Inés Arco Escriche is a research fellow at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs) working in the line of geopolitics, specialising in East Asia and Chinese politics. She is also an associate professor in UOC-UNITAR's MA in Diplomacy and International Affairs. She joined CIDOB in 2021 as a junior visiting research fellow as part of the First Edition of the Talent Global programme, where she focused on analysing the emergence of feminist foreign policy and pro-gender rules in the international system.Graduated in East Asian Studies from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), she holds a MA in International Relations from the Institut Barcelona Estudis Internacionals (IBEI). Before joining CIDOB, she previously worked at the International Climate Development Institute (ICDI) in Taiwan, where she participated in multiple projects on climate action, social innovation and sustainable development policies. Her current research covers the influence of domestic issues in Chinese foreign policy, the impact of the rise of China for the liberal international order and East Asia regional dynamics.
Doctor in Public International Law and Master in European Studies from the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB). Senior Research Fellow on Latin America in at CIDOB since 2002, previously coordinator of the International Cooperation Area (1996-2002). Associate Professor of Public International Law at the UAB since 1998 and member of the DIE-EURJAIDI research team (2014-2016 and 2017-2019). Associate Professor in the Barcelona Institute for International Studies (IBEI). Member of the Editorial Board of the Revista CIDOB d’Afers Internationals; Member of the Consultative Council of the Revista Mural International of the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro; Member of the advisory board of the Comillas Journal for International Relations. Member of the Scientific Committee of the Reflection group on integration and development in Latin America and Europe (GRIDALE). Research stays at Fundaçao Getulio Vargas of Rio de Janeiro; Colegio de México and the Technical Office of Spanish Cooperation in Mexico City; "School of Oriental and African Studies" in London; the "Institute of Development Studies" University of Susex; and the "Deutches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik" in Berlin. Experience in reports and consultancies for various Spanish and EU institutions. Coordinator of the Europe-Cuba Forum Jean Monnet Network (2018-2021).
Pol Bargués is a Senior Research Fellow at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs), working on the Horizon 2020 project (JOINT), which examines the EU’s external action in conflict-affected societies. He also contributes to the project REGROUP on governance and policies after Covid-19 and SHAPEDEM on EU’s democracy support policies in its Eastern & Southern NeighbourhoodsBargués earned his PhD from the University of Westminster, United Kingdom, in 2014. Before joining CIDOB in 2018, he was a post-doc research fellow at the Centre for Global Cooperation Research and the Institute for Development and Peace (both from the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany). He has also taught several International Relations courses in the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, and the Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals, Spain.Over the years he has developed an interest in the intersection of philosophy, critical theory and international relations. He has critically interrogated international interventions and explored the ideas of resilience, hybrid peace, and hope. He is author of Deferring Peace in International Statebuilding: Difference, Resilience and Critique (Routledge 2018) and has published in diverse academic journals like Review of International Studies, Global Society, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding, Millennium Review of International Studies or Democratization. Since 2020, Bargués is Editor in Chief in the Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding and of the book series Routledge Studies in Intervention and Statebuilding.
Moussa Bourekba is a Research Fellow at the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs (CIDOB). He is also adjunct professor at Blanquerna Faculty of Communication and International Relations and at the University of Barcelona, where he teaches international relations in the MENA region, terrorism and violent radicalisation. Prior to joining CIDOB, he was Junior Research Fellow at the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed, Barcelona). He also worked as a consultant for the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI, Paris). At CIDOB, Moussa focuses on international relations in the MENA region, democratisation processes in North Africa, Arab youth, and violent extremism in Europe and North Africa. His research also covers Islamophobia in Europe. His past projects include EU-funded FP-7 SAHWA, and several Horizon 2020 projects such as EU-LISTCO, CASCADES and BRIDGES. Moussa is completing his PhD on Spanish strategies to prevent violent extremism at the University of Barcelona. He speaks French, English, Spanish and Arabic.
Víctor Burguete is a Senior Research Fellow in the area of Global Geopolitics and Security at CIDOB (Barcelona Center for International Affairs). He is also an associate professor in the Master of Science in Finance and Banking at UPF-BSM (Universitat Pompeu Fabra- Barcelona School of Management). His research focus on foresight geopolitics and issues related to energy, economics, and the European Union. Previously, he had specialized in European issues, political risk and commodities in the Research Service of Banco Sabadell, where he worked as an economist and geopolitical analyst for eight years and he was head of energy and industrial sector analysis. He had previously worked at IESE Business School, as a researcher and research assistant in the evaluation of public policies, macroeconomics and banking competition; and at CaixaBank in the Research Department in the area of European economics.Víctor Burguete has a master's degree in Specialized Economic Analysis in International Trade, Finance and Development from the BSE (Barcelona School of Economics) and bachelor’s degrees in Economics and in Journalism from the Carlos III University of Madrid. He also has a specialized accreditation in financial markets granted by the IEB (Instituto de Estudios Bursátiles).
Carme Colomina is a Senior Research Fellow on European Union, disinformation and global politics at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs), Editor and member of the Editorial Board. She is also visiting professor at the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium, where she teaches a course on Communications Management in the European Union, and at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra. Graduated in Information Science from the Universitat Autònoma of Barcelona and with a postgraduate course in European Union Studies from the UOC, she has been Brussels’ correspondent and head of international affairs in Catalunya Ràdio and in ARA newspaper. As a special envoy, she covered dozens of international summits and political conflicts and she is still a frequent contributor to various media organizations as an analyst of European current affairs. Before joining CIDOB, she also worked as a consultant on various communication projects in the European and Euro-Mediterranean sphere, and was Head of Interregional Cooperation in the Foreign Affairs department of the Catalan government.
Agustí Fernández de Losada Passols is Senior Research Fellow and Director of the Global Cities Programme at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs); founding partner at Phare, Territorios Globales; consultant specialised in urban and territorial governance, city diplomacy and international cooperation; and associate professor of the International Relations Degree at Blanquerna-Universitat Ramon Llull and at IBEI (Barcelona Institute for International Studies) where he teaches International Relations of Global Cities. He is also and Vice-president of the board of the Interarts Foundation and partner at Nadir Perspectiva.During his more than 25 years of professional career, he has worked for different international organizations, national and local governments and other public and private institutions. He has been Director of Studies at Tornos Abogados (2013-2019), Director of the Barcelona Centre for Territorial Studies (2012-2013), Director of International Relations at Diputació de Barcelona (2000 - 2012), General Coordinator of the Office of Orientation and Coordination of the EU URBAL Programme (2008-2012) and the Observatory of Decentralised Cooperation EU-LAC (2005-2012).He holds a bachelor’s degree in law and a master’s degree in European Studies from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB). He also holds a degree in public management from ESADE Business School (ESADE). He is author of several books, reports, policy briefs, papers, and specialized articles.
Marta Galceran is a Research Fellow with the Global Cities Programme at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs), and a part-time lecturer on International Relations at Pompeu Fabra University and CEI-International Affairs. She is a political scientist, holds a PhD in International Relations from UPF and a Master’s (awarded with special distinction) from the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on city diplomacy, urban alliances and global governance, particularly in the field of digital transitions and technological humanism. She has authored several policy papers, academic articles, and other publications on these topics. She also leads the research at the Global Observatory of Urban Artificial Intelligence (GOUAI), within the Cities Coalition for Digital Rights. Before joining CIDOB she held the position of Program Coordinator of the Smart City Expo World Congress and senior consultant at Anteverti, where she advised local governments and international organizations (i.e., UN-Habitat, IADB, European Commission) on internationalization and urban innovation policies.
Blanca Garcés is a Senior Research Fellow in the area of Migrations and Research Coordinator at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs). PhD cum laude in Social Sciences from the University of Amsterdam and BA in History and Anthropology from the University of Barcelona. Her PhD thesis was awarded the Dutch Sociological Association (NSV) prize for the best sociological dissertation defended in the Netherlands in 2009 and 2010. For more than 15 years she has studied immigration and asylum policies from a comparative perspective. In her book Markets, citizenship and rights (2012), she analysed to what extent different political contexts (Spain and Malaysia) lead to different immigration policies. In the book Integration, processes and policies in Europe (2014), written together with Rinus Penninx, she proposes a heuristic model to study integration processes and policies. In the last five years she has studied policies and political discourses on asylum in Europe, with a special attention to border policies and state reception systems. Since 2021, she coordinates a H2020 project to understand the causes and consequences of migration narratives in a context of increasing politicisation and polarisation in Europe. She is member of the european network IMISCOE and of the editorial college of the recently created Migration Politics Journal.
Research Fellow in the area of migrations at CIDOB and research collaborator at CER-Migracions. She has a PhD in sociology with an extraordinary award from the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), and she wrote her thesis on ethnic entrepreneurship and the Pakistani community in Barcelona. Her main lines of research are migrations and the labour market, and migrations from a gender perspective. At CIDOB she has worked specifically on LGTBI refugees, agricultural seasonal workers, and circular migration, and currently with narratives and migrations. Previously, she has worked for eight years at the European Social Research Unit of the University of Barcelona (UB) on various projects on discrimination, migration and social exclusion, and two years at CER-Migracions on a project on arranged and forced marriages. She has also received the Josep Irla Postdoctoral Scholarship, researching the educational and employment trajectories of descendants of Asian immigrants in Catalonia, and has collaborated with the Barcelona City Council on a study on the economic empowerment of Pakistani women. As for teaching, she is coordinator of the Labour Market and Immigration Module of the Interuniversity Master in Contemporary Migration of CER-Migracions.
Ricardo Martinez is a Senior Research Fellow of the Global Cities Programme at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs). His research focuses on the international and transnational actions of cities, the localization of the global and European agendas on sustainability and development, and the contribution of city diplomacy to global climate governance. He has published on urban studies and international relations’ academic journals such as Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Urban Geography, and Urban Studies. Before joining CIDOB, he has been a Postdoctoral Fellow and Research Associate at the Asia Research Institute (ARI) of the National University of Singapore (NUS), researching on policy mobilities, decentralized cooperation, and the urban age. Previously a policy officer, Ricardo has over 10 years of professional experience in the global network United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), where his work focused on the linkage between international development and urban governance. He obtained a PhD in Political Science from Heidelberg University with a doctoral thesis on city networks, multilateralism, and policy learning. Ricardo has a Master’s Degree in Information and Knowledge Society from the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), a Master’s Degree in Urban and Territorial Development from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC), and a Bachelor’s Degree in Urban Planning from the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’.
Pol Morillas is Director of CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs). He is a political scientist, holds a PhD in Politics, Policies and International Relations from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) and a Master's (with distinction) in International Relations from the London School of Economics. His PhD received the distinction Cum Laude and the special prize award by UAB. He has taught at several universities, including the UAB, IBEI, ESADE and Blanquerna. He is also a member of the Board of Cercle d’Economia and of IBEI's Observatori de Política Exterior Europea (European Foreign Policy Observatory). Previously, he was Coordinator of the Political and Security Committee of the Council of the EU, Advisor on External Action at the European Parliament and Head of the Euro-Mediterranean Policies field at the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed). He has published numerous research articles in academic journals, think tanks and opinion pieces on global geopolitics, European foreign policy and European integration, among other topics. His latest book is Strategy-Making in the EU. From Foreign and Security Policy to External Action (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019) and he has co-directed the documentary Bouncing Back: world politics after the pandemic (2021), which proposes a reflection on the dynamics of conflict and opportunities for international cooperation in the post-Covid-19 world. He has also participated in several H2020 and Horizon Europe research projects such as MENARA, FEUTURE, MEDRESET, EU-LISTCO, EU IDEA and JOINT and collaborates with other think tanks and international organisations. He regularly collaborates with various media outlets (press, radio and TV) as a European and international affairs analyst.
Francesco Pasetti is a Research Fellow at CIDOB in the area of Migrations and adjunct professor at the Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals (IBEI) and at Pompeu Fabra University. His interest in “migration matters” dates back to his experience at the ASK Research Center (Bocconi University) where he developed a two-year project on diasporic media. Turned his attention to the world of politics, he delved into the study of migrant integration and its politics at GRITIM-UPF as PhD candidate. In his thesis, Pasetti addressed the issue of integration policies in Europe through a mixed-method investigation, paying special attention to the political imaginaries that lie beyond citizenship regimes in Italy and Spain. His expertise on integration policy grows in parallel as research collaborator for the Migration Policy Center (European University Institute) between 2013 and 2015. Since 2017, he has specialized in policy evaluation based on indicators. Currently, he is working on policies and political discourses on refugees, paying special attention to the Spanish context.
Héctor Sánchez Margalef is a Researcher at CIDOB (Barcelona Centre for International Affairs). He holds a BA in Political Science and a MA in International Relations, Security and Development by Autonomous University of Barcelona in 2012 and is PhD candidate at the University of Barcelona. Before joining CIDOB he worked as an intern in the Research Institute for Managing Sustainability (Vienna) and the European Institute of the Mediterranean (Barcelona). In 2013 he joined CIDOB as a research assistant of the Greater Mediterranean area. Later he joined CIDOB’s expert team as researcher in his areas of study: European politics and integration dynamics, new political movements and democracy and participation. He has worked in private and public funded projects such as the Mercator European Dialogue, FACTS, EU Idea and The Raval Project. He speaks Catalan, Spanish, English and French.
Reinhard Schweitzer is a Research Fellow in the area of Migration at CIDOB, the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs. He is also a Research Associate at the Sussex Centre for Migration Research (SCMR) in Brighton, UK, and Associate Editor of the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. He holds a PhD in Migration Studies from the University of Sussex, as well as degrees in Political Science and Sociology from the University of Innsbruck. From 2018 to 2020 he was a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Research Fellow at the Department of Political Science of the University of Vienna, where he led the project REvolTURN - Managing migrant return through ‘voluntariness’. His research focusses on the politics, practices, and challenges of governing international migration across different political and administrative levels, geographical contexts, and institutional settings. From an interdisciplinary and comparative perspective, he studies legal frameworks, everyday practices of policy implementation, and ways in which migrants themselves perceive, use, bend or resist the rules and restrictions imposed on their mobility and “integration”. He recently co-edited the open access book Politics of (Dis)Integration (IMISCOE Research Series, 2020) and has published in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Politics and the Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies. His latest book Micro-Management of Irregular Migration will be published by Springer in early 2022.
Alexandra Vidal is a researcher and project manager for the Global Cities Program. Her research revolves around the digitization of cities and the democratic and ethical processes in the development of urban artificial intelligence. Currently, she is part of the research team of the Global Observatory of Urban Artificial Intelligence (GOUAI) within the framework of the Cities Coalition for Digital Rights. She has a Postgraduate Degree in Territorial Planning with a focus on sustainable urbanism from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya and a Degree in International Relations from Blanquerna - Universitat Ramón Llull, having completed part of her studies at "L'École de Gouvernance et d'Économie" in Rabat. Before joining CIDOB, she was a researcher and project manager at the Tanja Foundation, developing international cooperation projects between Morocco and Spain.
