Dr Irene Fernandez-Molina

I am a senior lecturer in International Relations at the University of Exeter, which I joined in 2015. I am a scholar of international relations of the Global South and across the Euro-Mediterranean space, contested statehood and international recognition politics, as well as foreign policy and conflicts in the Maghreb/North Africa. My work has shed light on the international from the perspective of subaltern and/or liminal actors and spaces, contributing to new constructivist and relational IR as well as to de-exceptionalising North African studies.

I am the current Director of Education and Student Experience (DESE) for Politics and International Relations in Exeter's Department of Social and Political Sciences, Philosophy, and Anthropology (SPSPA). Here, I have also convened the MA Politics and International Relations of the Middle East, and acted as the Department of Politics' Director of Undergraduate Studies. I am a fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy, and have taught as a visiting professor at the College of Europe, Bruges campus.

I was previously a lecturer in Middle East Politics and lecturer in International Relations at Exeter, a research fellow at the European Neighbourhood Policy Chair of the College of Europe, Natolin campus (Warsaw), a Schuman fellow at the Directorate-General for External Policies of the European Parliament (Brussels) and a PhD research fellow at the Complutense University of Madrid. I obtained my PhD in Political Science/International Relations with a thesis on Moroccan foreign policy which led me to conduct fieldwork and research visits at various institutions in Morocco (Centre Jacques Berque, Institut Marocain des Relations Internationales-IMRI) and France (Institut de Recherche sur le Monde Arabe et Musulman-IREMAM).