Sara Mustafa, PhD

Introduction

Dr. Sara Dilzar is a faculty member in the Department of Political Science and International Relations, where she has been teaching since 2018. She teaches at both undergraduate (BA) and postgraduate (MA) levels and supervises doctoral (PhD) candidates.

Her research focuses on Oil Politics, Federalism, Secession, Conflict Resolution, and Middle East Politics, with particular attention to governance, state formation, and resource management in divided and post-conflict societies.

Dr. Sara has delivered a wide range of modules in Political Science and International Relations, including Politics of Oil, International Law, Constitutional Law, Conflict Resolution, and Comparative Politics. Her teaching integrates theoretical frameworks with regional case studies, particularly Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, encouraging students to bridge conceptual analysis with real-world political dynamics

Education

• - PhD in Political Science, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, Spain. 2022.
• - Master of Arts in Political Science, Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada. 2018.
• - Bachelor of Arts in Politics and International Relations, University of Kurdistan-Hewler. 2017.

Research

Mustafa, Sara D. "Iraqi Kurdistan independence referendum: political parties, opportunity and timing." British journal of Middle Eastern studies 48, no. 5 (2021): 890-907. Mustafa, Sara D. "Oil Resources in Relations Between Erbil and Baghdad." Middle East Policy 29, no. 3 (2022): 71-78. Bakir, Falah Mustafa, and Sara D. Mustafa. "Legal Framework, Institutionalization, Tools, and Motives of Kurdistan Iraq’s Paradiplomacy." In Between Diplomacy and Non-Diplomacy: Foreign relations of Kurdistan-Iraq and Palestine, pp. 75-91. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2023. Mustafa, Sara Dilzar. "The independence referendum in Kurdistan." In Routledge Handbook on Elections in the Middle East and North Africa, pp. 214-221. Routledge, 2023.