Dr. Arash Beidollahkhani is a Research Fellow at the Global Development Institute at the University of Manchester and an Affiliated research assistant professor at the Hannah Arendt Institute for Totalitarianism Studies at TU Dresden. His research focuses on digital politics, AI governance, authoritarian resilience, and political transformation in the Middle East and Central Asia. Prior to joining Manchester, he held teaching and research positions at universities across the Middle East and Central Asia, including institutions in Iran, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Taiwan, and South Korea. His work has been supported by major international foundations, including the British Academy and the Gerda Henkel Foundation, and he has been awarded multiple competitive fellowships in Europe and Asia. Dr. Beidollahkhani has published extensively in leading international journals, with recent articles appearing in Democratization, International Peacekeeping, Central Asian Survey, Discourse & Communication, Higher Education Policy, and Feminist Media Studies. His current research examines AI-driven governance, digital politics and AI infrastructure policy in global south, and the socio-political effects of emerging technologies across West Asia. He is also an active member of BRISMES (The British Society for Middle Eastern Studies), and several regional research networks. At IGPP, his research explores China’s evolving AI politics- policy and its role in shaping political dynamics, digital infrastructure development, and technological empowerment across the Global South, with a particular analytical focus on West Asia and Central Asia.

Here also are some recent publications if you would like to add to the website: 

Beidollahkhani, A. (2025). From predicting dissent to programming power; analyzing AI-driven authoritarian governance in the Middle East through TRIAD framework. Democratization, 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2025.2576527 [doi.org]

Beidollahkhani, A. (2025). From Rubble to Renewal: Hannah Arendt’s Natality as a Framework for Peacebuilding in Gaza’s Humanitarian Collapse. International Peacekeeping, 32(5), 947–972. https://doi.org/10.1080/13533312.2025.2542780 [doi.org]

Beidollahkhani, A. (2025). Visual resistance, digital counterpublics, and feminist agency in Iran’s digital protests from 2018 to 2023. Discourse & Communication, 19(5), 864-886. https://doi.org/10.1177/17504813251380447 [doi.org]