Romania's President appoints advisor on climate and sustainability issues

President Klaus Iohannis has appointed Alexandra-Maria Bocșe as an advisor, working with the Presidential Administration's Climate and Sustainability Department.

Bocșe, who is 33 years old, holds a Ph.D. in Politics and International Studies from the University of Cambridge (2017). Throughout her Ph.D. program, she held an academic excellence scholarship at Trinity College Cambridge, according to her bioon the Presidential Administration's website.

In 2011, she graduated with an MPhil in International Relations, also from Cambridge, with a dissertation on international environmental policy. Previously, she graduated as valedictorian from the Political Science Faculty of the University of Bucharest.

In 2016, she joined the International Relations Department of the London School of Economics, where she worked for the next four years teaching and conducting research in the area of European and International Affairs, with a specialization in energy, environment, and climate issues.

Between 2015 and 2016, she was a fellow at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, the University of Harvard, on a Fulbright-Schuman scholarship.

She was previously a doctoral researcher and coordinator of the European Center of the Politics and International Studies Department of the University of Cambridge, and an associate editor of the Cambridge Review of International Affairs.

She has been teaching for more than seven years, both at the undergraduate and graduate level, at the University of Cambridge, London School of Economics, and King's College London.

Starting with 2011, she also held analysis and advisory roles for the EU, EU governments, and intergovernmental organizations.

Her work was published in journals such as Climate Policy, International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, and Energy Research and Social Science. She also authored a book on international energy and environment policy networks, due to be published by Palgrave Macmillan this fall.

The Climate and Sustainability Department provides the President with information and analyses on "national and international developments in the area of climate change and sustainability." It is also meant to facilitate cooperation with public institutions, NGOs, private entities, higher education, and research institutions to "optimize Romania's response to climate change," among others.