Anita Vandenbeld is a Canadian Member of Parliament, where she has represented Ottawa West-Nepean since 2015. From 2015 to 2018 Vandenbeld served as chair of the House of Commons Subcommittee on International Human Rights as well as the the Parliamentary Women’s Caucus, and has sat on the Foreign Affairs and International Development Committee and the Committee on Access to Information, Privacy, and Ethics. She is also the founding chair of the all-party Democracy caucus. Vandenbeld has also served on the Committee on the Status of Women and the Procedure and House Affairs committee.

Prior to her election to the Canadian House of Commons, Vandenbeld worked for over a decade in international democratic development and women’s political participation, having worked in over 20 countries on inclusive governance and women’s leadership. She managed a global, multi-partner online network to promote women’s political rights and participation, called iKNOWpolitics.org. Vandenbeld was a parliamentary advisor with the United Nations Development Programme in Bangladesh; Senior Advisor and Deputy Chief of the Central Assembly and Political Parties Section of the Organization for Security Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Mission in Kosovo; She coordinated an anti-corruption campaign with the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina; and as the resident director of the National Democratic Institute’s office in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Vandenbeld established a political party program during the 2011 elections.

Vandenbeld has a Masters Degree in Constitutional and Political History from York University. Shortly after leaving graduate school she spent 6 years as a staff member in the Canadian Parliament, including as Director of Parliamentary Affairs in the office of the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister Responsible for Democratic Reform.

Vandenbeld is a recipient of the Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal for her work in Kosovo. She has also served as a board member to the Parliamentary Centre, a Canadian non-profit dedicated to strengthening parliaments around the world, and as a founding board member of the Centre for Democratic and Participatory Governance in Brussels.