Ida Nikou, PhD

My name is Ida Nikou. I am a sociologist, writer, and political activist working across international political economy, labour studies, and social movement research. My work examines how geopolitical coercion is transformed into domestic class power. Using Iran as a central case, I study how sanctions, militarised conflict, and exclusion from global financial systems reshape economic governance, capital accumulation, labour regimes, and the conditions under which workers organise and resist. 

I received my PhD in Sociology from Stony Brook University. My dissertation examined how workers in Iran resisted, negotiated, and subverted the interconnected pressures of sanctions, neoliberal restructuring, and authoritarian rule. It traced how these forces reorganised industrial workplaces while shaping the possibilities and limits of collective organisation. The dissertation received the Judith Tanur Award for its originality and scholarly contribution.

My current research develops a broader account of accumulation under constraint. I investigate how sanctions-era crisis is absorbed and reorganised through state institutions, financial systems, and firm strategies, and how this transformation remakes labour power unevenly across industries. I combine archival and documentary research, digital ethnography, protest-event analysis, and quantitative analysis of Iranian and international economic data. This research received the European Commission’s Seal of Excellence under the 2025 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowships programme.

Across my academic research and public writing, I approach sanctions from the standpoint of the societies and people subjected to them. My work rejects state-centric geopolitical analysis and instead offers a structural account that centres lived experience, while also examining how domestic elites and institutions use geopolitical crisis to deepen accumulation, discipline labour, and restrict collective action.

Teaching is one of the most rewarding parts of my academic work. Since 2019, I have designed and taught my own courses in social theory, social movements, crime, deviance, technology, and introductory sociology, both in person and online, including large-enrolment classes at public universities. Across these subjects, I encourage students to treat sociology as a way of interpreting the conflicts, institutions, and inequalities that shape their everyday lives.

My classes connect classical and contemporary theory to urgent social questions, from political protest and technological change to criminalisation, inequality, and state power. I design my courses around varied forms of participation and assessment so that students with different backgrounds and learning styles can contribute meaningfully to the classroom. 

In recognition of my teaching, I received the President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching by a Graduate Student at Stony Brook University. Student evaluations have consistently emphasised the intellectual value, accessibility, and relevance of my courses. Many of my courses consistently reached capacity and maintained wait lists, reflecting strong student interest in both the subject matter and the classroom environment.

Courses taught:

• Soc 361 Historical Development of Social Theory
• Soc 309 Social Conflicts and Movements
• Soc 337 Social Deviance
• Soc 338 Sociology of Crime
• Soc 105 Introduction to Sociology
• Soc 315 Sociology of Technology