Gentian Elezi is resident professor in the Department of European Transformation and Integration (ETI) at the College of Europe, Tirana Campus.
Prior to joining the College, he was Chair of Department of EU Diplomacy and International Relations at the Institute of European Studies of the University of Tirana. He was also a Visiting Scholar at the Department of Politics and International Studies (POLIS) of the University of Cambridge, UK (2018). Previously, he has also worked as academic coordinator and lecturer at the European University of Tirana (2008-2012).
In addition to his academic career, he has experience in EU affairs as a practitioner, by holding the position of Deputy Minister for European Integration of Albania (2013-2016) and providing consultancy and expertise in several projects and think-tanks in the Western Balkans.
His main research interests focus on EU enlargement policy, democratisation, policy and institutional reforms, and the Western Balkans EU accession process. He holds a Jean Monnet Chair in "Building capacities for EU accession" (2022-2025) and has been main coordinator in many research projects. He is recipient of several awards, including the Chevening scholarship (Foreign Commonwealth Office, UK), Francois Duchene Award (European Movement UK), Civil Society Scholar Award (OSI), etc.
Gentian Elezi holds a Ph.D. in Politics and an MA in European Politics, both from the University of Sussex, UK. He obtained his BA in Political Science from the University of Milan, Italy.