Merel Jonker obtained her doctorate for a PhD on child maintenance. In this research, she compared child maintenance systems in the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden and discussed whether these Nordic systems could be a source of inspiration for the Dutch system.  The dissertation called ‘Child maintenance: a shared responsibility’ was published in 2011 and received the FJR-prize of the Dutch Association for Family and Youth law.

From 2011 to 2013, Jonker worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Social Research in Oslo. Here she conducted comparative research into multidimensional discrimination cases by analyzing judgments of the Dutch Commission for Equal Treatment and the equality bodies in Norway, Sweden en Denmark.

Currently, Jonker is coordinator and principal investigator of the research project ‘Incoming child abduction procedures in the Netherlands’, commissioned by the Dutch Research and Documentation Centre (WODC), resorting under the Dutch ministry of Justice.