Rapoport is director of the Institute of Family and Environmental Research, a nonprofit educational trust located in London. In 1994-95 she was a scholar in residence at the Ford Foundation, and in recent years she has been a Distinguished Fellow and adviser at the Center for Gender in Organizations at the Simmons Graduate School of Management in Boston. Born in Cape Town, South Africa, she earned her bachelor of social science degree at the University of Cape Town and her doctorate in sociology at the London School of Economics.