PROJECT MANAGER
assoc. prof. dr.
Simona KUKOVIČ
Dr. Kukovič’s area of expertise is political and administrative leadership at the local level. She also conducts research in the areas of leadership, comparative regional and local government, local democracy and participation, public administration, and administrative and political processes and institutions.
About
Dr. Kukovič is Slovenian representative in the COST networks, General Secretary and member of the executive board of the Central European Political Science Association (CEPSA) and general editor of the international scientific journal Journal of Comparative Politics.
In 2024, dr. Kukovič successfully completed specialisation at Yale University (Connecticut, USA), School of Management in the Leadership Programme.
Dr. Kukovič has been a visiting professor/researcher at several universities, including DeMontfort University, Leicester, UK (2015), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA (2018), Paris Lodron University Salzburg, Austria (2018–2019), and Montana State University Billings, Montana, USA (2022).
She was the head of the postdoctoral project entitled “Leading the Locality: Bureaucratisation of Politics or Politicisation of Bureaucracy?” (2018–2020) and six bilateral projects between the Republic of Slovenia and the USA, Montenegro, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In 2022, Dr. Kukovič was awarded the title of Jean Monnet Professor. In 2022-2024, she holds the Jean Monnet Chair, as part of which she also founded the Summer Leadership Academy.
She is (co-)author of several scientific publications, including the monographs “Slovenian Politics and the State” (Lexington Books, Rowman & Littlefield, USA) and “Political System of Slovenia” (Sampark, Calcutta, India). In Slovenia, she is known for her academic work in the field of local leadership and local self-government. She is also the creator of the “Municipal Administrative Capacity” quality standard.