Kauffer, Edith

Edith Kauffer is a senior professor and researcher at the Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social (Centre of Research and Superior Studies in Social Anthropology) (CIESAS) in San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, in Southern Mexico.

As a political scientist, she has studied refugees in Central America and in the South of Mexico and analyses refugees’ policies and Guatemalans’ return political project between 1991 and 2002. From 2003, she focused her research on water politics and policy issues: water policies, waters and borders, transboundary river basins, conflicts and cooperation, gender and water, water and power. Her fieldwork experience took place in various regions mainly in Central America, Mexico, the Mediterranean but also in Western Africa, South and North America, and Europe. She participated in diverse activities of training with NGOs and grass roots organisations, civil servants from local, states and national governments as well as international organisations in different Latin American countries on water, climate change, gender and refugees topics.

As she has always worked with colleagues from diverse disciplines of social sciences and humanities, but also biologists and engineers, her approach emphasises dialog between sciences and stakeholders’ collaboration. In this context, she recently incorporated into a bilateral, interdisciplinary and interinstitutional project between Mexico and France, which is part of her residence in Lyon.