Iker Itoiz Ciaurriz
- Position: Teaching Fellow in Modern History
- Areas of expertise: Twentieth-Century political, social and intellectual history; Political violence in the twentieth century Europe (1936-1962). Political and cultural memory in modern and contemporary Europe
- Email: I.ItoizCiaurriz@leeds.ac.uk
- Location: 414 Parkinson
- Website: ORCID
Profile
After receiving a BA (Hons) in History and Politicis (2014) and then an MA in Modern History (2015) from the Complutense University of Madrid, I moved to the University of Edinburgh to begin work on my PhD. under the supervision of Professor Emile Chabal. Having held a temporary teaching fellow in Modern European History at Durham University, I joined the University of Leeds in August 2024 as Teaching Fellow in Modern History.
Research interests
I am a historian of twentieth-century political and intellectual life, with a strong focus on Britain and Europe.
My current research agenda is twofold. First, my first monograph, The Crises of Eric Hobsbawm: From Primitive Rebels to the End of Communism (currently under contract with Bloomsbury Publishing) explores the life and work of Eric Hobsbawm as a lens through which to examine the transnational history of communism in the twentieth century. The book offers a political, social and intellectual biography of Eric Hobsbawm as a committed Marxist and Communist during the Global Cold War. Using newly available archival material, it explores how Hobsbawm navigated the social and ideological crises of European communism, from 1936 to 1989, through historical scholarship and political engagement. The book situates Hobsbawm within global revolutionary networks, especially in Italy, France and Latin America. It challenges Eurocentric Cold War Historiography by emphasising the transitional circulation of Marxist ideas from Latin America to Europe. It contributes to debates in European social and economic history, Marxist historiography, and the political organisation of the Left in the twentieth century.
Second, my new project, The Unmaking and Remaking of Europe: Consent, Coercion, and Ordinary Violence in Spain, France, and Italy (1936–1952), explores the everyday mechanisms of complicity, repression, and reconstruction during Europe’s mid-century crises. It analyses how authoritarian regimes and resistance movements mobilised violence, built legitimacy, and shaped political order from below—foregrounding the agency of ordinary citizens in systems of both coercion and consent. Drawing on interdisciplinary methods and a wide range of sources, this project contributes to ongoing debates in the history of violence, political and social history, and postwar reconstruction. Together, these projects articulate a broader research agenda focused on the circulation of political ideas, the practice of ideology, and the ordinary citizens in shaping political transformation across Europe and beyond.
Qualifications
- PhD in History
- MA in Modern History
- BA (Hons) History
- BA (Hons) Political Science
Professional memberships
- Royal Historical Society
Student education