About us

Dženeta Karabegović (she/her) is a researcher and lecturer at the University of Salzburg. Her academic interests are in international political sociology with a focus on migration, transnationalism, diaspora, education, remembrance, transitional justice, foreign policy, and the Balkans. She consults and guest lectures with local and international organisations focused on diasporas and development, returnees, education, countering extremism, remembrance, democratisation, social entrepreneurship, and civil society. She holds a PhD in Politics and International Studies from the University of Warwick, an MA in International Relations from the University of Chicago, and a BA (Hon) in German and Political Science with a minor in Holocaust Studies from the University of Vermont. Besides article and chapter length publications in peer-reviewed outlets, she has co-edited several books including the first book on Bosnia and Herzegovina’s foreign policy, a volume on diasporas and transitional justice, migration studies in Austria, and the forthcoming Bosnian Studies – Perspectives from an Emerging Field. Besides her academic engagement, she serves on the Board of Directors of Transparency International BiH, ŠTO TE NEMA, and as an Advisory Board Member at the Kulin Initiative. She was born in Banja Luka, BiH and grew up in Berlin, Germany and Burlington, Vermont in the United States.

Sladjana Lazic (she/they) is an assistant professor of Peace and Conflict studies at the University of Innsbruck, whose research has explored questions of transitional justice, peace(-building) and gender, and memory politics with a regional focus on post-Yugoslav context. Sladjana is the host and editor of the Opinion Peace, a podcast that she started in 2019 during her postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Peace Studies. Sladjana was a co-convener (with Elena Stavrevska) of the workshop “Peace in Plural: Decolonial (and) Feminist Approaches to Peace(-building)" and is a co-editor of the resulting forthcoming special issue. Sladjana holds a PhD in Political Science (with specialisation in Peace and Conflict Studies) from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway.

Vjosa Musliu (she/her) is an assistant professor at the Department of Political Science, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). Her research focuses on international interventions, EU external relations and the way the EU creates and maintains its relations with its ‘others’ and how such practices also creep in in academic work. At VUB she teaches on international conflicts, international political economy, and European history. Previously she was an FWO postdoctoral fellow and had worked as a postdoc at Ghent University and a lecturer at Kent University – Brussels School of International Studies. Her book titled Europeanization and Statebuilding as Everyday Practices. Performing Europe in the Western Balkans (Routledge Studies on Intervention and Statebuilding) was published in 2020. She is a co-author (with Gëzim Visoka) of the edited volume Unravelling Liberal Interventionism. Local Critiques of Statebuilding in Kosovo (Worlding Beyond the West Series). She is also a co-editor of the Routledge Studies on Intervention and Statebuilding Series.

Jelena Obradović-Wochnik (she/her) is a senior lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Aston University, which she joined in 2009. Before joining Aston, Jelena held visiting fellowships at the Aleksanteri Institute, University of Helsinki and the European Union Institute for Security Studies, Paris. Between October and December 2012, Jelena was a visiting fellow at the Center for European Studies, Harvard. Her research interests include migration, transitional justice, war crimes, and the Western Balkans.

Julija Sardelić (she/her) is a lecturer at the Political Science and International Relations Programme, Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University of Wellington (New Zealand), where she (co-)teaches courses on human rights, politics of (forced) migration and nationalism. Her research encompasses broader topics of citizenship and migration, but she is particularly interested in the position of marginalised minorities (Roma), stateless people and forced migrants. Her book entitled The Fringes of Citizenship: Romani Minorities and Civic Marginalization (Manchester University Press, 2021) received a Harriman Rothschild Book Prize Honorable Mention (in Nationalism Studies). Her other research has been published in different political science journals (Ethnopolitics, Politics Journal, among others). She is also a member of the programme committee of the Association for Studies of Nationalities. Before coming to New Zealand, she was a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow at University of Leuven (LINES-Leuven International and European Studies), postdoctoral fellow at University of Liverpool (School of Law and Social Justice), Max Weber fellow at the European University Institute and CITSEE research fellow at University of Edinburgh (CITSEE – ERC Research Project Europeanisation of Citizenship in the Successor States of the Former Yugoslavia). She also has a decade long experience in working in civil society in South East Europe, especially in Romani communities.

Elena B. Stavrevska (she/her) is a lecturer in International Relations at the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies at the University of Bristol. She previously worked as a research officer at the LSE Centre for Women, Peace and Security, a visiting research fellow at the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame, a postdoctoral teaching fellow at Bard College Berlin, and a work-package coordinator and researcher in the EU-funded project Cultures of Governance and Conflict Resolution in Europe and India at the Central European University. Elena co-edited a book with Werner Distler and Birte Vogel on the everyday manifestations of the political economy of peace, Economies of peace: Economy formation processes in conflict-affected societies, published with Routledge. She is currently co-editing (together with Slađana Lazić) a special issue on feminist and decolonial approaches to peace. Her research has explored issues of intersectionality, justice, and political economy in conflict-affected societies, with a particular focus on Bosnia and Herzegovina and Colombia. Beyond her academic work, Elena is a co-founder of Stella, which initiated the first mentorship programme for women and girls in higher education in Macedonia, aiming to build solidarity networks while taking into consideration concerns of first generation and minority women students in particular. She is also the initiator of the #WomenAlsoKnowBalkans list, in an effort to facilitate the inclusion of women in policy and media discussions in and about the region.