HSE University Welcomes New International Faculty Members
In early December, Vice Rector Alexey Koshel hosted his traditional welcome meeting with new international faculty members. In 2025, HSE University welcomes 44 successful candidates for tenure-track positions and postdoctoral fellowships.
Each of them holds a PhD from the world’s leading universities, including the University of California, Los Angeles (USA), the University of Oxford (UK), Harvard University (USA), the Free University of Brussels (Belgium), the University of Toronto (Canada), the University of Southern Denmark, George Washington University (USA), the University of Pittsburgh (USA), the University of São Paulo (Brazil), the University of Bordeaux (France), Boston College (USA), the Free University of Berlin (Germany), the Indian Statistical Institute, Jawaharlal Nehru University (India), the Beijing Institute of Technology (China), and many others.
Alexey Koshel warmly welcomed the international specialists and thanked them for choosing HSE University as the next step in their research careers. Special acknowledgement was given to Russian graduates of top global universities who have chosen HSE to advance their academic pursuits.
Alexey Koshel
Vice Rector
Alexey Koshel remarked, ‘This year, HSE University marked its 33rd anniversary. Founded in 1992 with a narrow scope of training future economists, HSE has transformed into Russia’s lead research and educational institution with the full spectrum of classical disciplines. It operates across four campuses in major Russian cities—Moscow, St Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, and Perm—with its current enrolment of 63,000 students, including 5,700 international students from 140 countries. In addition, our online campus serves more than 7,500 students worldwide.
Our university features strong fundamental scientific research, with a network of international laboratories, national research centres, and centres of excellence. They play a pivotal role in advancing research domestically and achieving prestige globally. At the same time, HSE stands as a critical hub for applied research and as a key expert analytical centre for the Presidential Administration and the Government of the Russian Federation. We are also recognised as Russia’s leading institution in computer science and artificial intelligence.’ In 2025, HSE launched three strategic technological projects: the National Centre of Science, Technology and Socio-Economic Foresight led by First Vice Rector Leonid Gokhberg, the Trusted 6G Communication Systems Technology Suite headed by Evgeny Koucheryavy, Director of the A.N. Tikhonov Telecommunications Research Institute at the HSE Moscow Institute of Electronics and Mathematics (MIEM), and the Multi-Agent AI Platform for Sectoral Solutions run by Deputy Vice Rector Elena Kozhina.’
The vice rector stressed HSE University’s focus on international recognition. In 2025, HSE ranks among the top 100 universities in three subjects: Business and Economics (70th place in THE rankings), Marketing (51st place in the world and 1st in Russia in QS rankings), and Social Sciences and Management (86th in the world and 2nd in Russia in QS rankings).
Ekaterina German
Deputy Vice Rector
Deputy Vice Rector Ekaterina German outlined international recruitment programmes and explained the tenure-track career path, including interim and tenure reviews. She also shared insights on successful tenure-track selection from international postdocs. International recruitment of PhD candidates from leading world universities for 2026 is open until January 31, 2026.
The vice rector noted the role of international cooperation in general and international recruitment in particular in strengthening HSE’s professional competencies as a leading educational and research centre. A key benefit is that international specialists bring their diverse research experience and academic cultures from top universities worldwide. As a globally renowned institution, HSE University distinguishes itself among Russian universities for its openness and international prestige, supported by over 400 active international cooperation agreements.
The two-hour meeting was warm and welcoming. In his concluding remarks, Vice Rector Alexey Koshel encouraged the newly arrived international specialists to actively contribute to university life through research, publishing, teaching, and participating in committees and dissertation councils. The participants expressed overwhelmingly positive feedback.
‘I joined HSE University in December 2024. For me personally, there were several reasons to apply for the assistant professor position at HSE University, including its strong academic environment, international reputation, opportunities for international cooperation and career growth, and a competitive salary."
My research focuses on high-entropy materials for energy applications. In the future, I aim to expand our established collaborations with professors in China, Spain, and Iran while also pursuing new domestic and international research grants.
The meeting with the vice rector was very positive. I appreciated the friendly atmosphere and the interest in our work and future plans. It was encouraging to hear about the support the university offers to new researchers. I am glad to be part of HSE University and look forward to contributing to its research community.’
‘I received my PhD in Economics from the University of Southern Denmark in 2022, where I had the opportunity to work with one of the strongest research groups in Europe in my area of specialisation. After graduation, I spent two years as a postdoctoral researcher at Lund University, where I expanded my research portfolio, publishing work based on my dissertation and initiating new collaborative projects.
Over the past year, I participated in the international academic job market and had the opportunity to interview with selection committees at several reputable institutions, including two departments at HSE University (the Faculty of Economic Sciences and ICEF). The selection process involved an initial online interview followed by an invitation to deliver a research seminar to HSE faculty.
I was pleased to ultimately receive a job offer from ICEF, which I accepted. My decision was motivated by several key factors. First, ICEF has a strong research profile across multiple areas, with faculty consistently publishing in top field journals. Being part of a dynamic and intellectually engaged academic community is essential for my own development. Second, I was attracted by the opportunity to teach highly motivated students in ICEF’s selective undergraduate and master’s programmes. My primary area of specialisation is quantitative economic history—a new field within the department. One of my long-term research goals is to digitise and analyse a large corpus of individual-level archival data from 19th-century Russia, including historical population censuses and church records. The collected data will create an empirical foundation for studying long-term changes in living standards, demographic patterns, and human capital formation. It also offers a unique opportunity to examine the lasting effects of the country’s major historical events. This makes the research base at a Russian institution especially relevant to my work.
Crucially, HSE provides strong institutional support for data-intensive research. Faculty members have access to individual research budgets that can be used for a wide range of needs, including attending conferences, purchasing data and software, and hiring research assistants. During the meeting with the vice rector, I was also assured that the university is committed to supporting productive research environments, which may include additional funding and help obtaining external research grants.
Equally important to me was the vice chancellor’s emphasis on HSE’s strategic vision of strengthening its international reputation as a globally connected research centre open to cross-border academic collaboration.
In the next five to ten years, I hope to establish myself as a leading scholar in my field and to contribute meaningfully to the university’s research and teaching mission.’
‘I joined HSE University in 2024 as a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Historical Research in St Petersburg. I decided to continue my academic career at HSE University due to the valuable opportunities for teaching Russian history, conducting archival research, and collaborating with a community of scholars in my field.
My research article on Soviet and Swedish ideologies in the Soviet–Finnish Winter War of 1939–1940 has been accepted to the international journal Scando-Slavica (HSE List A) and will be published in January 2026. I am currently finishing another article—on the Anti-Komintern’s activities in Sweden in the interwar period from 1933 to 1939—based on research in the Bundesarchiv in Berlin and Riksarkivet in Stockholm, which was supported by the HSE Research Fund. I plan to submit this article to an international journal in the near future.
The meeting with Vice Rector Alexei Koshel was especially informative about the expectations for tenure-track positions, including interim, tenure, and post-tenure reviews. This information has given me a clearer understanding of the expectations and opportunities for career development at HSE University.’
Research Fellow, Laboratory for Experimental Economics and Finance, Faculty of Economic Sciences
‘I joined HSE University two months ago, in October, as a postdoctoral researcher at the Laboratory for Experimental Economics and Finance (LEEF) in the Faculty of Economic Sciences.
What first motivated me to apply to HSE was its outstanding international reputation and vibrant academic atmosphere. The university’s strength in economics, especially its highly regarded theory group, was strongly endorsed by my PhD advisors, who encouraged me to apply. I was excited by the prospect of joining such an intellectually active and dynamic community.
My research interests lie at the intersection of applied economic theory and experimental economics, and HSE is uniquely well suited for this combination. It brings together a strong theoretical group and excellent resources for experimental research, a combination that is surprisingly rare. For someone at the early stage of building a long-term research agenda, HSE offers an ideal environment to grow, explore new ideas, and collaborate with leading scholars.
I am also enthusiastic about HSE’s expanding international partnerships, including initiatives with universities in China. Having grown up in China and later studied in the US and the UK, I hope to contribute to strengthening these academic ties and to bring a broader international perspective to joint research efforts. This aligns closely with my long-term goal of engaging in global academic dialogue while advancing my own research agenda.
In addition, HSE provides both flexibility and strong institutional support for early-career researchers. The freedom to pursue independent projects, the opportunities for collaboration, and the availability of research resources make HSE an exceptional place to prepare for the next steps in an academic career.
The meeting with Vice Rector Prof. Alexey Koshel left a particularly strong impression. The discussion was insightful and encouraging, offering clarity on both near-term priorities and the university’s broader vision for research and career development. I greatly appreciated his openness and strategic perspective. The conversation made me feel more connected to the university community and more confident about my path here. I left with a deeper understanding of the support available to young scholars and a renewed motivation to contribute actively to HSE’s academic life.
I am sincerely grateful to Vice Rector Prof. Koshel, Deputy Vice Rector Dr German, and the International Faculty Support Center for their warm welcome and continued support. The meeting reinforced my enthusiasm for being part of HSE and for contributing to its research environment in the years ahead.’
See also:
Postdoctoral Fellowship Recruitment
HSE University is announcing an open call for Postdoctoral Fellowship positions starting in the 2023/2024 academic year. Candidates must hold a recent PhD degree. Postdoctoral fellowship appointments are made for a one-year period and may be renewed. The deadline for applications is January 31, 2023.
To Enjoy Academic Freedom at the HSE
Dr. Dina Balalaeva, who will begin a tenure-track position at the Faculty of Social Sciences at the HSE in September, recently completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the HSE. She received her PhD in Political Science at the State University of New York at Binghamton in 2013. She agreed to speak with the HSE news service about her decision to make her career at the HSE and her plans for future research and teaching.
HSE Postdoctoral Fellows Programme
The National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE), invites applications for its 2012-2013 postdoctoral fellows programme. This competitive institutional award is open to recent doctorates (Ph.D. degree within the past 3 years from non-Russian universities) and doctoral students who have completed their Ph.D. thesis in Economics and Sociology.