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Professor Albena Azmanova

Professor of Political and Social Science

School of Policy & Global Affairs Department of International Politics

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About

Overview

Albena Azmanova is a professor of political science at City St George’s University of London with specialisation in critical social theory and political economy. Her research and teaching interests include, among other things, democratic theory, political epistemology, and critiques of contemporary capitalism. Her most recent research on the political economy and social psychology of the rise of populism in current-day democracies has received numerous awards. Professor Azmanova is a member of the expert group to the Independent Commission for Sustainable Equality of the European Parliament and Honorary Fellow of the Institute for Global Sustainable Development, University of Warwick. As a Senior Fellow at Open Society University Network’s Economic Democracy Initiative, led by Bard College, she is curating, with Pavlina Tcherneva, the symposium “Post-Neoliberalism: Pathways for Transformative Economics and Politics”. Professor Azmanova is founder and editor-in-chief (with James Chamberlain) of Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis and co-director of the Radical Critical Theory Circle. She also serves on the European Civic Academy’s Task Force to the European Civic Forum, among other advisory positions in international political institutions.

AWARDS AND HONORS

2024: Accreditation Council for Entrepreneurial and Engaged Universities (ACEEU): Impactful Research of the Year, Triple E Awards (Entrepreneurship and Engagement Excellence in Higher Education)

2022: International Studies Association: Best Book Prize for International Political Economy

2021: American Political Science Association, caucus for critical political science: Michael Harrington Book Award, in recognition of “an outstanding book that demonstrates how scholarship can be used in the struggle for a better world”

2021: British International Studies Association: Susan Strange Best Book Prize, (Honourable Mention)

2001: The Hannah Arendt Memorial Award in Politics of the New School for Social Research for PhD dissertation

Qualifications

  • PhD in Political Science, The New School for Social Research, United States, 1995 - May 2001
  • M.A. in Political Science, The New School for Social Research, United States, September 1992 - December 1994
  • M.A. in Political Science, Sofia University, Bulgaria, September 1987 - August 1992
  • Certificat d’Etudes Européennes, Institut des Hautes Etudes Européennes, Université Robert Schuman, France, September 1991 - June 1992

Employment

  • Honorary Professor, University of Kent, United Kingdom, September 2024 - present
  • Professor of Political and Social Science, City, University of London, United Kingdom, September 2024 - present
  • Senior Fellow, Bard College, United States, September 2023 - present
  • Honorary Fellow, Institute for Global Sustainable Development, University of Warwick, United Kingdom, May 2023 - present
  • member of the Civic Academy Task Force, European Civic Forum, Belgium, September 2022 - present
  • Editor-in-Chief, Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis, United States, September 2021 - present
  • Member of the International Advisory Board, The Bauman Institute for Critical Sociology, United Kingdom, September 2020 - present
  • member of expert grooup, European Parliament, Belgium, September 2020 - present
  • member of the Advisory Board, The Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability, Belgium, September 2020 - present
  • Professor of Political and Social Science, University of Kent, United Kingdom, September 2005 - September 2024
  • Assistant Professor of Politics, Vesalius College, Belgium, September 2002 - September 2005
  • Maître de Conférences, Institut d'études politiques de Paris (Sciences Po), France, September 1998 - September 2002
  • Adjunct Professor, Ecole des Hautes Études Commerciales/ HEC Paris, France, January - June 1998
  • Adjunct Professor of Political Theory, The New School for Social Research, United States, September 1995 - December 1996

Languages

French (can read, write, speak, understand spoken, peer review) and Russian (can read, understand spoken)

Publications

Publications by category

Book

  • Azmanova, A. and Mihai, M. (2015). Reclaiming democracy: Judgment, responsibility and the right to politics.

Chapters (17)

  • Azmanova, A. (2025). 1989's ambitious pragmatism. Velvet Capitalism and the Crisis of Liberal Democracy (pp. 60-73). Routledge.
  • Azmanova, A. (2025). 1989’s ambitious pragmatism: Lessons for fighting autocratic capitalism today. Velvet Capitalism and the Crisis of Liberal Democracy (pp. 61-73).
  • Azmanova, A. (2024). The Road to the European Social Green Deal: Class Struggle or Counter-Hegemony. Philosophy and Politics - Critical Explorations (pp. 13-24). Springer Nature Switzerland. ISBN 9783031537356.
  • Azmanova, A. and Chamberlain, J. (2022). Introduction: Democracy, Capitalism, Socialism, or None of the Above – Deciphering History’s Tremors. Philosophy and Politics Critical Explorations (pp. 1-8).
  • Azmanova, A. (2022). Populism and the Recasting of the Ideological Landscape of Liberal Democracies. The Palgrave Handbook of Populism (pp. 379-385). Springer International Publishing. ISBN 9783030808020.
  • Azmanova, A. and Chamberlain, J. (2022). Introduction. Philosophy and Politics - Critical Explorations (pp. 1-8). Springer International Publishing. ISBN 9783031084065.
  • da Silva, F.C. and Vieira, M.B. (2021). Populism. Routledge International Handbook of Contemporary Social and Political Theory (pp. 531-540). Routledge.
  • Azmanova, A. (2021). Battlegrounds of Justice: The Pandemic and What Really Grieves the 99%. Pandemics, Politics, and Society (pp. 243-256). De Gruyter.
  • Azmanova, A. (2020). The costs of the democratic turn in political theory. Theory as Ideology in International Relations (pp. 99-117). Routledge.
  • Azmanova, A. (2019). Late Capitalism. The Cambridge Habermas Lexicon (pp. 230-234). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107172029.
  • Azmanova, A. (2019). Karl Marx (1818–1883). The Cambridge Habermas Lexicon (pp. 616-620). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107172029.
  • Azmanova, A. (2019). Andrew Arato (1944– ). The Cambridge Habermas Lexicon (pp. 483-484). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107172029.
  • Azmanova, A. (2016). Democracy against Social Reform: The Arab “Spring” Faces Its Demons1. What is Enlightenment Continuity or Rupture in the Wake of the Arab Uprisings (pp. 239-254).
  • Azmanova, A. and Mihai, M. (2015). RECLAIMING DEMOCRACY Judgment, Responsibility, and the Right to Politics INTRODUCTION. RECLAIMING DEMOCRACY: JUDGMENT, RESPONSIBILITY, AND THE RIGHT TO POLITICS (pp. 1-13). ISBN 9781138850910.
  • Azmanova, A. (2013). The 'crisis of capitalism' and the state-more powerful, less responsible, invariably legitimate. Semantics of Statebuilding Language Meanings and Sovereignty (pp. 163-180).
  • Azmanova, A. (2013). The 'crisis of capitalism' and the state-more powerful, less responsible, invariably legitimate. Semantics of Statebuilding Language Meanings and Sovereignty (pp. 150-162).
  • Azmanova, A. (2012). Social Harm, Political Judgment, and the Pragmatics of Justification. Philosophical Dimensions of Human Rights (pp. 107-123). Springer Netherlands. ISBN 9789400723757.

Conference paper and proceedings

  • Albena Azmanova, Deliberative Conflict and 'The Better Argument' Mystique. .doi:10.1353/gso.0.0098

Internet publication

  • Azmanova, A.(2025).Albena Azmanova, "Diagnosing Europe: Precarity and insecurity as the new normal" (interview), European Economic and Social Committee, Newsletter April 2025.

Journal articles (35)

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