Simone de Beauvoir Prize

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The Simone de Beauvoir Prize (French: Prix Simone de Beauvoir pour la liberté des femmes) is an international human rights prize for women's freedom, awarded since 2008 to individuals or groups fighting for gender equality and opposing breaches of human rights. It is named after the French author and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir, known for her 1949 women's rights treatise The Second Sex.[1]

The prize was founded by Julia Kristeva on January 9, 2008, the 100th anniversary of de Beauvoir's birth. It amounts to 20,000 and is funded by Éditions Gallimard and Culturesfrance. Julia Kristeva, philosopher, is the head of the Simone de Beauvoir prize committee.[2]

According to the organizers:

The prize is awarded every year to a remarkable personality whose courage and thoughts are examples for everybody, in the spirit of Simone de Beauvoir who wrote: "The ultimate end, for which human beings should aim, is liberty, the only capable [thing], to establish every end on."[3]


Prize committee[edit]

The current prize committee is composed of approximately 20 internationally known figures,[1] including several writers, sociologists, philosophers, journalists and politicians.[9]

Julia Kristeva is the founder and head of the Simone de Beauvoir prize committee.[2]

List of committee members[edit]

The committee members for 2009 award were, in alphabetical order, as follows:[3]

  1. Elisabeth Badinter, author, professor of Philosophy
  2. Gerard Bonal, author
  3. Annie Ernaux, author
  4. Claire Etcherelli, author
  5. Elizabeth Fallaize, professor of French at Oxford University
  6. Madeleine Gobeil-Noel, former director of arts at UNESCO
  7. Michel Kail, publisher
  8. Liliane Kandel, sociologist
  9. Ayse Kiran, physician at Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey
  10. Claude Lanzmann, filmmaker
  11. Bjorn Larsson, author
  12. Liliane Lazar, author, Simone de Beauvoir institute in the USA
  13. Annette Levy-Willard, journalist
  14. Anne-Marie Lizin, politician, former Belgian Senate president
  15. Kate Millett , American feminist
  16. Yvette Roudy, former women's rights minister in France
  17. Danièle Sallenave, author, Journalist
  18. Josyane Savigneau, journalist for Le Monde.
  19. Alice Schwarzer, German feminist
  20. Annie Sugier, president of the feminist association (association féministe)
  21. Linda Weil-Curiel, lawyer
  22. Anne Zelensky, president of the League of Women Law (la Ligue du Droit des femmes)


  1. ^ a b "One Million Signature Campaign Honored with Simone de Beauvoir Award". Campaign for Equality. January 9, 2009. 
  2. ^ a b "Simone de Beauvoir Prize 2009 goes to the One Million Signatures Campaign in Iran". Change for Equality. January 10, 2009. 
  3. ^ a b "Création du prix " Simone de Beauvoir pour la liberté des femmes "" (PDF). CulturesFrance. January 14, 2008. 
  4. ^ "Le Prix Simone de Beauvoir 2013 décerné à Malala Yousafzai" (in French). 28 December 2013. Retrieved 7 January 2013. 
  5. ^ "Le Prix « Simone de Beauvoir pour la liberté des femmes » 2010," 26 Dec 2009
  6. ^ "The Simone de Beauvoir prize for Women’s freedom 2009 is awarded to the Iranian campaign "One Million Signatures"". Prix Simone de Beauvoir official weblog. Press release 9 January 2009. Retrieved 12 Oct 2009.  Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ^ "Exiled writer Taslima Nasreen awarded Simone de Beauvoir prize". Radio France international. 2008-05-21. 
  8. ^ "Presentation of Simone de Beauvoir prize to Taslima Nasreen (May 21, 2008)". France-Diplomatie (French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs). 
  9. ^ کمپین یک میلیون امضاء برنده جایزه دوبووار (in Persian). Radio Zamaneh. 

External links[edit]