Anjeza Xhaferaj has been a lecturer at the Department of Applied Social Sciences since 2011. She currently teaches Political Parties and Electoral Systems, Comparative Foreign Policy, and Politics of Great Powers. Anjeza holds a PhD in Political Theory, awarded in 2016 by the European University of Tirana. She completed her Master’s studies in European Politics at the University of Sussex, United Kingdom, in 2010. Her fields of expertise include political parties and electoral systems, political movements, civil society, studies on totalitarianism in Albania, and Albania’s foreign policy.

Anjeza has completed the executive courses Leadership and Character in Uncertain Times at Harvard University (2020), Influencing without Authority in a VUCA World, and Navigating Change at the Centre for Creative Leadership, Brussels, Belgium (2020). As part of the LEAD Albania Fellowship Programme and under its framework, during 2019-2020 Anjeza has worked as Advisor/Lead Fellow at Prime Minister’s Office.

Dr. Xhaferaj actively participates in COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) research projects, including History of Identity Documentation in European Nations: Citizenship, Nationality and Migration; Linking Euroscepticism and Populism: Causes and Consequences; Redressing Radical Polarisation: Strengthening European Civil Spheres Facing Illiberal Digital Media; and Research Network for Interdisciplinary Studies of Transhistorical Deliberative Democracy.

She has also been involved in other major EU-funded international projects such as the Horizon project Re-engaging with Neighbours in a State of War and Geopolitical Tensions; STEFORA (STEM for All); University to Society Innomediaries in Albania: Co-Production of Knowledge and Research that Matters (U-SIA); Green Western Balkans (GREENWB); and HEART: Placing Human Rights at the Heart of Higher Education in the Western Balkans, a Tempus project. Additionally, she has contributed to the project Training of Trainers for Candidates for Municipal Councils: The Functional Model of Municipal Councils in Albania, funded by Bashki të Forta / Helvetas.

Anjeza is the EUT coordinator of PoSIG: Erasmus+ Joint Master’s in Political Science, led by the University of Salzburg. Within the Erasmus+ exchange programme, she has lectured at universities in Portugal, Poland, and Lithuania.