Nora Fisher Onar

Nora Fisher Onar is Associate Professor and Chair of International Studies at the University of San Francisco. 

Her research interests include international relations theory, diplomacy, comparative politics / area studies (Turkey/Middle East; Europe; Eurasia), political ideologies, gender, and history/memory. She is also increasingly interested in the impact of technological change on international affairs. 

She received her doctorate from the University of Oxford and holds master’s and undergraduate degrees from Johns Hopkins (SAIS) and Georgetown universities, respectively. She speaks five languages, has traveled to over 80 countries, and lived in eight.

Fisher-Onar is the author of Contesting Pluralism(s): Islam, Liberalism and Nationalism in Turkey, with Cambridge University Press, and lead editor of the volume, Istanbul: Living With Difference in a Global City (co-edited with Susan C. Pearce and E. Fuat Keyman). She is also the editor of special issues of major scholarly journals like: the Journal of Common Market Studies; International Affairs, and Global Studies Quarterly, among others.

Fisher-Onar speaks often at policy fora like Brookings, Carnegie, and the German Marshall Fund (GMF) where she has served as a Ronald Asmus Fellow, Transatlantic Academy Fellow, and Non-Residential Fellow. She further contributes commentary to platforms like the Washington Post, Foreign Affairs, and OpenDemocracy.

• Empire/Post-colonialism
• Religion and politics
• History, memory and politics
• Turkey/Middle East
• EU/Europe

• International relations theory
• Comparative politics/area studies
• Political ideologies
• Gender
• Digital diplomacy/Technology and international relations

• DPhil (PhD) in International Relations / Political Science, University of Oxford
• Master in International Affairs (MIA), Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies
• BS, Foreign Service, Georgetown University

• Jesuit Foundation Grant, USF 2023

• Davies Forum Professorship, USF Spring 2021

• Deborah Gerner Award, Women's Caucus for International Studies, International Studies Association (ISA), 2017

• Transatlantic Academy, Residential Fellowship on "Religion and the Liberal Order" German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF), 2014-5

• National Humanities Center Fellowship, 2013-4

• Contesting Pluralism(s): Islam, Liberalism and Nationalism in Turkey, Cambridge University Press, in-press/2024
• "From Realist Billiard Balls and Liberal Concentric Circles to Global IR's Venn Diagram? Rethinking IR via Turkey's Centennial," International Relations, Jun 2023 (OPEN ACCESS))
• "From Trans-Atlantic Order to Afro-Eur-Asian Worlds? Reimagining International Relations as Interlocking Regional Worlds," Global Studies Quarterly, 2(4): 2022 - (introduction to Special Forum co-authored with Emilian Kavalski) OPEN ACCESS
• "The Capitulations Syndrome: Why Revisionist Powers Leverage Post-Colonial Sensibilities towards Post-Imperial Projects," Global Studies Quarterly, 2(4): 2022 - OPEN ACCESS
• "How to Reflexively Decentre EU Foreign Policy: Dissonance and Contrapuntal Reconstruction in Migration, Religious and Neighbourhood Governance" Journal of Common Market Studies (JCMS), April 2022 (co-authored w/Wolff, Gazsi and Huber) - OPEN ACCESS
• “Post-Colonial Theory and EU-Middle East Relations: Recognizing Co-Constitution,” in Bouris, Huber, and Pace, eds. Routledge Handbook on EU-Middle East Relations, (London: Routledge, 2021), 113-134.
• "Remembering Empire: Between Civilizational Nationalism and Post-National Pluralism," in Chovanec and Heilo, eds. Narratives of Pluralism in the Late Habsburg and Ottoman Empires, (London: Palgrave, 2021), 387-398.