Yakin Ertürk (born 1945)^[1] is a Turkish former United Nations special rapporteur on violence against women and board member of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD), and was a professor of Sociology.^[2][3]

Ertürk has a B.A. from Hacettepe University (1969) and a Ph.D. in Sociology from Cornell University: her thesis (1980) was on "Rural change in Southeastern Anatolia : an analysis of rural poverty and power structure as a reflection of center-periphery relations in Turkey".^[4][5]

Ertürk held posts at King Saud University (1979-1982), Hacettepe University (1983—1986) and Middle East Technical University (METU) (1986-1987) before joining the United Nations in 1997 to become Director of the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW) in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (1997-1999) and then Director of The Division for the Advancement of Women at UN headquarters in New York (1999-2001).^[3] She rejoined the faculty of METU in 2002,^[5] and was a professor in the Department of Sociology until her retirement, and was also the chair of the university's Gender and Women's Study Programme.^[2][6] She was a Visiting Global Associate, Rutgers University, the Center for Women’s Global Leadership (CWGL) and the Institute for Women’s Leadership (IWL) Consortium (15 Sept. 2017-15 April 2018).

In 2003, she was appointed as the United Nations special rapporteur on violence against women, and held this position for six years.^[3] 2009-2013, she served on the Council of Europe Committee on the Prevention of Torture.

• Towards an effective implementation of international norms to end violence against women: Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Yakin Ertürk (PDF). United Nations: Economic and Social Council. 2003.
• Intersections of violence against women and HIV/AIDS: Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Yakin Ertürk (PDF). United Nations: Economic and Social Council. 2005.
• The due diligence standard as a tool for the elimination of violence against women: Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Yakin Ertürk (PDF). United Nations: Economic and Social Council. 2006.
• Intersections between culture and violence against women: Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Yakin Ertürk (PDF). United Nations: Economic and Social Council. 2007.
• Indicators on violence against women and State response : Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Yakin Ertürk (PDF). United Nations: Economic and Social Council. 2008.
• Political economy of women's human rights: Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Yakin Ertürk (PDF). United Nations: Economic and Social Council. 2009.
• Erturk, Yakin; Thompson, Audrey. 15 years of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences (1994-2009) a critical review (PDF).
• Ertürk, Yakin (2016). Violence without Borders : Paradigm, policy and praxis concerning violence against women. Women's Learning Partnership. ISBN 978-1939525666.
• Afkami, M.; Ertürk, Y.; Mayer, A.E., eds. (2018). Feminist Advocacy, Family Law and Violence Against Women. Routledge. doi:10.4324/9780429438202-2. ISBN 978-0-429-43820-2. S2CID 158530374.

• Ertürk, Yakın (2018). "Feminist advocacy for family law reform: international perspectives". In Afkami, M.; Ertürk, Y.; Mayer, A.E. (eds.). Feminist Advocacy, Family Law and Violence Against Women. Routledge. pp. 11–29. doi:10.4324/9780429438202-2. ISBN 978-0-429-43820-2. S2CID 158530374.