Dr Vlad Mykhnenko

Profile details


Note: Vlad Mykhnenko is on sabbatical leave until 15 January 2024 (Hilary Term 2024).

Academic Profile

Vlad Mykhnenko is an economic geographer, specialising in geographical political economy. Empirically, over the past twenty years, Mykhnenko’s research interests have expanded from the urban and regional economies of the post-communist eastern Europe (esp., Polish Upper Silesia and the Ukrainian Donbas) - the global East - to encompass the local development phenomena observed across the global North and the global South. Over the past twenty years, he has produced over 125 research outputs, containing books, articles in top quartile peer-reviewed journals, including Applied Geography, Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society, Cities, Environment and Planning A, Environment and Planning C, European Planning Studies, European Urban and Regional Studies, Europe-Asia Studies, The Geographical Journal, International Planning Studies, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, Journal of Economic Geography, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, Journal of Urban Affairs, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Regional Studies, Urban Research & Practice, digital artefacts, and other documents. Vlad currently serves on the editorial boards of Eurasian Geography & Economics, and Chinese Geographical Science.

Dr. Mykhnenko’s research has so far generated over £8.5 million in external research funding, with £1.8 million as a Principal Investigator. Recently, he has served as Consortium Lead and Principal Investigator of the Smart Shrinkage Solutions research project (3S RECIPE, €1.7m, 2017-2020) funded by the Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe and the UKRI Economic and Social Research Council, before pursuing a series of industry-funded research projects on the future of cities and work, the future of environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG)-influenced investment, the metaverse, and the future of money. Currently, Vlad is carrying out several externally-funded research initiatives, ranging from green steel, rebuilding Ukraine’s iron and steel sector post-war without the use of fossil fuels, to sustainable urban development in Kazakhstan.

Vlad Mykhnenko holds a PhD in Political Economy from Darwin College, the University of Cambridge (2005); an MA in International Relations and European Studies from the Central European University (CEU, 1999); and an MA (1998) and a BA (1996) in International Relations from Taras Shevchenko University of Kyiv. He joined the Oxford University Department for Continuing Education (OUDCE or ContEd) in January 2017 to take up an Associate Professorship in Sustainable Urban Development, alongside a Research Fellowship in Sustainable Urban Development at St. Peter’s College, Oxford. Between 2018-2021, Vlad served as Continuing Education Director of Graduate Studies for Postgraduate Research Students (DGS Research). 

Prior to Oxford, Dr. Mykhnenko was Lecturer in Human Geography, Urban Adaptation and Resilience at the University of Birmingham (2008-2012); Visiting Professor at Al-Farabi Kazakh National University in Almaty (Autumn 2014); and held a series of successive Research Fellowships at the University of Nottingham (2008-2011), the University of Glasgow (2005-2008), and the CEU Centre for Policy Studies in Budapest (2003-2004).

Dr. Mykhnenko regularly acts in an advisory capacity for the public, private, and civil society sectors, municipal and regional governments, intergovernmental organisations, and multinational companies. He currently serves as a non-executive director of Oxford International Study Abroad Programme Ltd., an EQAC-accredited short course provider. In 2015, he was appointed by the Secretary-General of the UN Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development to a High-Level expert group of 200 leading urbanists to provide UN-Habitat with independent policy recommendations. Vlad’s policy unit #9 submission on Urban Services and Technology has subsequently formed an integral part of the New Urban Agenda – a universal framework of actions for housing and sustainable urban development, which was officially adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in December 2016. In addition, he has sat on the Advisory Group on Declining Cities at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (2014-2015). More recently, Dr. Mykhnenko has given expert evidence in public to the UK House of Commons, in connection with the Foreign Affairs Committee inquiry into the challenges of Recovery in Ukraine. In May 2023, Vlad was invited by the Mayor of Mariupol to advise Mr. Boichenko and the local authority on Mariupol Reborn – a post-liberation revival strategy for the pulverised east Ukrainian city. In September 2023, he also joined a new 8 world-leading experts’ strong Consultation Group on Shrinking Smartly and Sustainably at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD, 2023-2026).

Vlad is originally from Donetsk, Ukraine.

Research

The great bulk of Vlad’s academic research is devoted to geographical political economy – a transdisciplinary study of spatialities, landscapes, and contested futures of modern capitalism, its varieties, development trajectories, and alternatives. Geographical political economy is founded on the assumption that economic, political, cultural, and environmental processes are necessarily related – co-evolving spatially, and co-implicated territorially with each other. The connective thread throughout much of his work has involved the application of theoretical, conceptual, and methodological dimensions of economic geography, geographical economics, and comparative political economy to the real-world challenges of urban and regional growth and decline, development and de-development, shrinkage, and resilience in the context of chronic stress (e.g., de-industrialisation, out-migration, sub-replacement fertility) and sudden shock events (e.g., natural disasters, revolutions, wars). 

Grant income and funded research projects

Vlad has been successful in research project bids as the sole or Principal Investigator (P.I.) with the UKRI Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Joint Programming Initiative (JPI) Urban Europe, Brazil’s State of São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP), and a number of universities, charitable foundations, and private sector companies, including the Universities of Cambridge and Birmingham, the CEU, the Global Strategic Communications Council (GSCC) with the Meliore Foundation, the Open Society Institute (OSI), and Protiviti, Inc. In joint project bids, as a Co-Investigator (Co-I) or named researcher, he has been successful with the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the European Research Council (ERC), the ESRC, the European Union’s 7th Framework Programme (FP7), the National Scientific Council for Research in Social Sciences and Humanities at Kazakhstan’s National Centre of Science and Technology Evaluation (NCSTE), The Republic of Kazakhstan Ministry of Science and Higher Education, and the Regional Studies Association (RSA).

The total research funding associated with Vlad’s research is currently valued at £8,535,843 (consumer price index-adjusted), with £1,839,615 in P.I. roles, as follows:

Citations

As of 1 December 2023, according to Google Scholar, Dr. Mykhnenko had 3,924 citations with an h-index score of 23. According to Scopus (Elsevier) his journal articles and books had been cited 1,625 times by other Scopus-listed journal articles, with an h-index score of 13. According to the Web of Science Core Collection metrics (Clarivate), Vlad had been cited 1,421 times overall, with an h-index score of 13.

Based on the Web of Science Core Collection data (November 2023), containing over 21K+ peer-reviewed scholarly journals and 134K+ books published worldwide in 254 subject categories across the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities, Vlad’s publications are ranked in the top 0.1% most cited globally in Urban Studies (190th of 196,358 publications, in total), the top 0.5% most cited globally in Regional & Urban Planning (1,032nd of 192,427 publications), the top 0.5% in Geography (2,641st of 488,913 publications), the top 0.7% in Environmental Studies (2,969th of 439,703 publications), and the top 1.2% in Area Studies (3,961st of 331,260 publications). Vlad's latest overall annual citation median has reached the 100th percentile (the top 1%), with his full career citation percentile median standing at the 89th percentile (see Web of Science Core Collection).

Impact on policy and society

Vlad Mykhnenko’s research has been quoted in at least 27 policy documents by 21 organisations across 12 countries, including the national governments of the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Serbia, South Africa, Switzerland, the UK, and the Scottish Government, a host of supra-national and international government organisations such as the European Parliament, the European Union, the Nordic Council, the OECD, and the UN, in addition to leading think tanks for development, poverty alleviation, and urban policy worldwide, including the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Germany’s Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik, Ecologic Institute, and IZA Institute of Labor Economics, and the UK’s Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, the Centre for Cities, and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Contributing to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), 56% of Vlad’s documented policy impact has been directly attributed to fostering SDG11: Sustainable Cities and Communities, 33% to SDG8: Decent Work and Economic Growth, and the remaining 11% to SDG1: No Poverty.

Aspects of Vlad’s research and analysis have been discussed and featured in around 130 mass media contributions across 29 countries, including, amongst the others, The Aberdeen Press and Journal (GBR) ●  Aftonbladet (SWE) ● Arirang TV (KOR) ● BBC Two TV (GBR) ● BBC News Online ● BBC News 24 TV ● BBC Radio 4 / BBC World Service Radio ● BBC Radio 5 Live ● BBC World Service TV ● BBC World Service Online ● Berliner Zeitung (Berlin, DEU) ● Blick (CHE) ● CNN Indonesia ● The Conversation (GBR) ● Daily Star Online (GBR) ● The Daily Telegraph (GBR) ● Danas (HRV) ● Donetskie Novosti (Donetsk, Ukraine) ● Doomsday Watch with Arthur Snell (GBR) ● El Heraldo de México (MEX) ● The Evening Chronicle (Newcastle, GBR) ● Evening Times (Glasgow, GBR) ● Expresso (PRT) ● Financial Times (GBR) ● Forbes (USA) ● Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Texas, USA) ● Frankfurter Rundschau (DEU) ● Il Giorno (ITA) ● Il Messaggero (ITA) ● Il Resto del Carlino (ITA) ● The Guardian (London, GBR) ● The Herald (Glasgow, GBR) ● The Herald-Sun (North Carolina, USA) ● Hindustan Times (IND) ● HN Online (SVK) ● Hromadske Radio (UKR)  ● The i (GBR) ● Interfax-Ukraine (UKR) ● The Irish Independent (IRE) ● Jornal Floripa (BRA) ● Klix (BIH) ● The Kansas City Star (USA) ● The Kyiv Independent (UKR) ● La Nazione (ITA) ● La Tribune (FRA) ● LB.UA (Kyiv, UKR) ● Le Monde diplomatique - edycja polska (POL) ● Lexington Herald-Leader (Kentucky, USA) ● Libération (FRA) ● LNK Žinios TV (LTU) ● Mediapart (FRA) ● Miami Herald (Florida, USA) ● MF DNES (CZE) ● Münchner Merkur (Munich, DEU) ● NDTV News (IND) ● The News & Observer (North Carolina, USA) ● The News Tribune (Washington, USA) ● Newsweek (USA) ● Novosti Kryma (Crimea, UKR) ● Novosti Luganska (Luhansk, UKR) ● Novosti N (Mykolaiv, UKR) ● Observator (ROM) ● The Olympian (Washington, USA) ● Oxford Mail (GBR) ● Planning (GBR) ● PR Newswire (USA) ● Premium Official News (PAK) ● Quotidiano Nazionale (ITA) ● RBC–Ukraine ● The Sacramento Bee (California, USA) ● The Scotsman (GBR) ● The State (South Carolina, USA) ● States News Service (USA) ● The Sunday Telegraph (London, GBR) ● Svenska Dagbladet (SWE) ● TIME (USA) ● The Tribune (California, USA) ● TV 2 (NOR) ● Vox (USA) ● Ukrainska Pravda (UKR) ● United Press International (USA) ● The Washington Post (USA) ● The Wichita Eagle (Kansas, USA) ● Yerepouni Daily News (ARM) ● Zing News (VNM).

See Vlad's Find an Expert page profile for further inquiries.

Teaching

Over the past twenty years, Dr. Mykhnenko has taught and supervised over 2,500 undergraduate, graduate, and MBA students at ten different higher education institutions across the UK, Europe, and Central Asia, including the Universities of Cambridge, Glasgow, Nottingham, Birmingham, Taras Shevchenko University of Kyiv, National University of Donetsk, Kyiv Mohyla Business School, Kyiv Mohyla Academy, Ukraine Human Development University, and Al-Farabi Kazakh National University at Almaty. His commitment to research-led and research-orientated teaching was recognised in 2014, when Vlad achieved the status of Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and in 2015, when he was awarded a Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (Merit) by the University of Birmingham. The outcome of Vlad's award-winning 4-year pedagogical experimentation with technology-enhanced learning tools and techniques was consequently published as a peer-reviewed academic paper in The Journal of Geography in Higher Education (see here).

At Oxford, Dr. Mykhnenko makes a full contribution to the Department’s flagship MSc in Sustainable Urban Development (MSUD) Course, regularly contributing to its teaching weeks (modules) and co-leading Teaching Week M1 Introducing Sustainable Urban Development, and M6 Urbanism, Community and City-Building. In addition, Vlad serves as a course admissions officer, a personal tutor to MSUD students, and regularly assesses their course assignments; since 2017, he has supervised 21 MSUD dissertation students.

Graduate Research Supervision

Dr. Mykhnenko welcomes applications to the DPhil in Sustainable Urban Development (DSUD) Programme from outstanding individuals wishing to undertake doctoral research on urban and regional economies; shrinking cities; urban resilience; local economic development; regional growth and regional policy; fiscal federalism, devolution, and local government finance; and territorial cohesion and contentious urban politics.

Current Oxford DPhil Students:

  • Linda Beyer, Household food insecurity and resilience in slum settlements of Nairobi, Kenya, DPhil in Sustainable Urban Development Programme, OUDCE
  • Oliver Harman, Local government finance and decentralisation in sub-Saharan Africa, DPhil in Sustainable Urban Development Programme, OUDCE
  • Rohan Kocharekar, Land value capture and municipal finance mechanisms, DPhil in Sustainable Urban Development Programme, OUDCE
  • Camilo Gomez Osorio, Economic geography of public investment management in African cities, DPhil in Sustainable Urban Development Programme, OUDCE
  • Richard Wilson, The role of local and regional government in fostering a knowledge-based economy: The case of Australia

Past Doctoral Students:

  • Dr. Zixuan Han (successful completion in 2023), Policy responses to urban shrinkage in North-eastern China, the OUDCE Sustainable Urban Development Programme and PhD in Public Administration Programme, Harbin Institute of Technology, China
  • Dr. Bin Li (successful completion in 2017): Governance of urban redevelopment in Guangzhou, China from 1990 to 2015. The University of Birmingham
  • Dr. David Worrall (successful completion in 2011): Foreign trade developments in Ukraine, Russia, Poland, Lithuania, Belarus & Moldova, 1996-2006. The University of Glasgow

Academic Citizenship and Service

Since 2010, Dr. Mykhnenko has been making a structured contribution to the development of geography and urban and regional studies through participation in the leading learned societies – the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) (Elected Fellow, 2010 - present), the Regional Studies Association (Elected Fellow, 2015-2022), and the American Association of Geographers (ad hoc Associate Member). Within the RGS-IBG, he is a member of the following four research groups: Economic Geography; Geography and Education; Political Geography; and Urban Geography. Vlad has contributed 16 paper presentations at the annual conferences of the RGS-IBG, RSA, and AAG. Moreover, he has convened 6 special panels of papers, including the RSA 2010 (After the Global Financial Crisis – Cities, Regions, and Sectors in East-Central Europe and the Former USSR); RSA 2011 (Shrinking Cities: The Governance of Shrinkage within a European Context); RGS-IBG 2011 (The Governance of Urban Shrinkage), RSA 2012 (Planning Smarter Cities and Regions), RGS-IBG 2012 (Planning Smarter Places), and AAG 2019 (Smart Shrinkage Solutions). He has also helped to organise the 1st International Conference on Urban Sustainability and Resilience, hosted by the UCL Centre for Urban Sustainability & Resilience in 2012.

At Oxford, Dr. Mykhnenko has served as the Departmental Director of Graduate Studies for Postgraduate Research Students (DGS-R). In October 2021, he was appointed as Chair to the MSc in Sustainable Urban Development Examination Board at the University of Oxford for a two-year term of office.

7 Keynote Addresses

98 External Invited Talks

35 Academic Conference Papers Given

15 Internal Seminars and Public Lectures at Oxford

Research Groups and Affiliations at Oxford:

Editorship of Journals:

External Examiner:

  • 2014 – 2018 (two full terms): MA in Urban Studies, The University of Manchester at the Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences, Russia
  • 2015 – 2019 (two full terms): BA in Management in the Creative Arts, The University of Manchester at the Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences, Russia

Peer-Review College Member for 10 Research Funding Bodies:

  • AHRC: The Arts and Humanities Research Council, UK Research and Innovation
  • The British Academy: Postdoctoral Fellowship Grants, UK
  • DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service): Postdoctoral Programme PRIME, Germany
  • ESRC: The Economic and Social Research Council, UK Research and Innovation
  • GCRF: The Global Challenges Research Fund, UK
  • MRC: The Medical Research Council, UK Research and Innovation
  • NCN: National Science Centre, Poland
  • NCSTE: National Centre of Science and Technology Evaluation (Kazakhstan Ministry of Education and Science), Kazakhstan
  • SSHRC: The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Canada
  • UEFISCDI: The Executive Agency for Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation, Romania

Peer-Reviewing for 55 Academic Journals

Peer-Reviewing for 7 Academic Publishers

Publications

  • 127 research outputs in total, including:

​Books:

Articles published in journals or books: 

  • (2017) 欧米諸国における都市縮小事情と国際的な比較研究の必要性. In Architectural Institute of Japan (Eds.), 都市縮小時代の土地利用計画 多様な都市空間創出へ向けた課題と対応策  (pp. 168-175) Gakugei Publishers.
  • (2016) Resilience: A Right-Wingers Ploy? In S. Springer, K. Birch & J. MacLeavy (Eds.), The Handbook of Neoliberalism (pp. 190-206) Routledge. 
  • Class voting and the Orange revolution: A cultural political economy perspective on Ukraine’s electoral geography. In S. White & D. Lane (Eds.), Rethinking the Coloured Revolutions (pp. 166-184). Routledge. 
  • (2010) Conclusion: The end of an economic order? In K. Birch & V. Mykhnenko (Eds.), The Rise and Fall of Neoliberalism: The Collapse of an Economic Order? (pp. 255-268). Zed Books.
  • (2010) The Corruption industry and transition: Neoliberalizing post-Soviet space? In K. Birch & V. Mykhnenko (Eds.), The Rise and Fall of Neoliberalism: The Collapse of an Economic Order? (pp. 112-132). Zed Books. 
  • (2010) Introduction: A world turned right-way up. In K. Birch & V. Mykhnenko (Eds.), The Rise and Fall of Neoliberalism: The Collapse of an Economic Order? (pp. 1-20). Zed Books. 
  • (2009) Transition economies. In C. Wankel (Ed.), The Encyclopedia of Business in Today’s World (Vol. 4, pp. 1613-1615). SAGE Publishing. 
  • (2008) Revolution in Orange. Europe-Asia Studies, 60(5): 867-869. 
  • (2008) Global Focus: European Cities. Australian Planner, 45(4): 50-51. 
  • (2008) Understanding Ukrainian Politics. Europe-Asia Studies, 60(2): 340-342. 
  • (2007) Strengths and weaknesses of weak coordination: Economic institutions, revealed comparative advantages, and socio-economic performance of mixed market economies in Poland and Ukraine. In B. Hancké, M. Rhodes & M. Thatcher (Eds.),  Beyond Varieties of Capitalism: Conflict, Contradictions, and Complementarities in the European Economy  (pp. 351-378). Oxford University Press. 
  • (2007) Poland and Ukraine: Institutional structures and economic performance. In D. Lane & M. Myant (Eds.), Varieties of Capitalism in Post-Communist Countries (pp. 124-145). Palgrave Macmillan. 
  • (2007) The Ukrainian Donbas in transition. In A. Swain (Ed.), Re-constructing the Post-Soviet Industrial Region: The Donbas in Transition (pp. 7-46). Routledge. 
  • (2007) Resurgent European cities? Population trajectories, 1960-2005. Examination of population growth rates - How do our cities compare? The Yorkshire & Humber Regional Review, 17: 3-5. 
  • (2007) Resurgent European cities? Merseyside and North Wales Business Prospect, 5(1): 32-33. 
  • (2006) Rescaling International Political Economy. Urban Studies, 43(11): 2126-2127. 
  • (2003) State, society and protest under post-communism: Ukrainian miners and their defeat. In C. Mudde & P. Kopecký (Eds.), Uncivil Society? Contentious Politics in Eastern Europe (pp. 93-113). Routledge. 

 Conference proceedings & working papers: 

  • (Eds.) (2018) Регіон – 2018: стратегія оптимального розвитку. Karazin Kharkiv National University Press. 
  • (2007) European Cities and Regions Dataset 1960-2005: Methods and Sources. Working Paper No. 3 (Amended version; 25 pp.). The University of Glasgow Centre for Public Policy for Regions.  

Research reports: 

  • (2020) 3S RECIPE Smart shrinkage solutions: fostering resilient cities in inner peripheries of Europe. In JPI Urban Europe (Eds.), The ERA-NET Cofund Smart Urban Futures Results Catalogue (pp. 34-35). IQS Sweden. 
  • (2018) Соціальні наслідки вимушеної міграції в Україні: ризики маргіналізації та соціальної ексклюзії. Zenodo. 
  • (2016) HABITAT III Policy Paper 9 – Urban Services and Technology. Preparatory Committee for the United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (Habitat III). A/CONF.226/PC.3/22. (Revised ed., 42 pp.). United Nations General Assembly. 
  • (2012) Governance of shrinkage: Lessons learnt from analysis for urban planning and policy. Shrink Smart: The Governance of Shrinkage within a European Context (47 pp.). Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Leipzig. 
  • (2011) Mapping urban shrinkage in Europe. Training School Final Report. EU-COST Action TU0803. Department of Spatial Planning and Planning Theory (ROP), Dortmund Technical University. 
  • (2010) Убывание в городах Донецк и Макеевка, Донецкая городская агломерация, Украина: Доклад по результатам исследования. (Final ed., 118 pp.). Industrial Economics Institute, Ukraine National Academy of Sciences. 
  • (2010) Discussion Paper on Cross-Cutting Challenges. D7 Research Report. Shrink Smart: The Governance of Shrinkage within a European Context (32 pp.). Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Leipzig. 
  • (2009) The specification of the working model. D1 Research Report. Shrink Smart: The Governance of Shrinkage within a European Context (43 pp.). Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Leipzig. 
  • (2004) The Ukrainian Ferrous Metals Industry (3 pp.). The CEU Center for Policy Studies and Open Society Institute. 

Digital artefacts: website content 

  • (2017) 3S RECIPE – Smart Shrinkage Solutions: Project Poster. JPI Urban Europe ENSUF Call. 
  • (2001) Тайная политика Сталина: власть и антисемитизм. e-Extreme, 2(4). 
  • (2001) Labour and Political Transformation in Russia and Ukraine. e-Extreme, 2(3. 
  • (2001) Russian Workers: The Anatomy of Patience. e-Extreme, 2(2). 
  • (2001) Українські ліві: між ленінізмом і соціал-демократією. e-Extreme, 2(2). 

Digital artefacts: digital or visual media 

  • (2022) Ukrainian Cities at War. The Urban Political Podcast on Urban Theory, Research, and Activism by Ross Beveridge and Markus Kip. The Georg-Simmel-Center for Metropolitan Studies, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin. 

Research data sets and databases: 

  • (2019) State rescaling and economic convergence: Supplementary data set. Regional Studies, 53(4).
  • (2007) Back matter: Statistical appendix. In D. Lane & M. Myant (Eds.), Varieties of Capitalism in Post-Communist Countries (pp. 258-270). Palgrave Macmillan.

Other: