Kian Tajbakhsh
Kian Tajbakhsh is an Iranian-American scholar, social scientist, and urban planner. He has taught at both American and Iranian universities. Tajbakhsh is an international expert in the areas of local government reform, urban planning, civil society capacity building, and international public policy research collaboration. He has also directed international projects in the areas of public health and social policy. Tajbakhsh was one of the Iranian-American dual citizens arrested and detained for years in Iran for allegedly engaging in activities against national security. He was one of five Iranian-Americans held in Iran, including Jason Rezaian, whose release was negotiated by the Obama administration as part of the Iran Nuclear Deal. He was finally permitted to leave on Implementation Day on January 16, 2016. Academic career
Tajbakhsh's academic research spans on both theoretical and policy projects related to urbanism and city life. He has conducted empirical research on decentralization, the role of social capital in local government performance, and local economic development in a number of countries. Tajbakhsh was set to begin a full-time academic teaching position at the Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation in New York City on September 8, 2009, but was unable to do so as a result of his incarceration. He took up his position at Columbia University as Visiting Professor of Urban Planning on February 1, 2016, which ended in 2018. Since 2016, as a Fellow of the Committee on Global Thought at Columbia, he has taught the class "Globalization and the Problems of World Order" in the Global Thought MA Program. In 2019, he became Senior Advisor to the Executive Vice President for Global Centers and Global Development at Columbia University working on university-wide initiatives focused on forced migration. 