Päivi Kymäläinen

I am Professor of Social Policy and the leader and founder of the JUSTSPACES research network. My research focuses on place/law relations, everyday law and democracy, urban inequality, right to public spaces, alternative urbanism and housing precarity. My research activities combine my interdisciplinary interest in critical legal geography, urban studies and social policy. I have worked at Tampere University since 2022, and my professorship is linked with the profilation area STUE (Sustainable Transformation of Urban Environments). I have previously worked at the Universities of Turku and Oulu, and at Helsinki University of Technology. I have also served as a visiting professor/scholar in Nordic (NTNU, Roskilde University, Uppsala University) and North American universities (Simon Fraser University, University of Pennsylvania), and have been a Fulbright Senior Scholar at Syracuse University (USA). 

I am a docent at the University of Turku (urban geography) and at Åbo Akademi University (legal geography).

I lead the Research Network for Justice, Space and Society (JUSTSPACES) and have recently served as a PI in five research projects: Housing Precarity (HOPE) (The Research Council of Finland, 2024–2028),  Spaces of Confinement in the Institutions of Care and Control in Finland (The Research Council of Finland, 2017–2022), The RIght to Suburban Space (The Finnish Ministry of the Environment, Neighborhood Program 2020–2023), Space, Justice and Everyday Democracy (Kone Foundation 2022–2026) and Forest Rights (Kone Foundation 2024–2027).

I enjoy supervising dissertations and Master's theses related to my expertise, so feel free to contact in case you are intersted in the topics of our research team. We are also interested in new collaboration with researchers, cities, journalists, artists, communities and activists. 

My main research interests include:  

- the right to urban space;

- place / law relations; 

- justice and inequality in cities; 

- everyday democracy and participation; 

- urban public spaces;

- urban margins and alternative communities; 

- everyone's rights;

- the conceptualization of place.