Seila Panizzolo

Seila is a Departmental Lecturer in International Politics at the Oxford Department of International Development and a Visiting Fellow at the International Relations Department of the London School of Economics. She previously held a Departmental Lectureship in Global Governance at ODID (2021–2023) and was a Fellow in Qualitative Methodology in the Department of Methodology at the London School of Economics (2023–2026). Before joining Oxford, she was a Senior Teaching Fellow in International Studies and Diplomacy at SOAS, University of London, and a Visiting Lecturer in International Politics at City St George’s, University of London.

She received her PhD in International Politics from City St George’s, where her research examined the humanitarian response of international organisations based in the United Arab Emirates to conflicts in the Middle East between 2016 and 2018. For her doctoral fieldwork, she was based at the United Nations Development Programme in Abu Dhabi and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Doha.

Seila is interested in how international organisations and institutions in humanitarianism and development operate across different geographical scales simultaneously and are therefore exposed to distinct power dynamics, particularly in times of crisis. Drawing on qualitative methods and extensive fieldwork, her research is informed by case studies in the Middle East (United Arab Emirates), Central America (Panama) and Southeast Asia (Thailand). Her current projects examine how the urban spaces of Panama City and Bangkok have been transformed by regional diplomacy and the presence of international organisations. Her book project is a comparative analysis of the regional policies of humanitarian organisations during migration crises in the Darién in Central America and the Andaman Sea in Southeast Asia.