Stephanie Arnold

Stephanie Arnold is a PhD Fellow at UNU-CRIS within the Digital Governance cluster and a PhD researcher at the Department of Political and Social Sciences of the University of Bologna (Italy). Throughout 2022/2023 she was a visiting PhD researcher at the Centre for Digitalization, Democracy, and Innovation of the Brussels School of Governance (VUB). Her research examines the role of foreign players in the digital development of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Previously, she studied abroad at Leiden University and the China University for Political Science and Law in Beijing. She also completed numerous internships including at the Embassy of Italy in Tanzania and the NATO Office of Legal Affairs. In 2022, she was selected to join the Europaeum Scholars Programme, a two-year policy and leadership course for doctoral students coordinated by the University of Oxford.

She obtained a 5-year master’s degree in law from the University of Bologna with a master thesis on cross-border data transfers between China and the European Union. She is fluent in English, German, Italian, and Swahili.