Rumela Sen
Lecturer in the Discipline of International and Public Affairs; Director of the Master of International Affairs
Personal Details
Rumela Sen’s research focuses on civil conflict, rebel governance, political development and state building, primarily in South Asia. Her first book Farewell to Arms: How Rebels Retire without Getting Killed (Oxford University Press, 2021 ) examines how Maoist rebels in India quit armed groups and return to the same political process that they had once tried to overthrow. The book draws on her extensive fieldwork (funded primarily by the American Institute of Indian Studies) in conflict zones in India, where she interviewed current and former Maoist rebels and other stakeholders in the conflict. The book has received multiple endorsements and has been reviewed in detail by Isabelle Duijvesteijn as part of the Critical Dialogue series in Perspective on Politics.
She is working on her second book on rebel governance and postconflict state-building in Nepal. With support from a SIPA Dean faculty grant, she has done extensive fieldwork in Rolpa and Rukum districts in Nepal and has interviewed Maoist military and political leaders all the way from local to the highest levels. She has earlier published her work on Nepal in Jacobin, and she writes opinion pieces on contemporary Nepali politics in East Asia Forum. Building on her expertise, she is currently collaborating with colleagues in the UK and Australia on a project on comparative rebel governance in South Asia.
She has also published on Hate in the Times of Covid and her recent research is on the evolving landscape of digital transnational repression, pre and post generative AI (under review) Her work has received media coverage in major outlets in South Asia including the India in Transition (CASI), Hindu Business Line, and Ratopati (Nepal). In addition to book chapters and articles, you can find her speaking or writing in diverse outlets including IAPS Dialogue, Mainstream Weekly, CountercurrentsInkstick Media, Alarmist podcast and so on.
Sen received her PhD in Government from Cornell University. She also holds a Masters from Villanova University and another Masters in IR from Jadavpur University (India).
Sen is currently the MIA faculty director at SIPA. She teaches the MPA core course as well as another course on political development. She has advised multiple student capstone projects on building peace in conflict zones with the UNDPO as client. She is also affiliated with the South Asia Institute and the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace at Columbia.
Education
- PhD, Cornell University
- MA, Villanova University
- BA, Jadavpur University
In The Media
SIPA's MIA director will lead initiatives exploring AI's role in international affairs education
SIPA lecturer Rumela Sen explores the politics of Nepal, digital transnational repression, and the intersection of democracy and technology.
Rumela Sen, faculty director of the master’s in international affairs programme at Columbia University, told Al Jazeera that if one looks beyond the visuals of rage emerging from these countries’ protests, “there is a very democratic, sincere aspiration for political inclusion, economic justice, and holding their elected representatives accountable”.
Rumela Sen, a South Asia expert at Columbia University, said it was "worrying" to see "an unprecedented glorification of the army as a voice of sanity and stability".
Historically in Nepal, “there is very much an expectation that security forces will break the law,” said Rumela Sen, a lecturer at Columbia University whose research focuses on political violence in South Asia.