Gul-i-Hina van der Zwan

Gul-i-Hina van der Zwan is a Lecturer at the Institute of Political Science, Leiden University. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Milan, Italy. Her research focuses on understanding the role of rising China vis-à-vis its impact on democratic governance, international development, and geopolitics. Specifically, she examined Chinese investments under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and its political implications on democratization and regime changes in partner countries. She has extensively published on Chinese Linkage and Leverage in Asia and the China- Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

Moreover, she has been an affiliated Research Fellow at the International Institute of Asian Studies (IIAS), Leiden University since 2019 where she contributed to the project “Building the New Silk Road”. “China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Context” from 2019 until 2022. She has also worked as a Lecturer in the International Relations and International Organization department, Faculty of Arts at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands (2022-2023). Her research interests include Comparative Politics, regime change, democracy, (de)democratization, authoritarianism, China, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), linkage and leverage, and politics in Asia.