Team
Scientific director
Laurence Deschamps-Laporte (PhD Oxford) is professor of political sciences at the University of Montreal. Expert in Canadian foreign policy and diplomacy, her main research agenda is set in feminism in international relations, Middle-East politics and islamist movements. She completed a PhD at Oxford University thanks to a Rhodes scholarship. Before joining UdeM and CÉRIUM, Laurence Deschamps-Laporte was an advisor, then chief of staff to three Canadian foreign ministers. As a consultant at McKinsey & Company, she carried out public policy mandates in several countries in Africa and the Middle East.
Contact Laurence Deschamps-Laporte by email
3744 Jean-Brillant street, Local 592-10
Academic director
Kathryn Furlong is a full professor in the Department of Geography at the Université de Montréal and holder of the Canada Research Chair in Water and Urbanization (2011-2021). She holds a PhD in Human Geography (UCB). Her research focuses on the social and environmental consequences of political-economic restructuring for water management and governance, particularly in the context of municipal governance. Her research thus brings together the disciplines of economic and urban geography and political ecology while examining numerous issues related to governance, political-economic restructuring, municipal service delivery, socio-technical networks, consumption and the links between practice and ethics. Her research has been supported by SSHRC, FQRSC, Infrastructure Canada and the Canadian Water Network.
Coordination
Clara Bort
Coordinator
Clara Bort is the coordinator of CERIUM. With a master's degree in political science from UdeM, she specialized in comparative politics, post-Soviet studies and theories of nationalism. Her directed work, supervised by Magdalena Dembinska and entitled Building a nation in the context of memory conflict: The case of the Riga Occupations Museum, received the Brigitte Schroeder prize for best directed work from the political science department of the UdeM of 2021. Before joining CÉRIUM, Clara worked in the Admission and Recruitment Department of UdeM, on the recruitment activities side, and was also responsible for communications for the Réseau québécois d'études post-soviétiques.
Contact Clara by email
3744 Jean-Brillant street, Local 592-8
Communications and partnerships
Amandine Hamon
Senior communications and partnerships advisor
Completing a doctorate on journalism and immigration in Quebec, Amandine is also a lecturer in communications and host of the popular science program Questions de communication for the CPAC channel, which aims to foster dialogue between science and society. Passionate about intercultural communication and the dissemination of knowledge, she was a consultant and trainer for the Mohammed VI Polytechnic University in Morocco, where she participated in the launch of a school of applied communications. A graduate of McGill University in political science, Amandine made a detour to the University of Salvador in Buenos Aires before obtaining two graduate degrees in journalism and international studies from the University of Montreal.
Contact Amandine Hamon by email
3744 rue Jean-Brillant, local 592-14
Finances
For questions about our finances, please contact finances@cerium.umontreal.ca.
Samphea Ok
Financial management agent
Contact Samphea by email
3744 Jean-Brillant street, Local 592-12
Fanny Reyns
Administration technician
Holder of a master's degree in cultural management from the University of Brussels, Fanny Reyns had the opportunity to enrich her professional career in Belgium, Italy, Vancouver and most recently at the Center for Dramatic Authors in Montreal. Fanny is delighted to now put her administrative and accounting skills at the service of CÉRIUM.
Contact Fanny by email
3744 Jean-Brillant street, Local 592-13
Research team
Africa
Nicolas Klingelschmitt
Researcher on Africa
Nicolas Klingelschmitt is a PhD candidate and lecturer in the political science department at the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM), and holds a master's degree in international relations & international program management from the University of Lyon 3 (France). His thesis, supported by the Quebec Research Fund in Society and Culture, focuses on the functioning of the African peace and security architecture, in particular the relations between the African Union, the Regional Economic Communities and external partners in the framework of conflict prevention and management. He is a researcher and coordinator at the FrancoPaix Center of the Raoul Dandurand Chair in Strategic and Diplomatic Studies and co-host of the podcast “Au FrancParler”. Nicolas is also a guest researcher at the Institute for Peace and Security Studies at Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia) and a member of the Interuniversity Group for Studies and Research on African Societies (GIERSA). Before starting his thesis, he worked for three years at the Africa World Institute, for which he carried out studies on interreligious dialogue and migratory dynamics in West Africa. He was also an author for Les Clés du Middle-Orient.
Europe
Amani Braa
Researcher on Europe
Amani Braa holds a bachelor’s degree in Middle Eastern languages, cultures, societies and religions from the Cà Foscari University of Venice and an Erasmus Mundus master’s degree in Crossing the Mediterranean towards investment and integration (Università Autonoma de Barcelona, Università Ca’ Foscari di Venezia and Université Paul-Valéry Montpellier). She is a doctoral student in sociology at the Université de Montréal, under the supervision of Valérie Amiraux. Her thesis focuses on family experiences of radicalization in Italy, Tunisia and Quebec.
Middle-East
Hiba Zerrougui
Researcher on the Middle East
Hiba Zerrougui (she/her) is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Political Science at McGill University. Her research interests lie at the intersection of the critical study of political violence, protest movements, everyday life, and the sociology of the state in authoritarian contexts, particularly in Middle Eastern and North African societies. Through a case study of Algeria, her doctoral research focuses on how different forms of violence are embedded in policies and initiatives aimed at providing public goods and services in non-democratic contexts, as well as the ways in which “ordinary people” cope with these violences in their everyday lives. Her four-article thesis is based on the construction of a catalog of nearly 3,000 protest events, in addition to two field studies in Algeria and more than six months of archival research at the United States National Archives (College Park, Maryland). Previously, she held the position of Research Manager at the Canada 150 Research Chair in International Security and Governance at McGill University, under the direction of Professor Jennifer Welsh. From 2021 to 2024, she was also a researcher at the Centre for the Prevention of Radicalization to Violence (CPRMV), where she focused on the rise and popularization of so-called “anti-gender” movements in the Global North and South.
Asia and Indo-pacific
Alexandra Parada
Coordinator of the Chaire d'études asiatiques et indo-pacifiques du CÉRIUM
Alexandra Parada's doctoral research addresses discrimination in the context of artificial intelligence. She participates in various research projects focusing on the practical and theoretical impacts of technologies on rights and justice. More generally, she is interested in the question of human rights and global issues linked to North-South dynamics. She is also involved in several rights defense organizations. She graduated from the University of Montreal (master's degree in international studies, 2017) and from the University of Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (bachelor's degree in law and bachelor's degree in philosophy, 2013).
Contact Alexandra by email
3744 Jean-Brillant street, local 592-11