie University

Category:Academic staff of the Royal Military College of Canada

Category:Academic staff of the University of Ottawa

Category:Canadian Africanists

Category:Canadian gender studies academics

Category:Canadian sociologists

Category:Development specialists

Category:International relations scholars

Category:20th-century Canadian women educators

Category:21st-century Canadian women educators

Category:Canadian women sociologists