Adel Hamaizia

Adel Hamaizia is a research fellow at the Belfer Center’s Middle East Initiative at the Harvard Kennedy School and a doctoral researcher at the University of Oxford, where he previously taught Middle East politics. His primary research interests include political economy, geoeconomics, energy policy, state-business relations, MSMEs, and the informal sector across the Middle East and North Africa (with a particular focus on the Maghreb and the Gulf Cooperation Council states). More recently, he has led research and policy projects on China-MENA relations, GCC-Africa relations, GCC energy transitions, and Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030.

Hamaizia is currently the managing director at London-based Highbridge Advisory, a strategic boutique advisory focused on information advantage, risk mitigation, and policy development and implementation for companies and governments working in the Middle East, the Balkans, and Africa. He is a senior advisor at the Milken Institute and a non-resident senior fellow at the Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Middle East programs. Hamaizia was formerly a visiting fellow at Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies and previously a senior teaching fellow at the Centre for Financial and Management Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He was previously the committee vice-chairman of the Oxford Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Studies Forum where he was the co-founder and the co-editor of the forum’s thematic-quarterly, “Gulf Affairs.” Hamaizia was also an associate at Global Partners Governance and formerly an associate fellow at the Chatham House Middle East and North Africa Programme. He has consulted for several governments, foundations, and private sector organizations with a focus on political risk, due diligence, corporate investigations, public diplomacy, and economic development.

Hamaizia regularly convenes and contributes to track 1.5 and 2 meetings and is engaged in a range of volunteering activities related to employability skills training for students across the Middle East and North Africa. He has provided commentary for media outlets including The New York Times, Financial Times, The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Arab News, The National, and Al Jazeera.