Violetta Zentai is a social anthropologist, associate professor at the School of Public Policy and
research fellow at the Democracy Institute of the Central European University, Budapest-Vienna. She
is also faculty member of the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology and the Doctoral
School for Political Sciences and International Relations of the University. She has been founding
member and advisor to the Open Learning Initiative (OLIve) program offering refugee education of
the CEU since 2016. She co-directed the Center for Policy Studies of the CEU (2003-2020). Her
research focuses on ethnic and gender inequalities, post-socialist socio-economic transformations,
European social inclusion policies, and social justice and pro-equality civil society formations. She
also worked as expert with the Open Society Foundations for two decades on democratic local
governance, equality mainstreaming, and rights-based development.