Virpi Mäkinen is Senior Lecturer of theological and social ethics in the Faculty of Theology at the University of Helsinki. She holds a title of Docent in theological ethics and philosophy of religion at the same university. As PI, she leads an academy research project "At the Frontiers of Humanity: Extreme Necessity in the History of Ethics, Law and Politics, 300–1600" (2020–2024). Mäkinen is a member of Finnish Academy of Science and Letters and acts as a member in several editorial and academic boards in Finland and other countries. Mäkinen has been a Core Fellow at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (2001–2005; 2005–2007) and Academy Research Fellow (2007–2012). As PI, she has also led an international academy research project “Rights and Needs in Medieval and Early Modern Politics” (2012–2015) and acted as a Vice Director in two Centre of Excellence (funded by the Academy of Finland): “Philosophical Psychology, Morality and Politics” (2008–2013) and “Reason and Religious Recognition” (2014–2019). In both projects she also led research team in medieval and/or early modern thought. In her research, Mäkinen has focused on the early history of individual rights, especially property and minority rights; see e.g. Property Rights in the Late Medieval Discussion on Franciscan Poverty (Peeters 2001); Transformations in Medieval and Early Modern Rights Discourse (Springer 2005, co-ed. Petter Korkman), Lutheran Reformation and the Law (Brill 2006), and Rights at the Margins (Brill 2020, co-ed. Jonathan Robinson, Pamela Slotte and Heikki Haara).