People
Graeme Robertson
Director
3110 FedEx Global Education Center
Email • Phone: (919) 962-0445
Graeme Robertson is a professor in the UNC Department of Political Science. His work focuses on political protest and regime support in authoritarian regimes. He is the author of Putin v. The People (with Samuel Greene), published by Yale University Press in June 2019. The book presents a fresh new look at the social bases of support for and opposition to authoritarian rule in Russia. Graeme is also the author of Revolution and Reform in Ukraine, published by PONARS Eurasia (with Silviya Nitsova and Grigore Pop-Eleches) and The Politics of Protest in Hybrid Regimes: Managing Dissent in Post-Communist Russia, published by Cambridge University Press. Graeme currently serves as the associate editor for comparative politics for the American Journal of Political Science.
Adnan Džumhur
Associate Director
3109 FedEx Global Education Center
Email • Phone: (919) 962-0901
Adnan (Adi) Džumhur oversees the center’s overall operations, development, grant administration, programming, and outreach. He spearheaded and was awarded numerous federal and private grants to bolster language and area studies curriculum at UNC. Those include National Resource Center (NRC) and Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowships (FLAS) programs, the Language Flagship Program, Expanding Disciplinary Horizons: New Directions in Russian Studies initiative, and UNC’s Visegrad Studies program. In addition to overseeing the implementation of these programs, Adi works closely with faculty members spanning departments and professional schools at UNC to create long-term opportunities for academic exchanges and partnerships. Those include the visiting lecturer program for Polish, funded by the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange (NAWA), and the UNC Forum on Southeast Europe, a national platform for interdisciplinary research dedicated to the region. In addition to his main administrative job, Adi teaches Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian in the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages.
Nataliia Bondarenko
International Education Program Coordinator
3111 FedEx Global Education Center
Email • Phone: (919) 962-5810
Prior to joining CSEEES, Nataliia Bondarenko founded and managed Soroban schools in Mariupol, Ukraine. She also served as a lecturer at Beetroot Academy Ukraine, mentoring aspiring entrepreneurs. She holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. With prior experience as a public relations specialist at Ukraina TV channel, Nataliia manages the Center’s outreach initiatives and communications.
Pakiza Mammadli
Undergraduate Program Assistant, AY 2023-24
3108 FedEx Global Education Center
Pakiza Mammadli is majoring in Economics B.S. and minoring in Data Science. Originally from Azerbaijan, she lived and studied in Tbilisi, Georgia for ten years. She speaks Azerbaijani, Russian, and Georgian. Pakiza has also been a part of various organizations that focus on advocating for the rights of different communities. Reading Russian literature is one of her favorite hobbies.
Nika Mukasashvili
Graduate Program Assistant, AY 2023-24
3108 FedEx Global Education Center
Nika Mukasashvili is from Tbilisi, Georgia. He finished Georgian-American high school and earned his B.A. from Tbilisi State University. He worked for two years as a senior researcher at Tbilisi State University before enrolling in the Global Studies MA program with concentration in Russian and East European Studies. His main interests are in ethnic and nationalism studies of the Caucasus, political philosophy, and global governance.
Kathryn Ulrich
Business Manager
3106 FedEx Global Education Center
Email • Phone: (919) 843-0129
UNC Russian Flagship Staff
Advisory Board Members
Andrea Bohlman, Associate Professor • Department of Music
Erica Johnson, Director of Graduate Studies • Curriculum in Global Studies
Alexander Kabanov, Distinguished Professor • School of Pharmacy
Klara Peter, Associate Professor • Department of Economics
Eliza Rose, Assistant Professor • Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages
Michele Rivkin-Fish, Associate Professor • Department of Anthropology
Graeme Robertson, Professor • Department of Political Science; ex officio, CSEEES
Stanislav Shvabrin, Associate Professor • Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages
Charles Szypszak, Distinguished Professor • School of Government
Eren Tasar, Associate Professor • Department of History
Kirill Tolpygo, Librarian • Slavic & East European Collections, UNC Libraries