Tech Diplomacy Global 50

Prof. Corneliu Bjola

Professor of Digital Diplomacy, University of Oxford
UK

Corneliu Bjola is Professor of Digital Diplomacy at the University of Oxford, UK, and the Head of the Oxford Digital Diplomacy Research Group. His research focuses on the impact of digital technology on the conduct of diplomacy, with a special interest in public diplomacy, international negotiations, and methods for countering digital influence operations. His current research examines the emerging role of artificial intelligence and quantum technologies in diplomacy, with a particular focus on their capacity to support decision-making, refine negotiation practices, and strengthen crisis response, while also addressing the ethical and governance challenges these technologies pose across diplomatic institutions, processes, and international order.

His most recent publications include a special issue on tech diplomacy in Global Policy (co-ed, 2025), which examines the emergence, conceptual foundations, and global practice of tech diplomacy as a distinctive approach to managing the geopolitical and governance challenges of emerging technologies. He also co-edited The Oxford Handbook of Digital Diplomacy (Oxford University Press, 2024), which provides a comprehensive overview of the theory, practice, and future of digital diplomacy across different regions and issues. Another recent volume, Digital International Relations: Technology, Agency, and Order (Routledge, 2023, co-ed.), explores how digital disruption impacts world order and global governance. Additionally, he has authored or edited several academic books on digital diplomacy, including the twin volumes Countering Online Propaganda and Violent Extremism: The Dark Side of Digital Diplomacy (2018) – listed by BookAuthority among the 20 Best New International Relations Books to Read in 2019 – and Digital Diplomacy: Theory and Practice (2015). His co-edited volume Digital Diplomacy and International Organizations: Autonomy, Legitimacy, and Contestation (Routledge, 2020) examines the broader ramifications of digital technologies on the internal dynamics, multilateral policies, and strategic engagements of international organisations.

He has conducted training sessions for the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Diplomatic Academies in U.K., European Union, Germany, Greece, Georgia, Spain, Israel, Lithuania, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Armenia, Honduras, Bahrain, Romania as well as for international organisations such as the UNITAR, the Digital Cooperation Organisation, United Nations System Staff College, the Commonwealth, the International Labour Organization, and the United Nations Population Fund.