Daphna Hacker

Daphna Hacker
Born	(1969-04-16) 16 April 1969 Jerusalem, Israel
Children	2
Academic background
Education	LL.B, 1994, Hebrew University of Jerusalem LL.M., 1996, Washington College of Law PhD., 2004, Tel Aviv University
Thesis	Motherhood’, ‘Fatherhood’, and Law: A Sociological Analysis of the Field that Shapes Custody and Visitation Arrangements (2004)
Academic work
Sub-discipline	family law, feminist jurisprudence
Institutions	Tel Aviv University

Daphna Hacker (Hebrew: דפנה הקר; born 16 April 1969) is a full professor at the Tel Aviv University law faculty and Women and Gender Studies Program. After publishing Legalized Families in the Era of Bordered Globalization, Hacker was awarded the 2018 LSA Jacob Book prize.

Early life and education

After attending Rene Cassin Alliance High School and serving in the IDF, Hacker earned her LL.B in 1994 from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She then moved to North America where she graduated with an LL.M. at the Washington College of Law in 1996 (sum com laude). In 2004, she earned her PhD at the Sociology and Anthropology Department at Tel Aviv University (sum com laude).

Hacker is the mother of two children.

Academic Career

Hacker has been a member at the Law Faculty and the Women and Gender Studies Program at the Faculty of Humanities at Tel Aviv University since 2005, becoming a full professor in 2020.  

Her research deals with the relationship between law and society, focusing on a gender perspective for family law. Her publications deal with parental arrangements upon divorce, transnational families, and intergenerational families. Hacker teaches courses on family law, feminism and law, advanced theories in law and society, and qualitative research methods.

In 2017, Hacker published a book exploring the interrelations between families, globalization and borders, through a legal lens. The book won an award from the American Society for Law and Society, for the best book of 2018.

Hacker served as the head of the women's and gender studies program at Tel Aviv University in the years 2018-2022. She has been a visiting professor at Cornell university, Hong Kong University, the University of Warsaw, and King’s College London.

In 2019, Hacker won the Michelle Halperin Award of Ben-Gurion University for excellence in research.

Public Service and Activism

Hacker was the Head of the Steering Committee of the Knowledge Center on Women and Gender, on behalf of the Ministry of Science and Technology. She also served on the Governmental Committee on Aspects of Parental Responsibility upon Divorce, and was a founding member of Itach-Maaki Women Lawyers for Social Justice. For her public service on behalf of women, she has been given the Katan Award for the Advancement of Gender Justice through Voluntary Work (2013), and the Jewel Bellush Outstanding Israeli Feminist Award, by the NCJW (2019).

In 2022, Prof. Hacker was elected by a majority of 115 countries in the UN General Assembly to a four-year term on the UN Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

In August 2024, she was nominated as the Chairwoman of the Israeli Women's Network.

Hecker is a member of The Israeli Law Professors’ Forum for Democracy, which works against the regime changes proposed in the legal system in 2023. She is also a member of the Day after the War Forum, which was established immediately after Hamas’ October 7th attack with the aim of persuading decision makers and the public that a military operation with the aim of overthrowing the Hamas regime in Gaza must be part of a regional security alliance.