Professor of Political Science at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences; member of the Georgian Political Science Association (GPSA); Director of Transnational Crime and Corruption Centre and serves as a visiting professor at Malmö University within the program Erasmus Mundus EMBER. In 2013, was visiting professor at the Swedish Institute at Malmö University. In 2010-2011, he was an invited scholar at the Monterey Institute of International Studies (California, USA); in 2003 he was an invited scholar at Freie Universität Berlin; 2000-2001 he led the Local Government Reform USAID Project as Deputy Director; he was Fulbright Visiting Professor at Mount Holyoke College and Johns Hopkins University (USA) in 1998-99 and has been working on democratization and civic engagement issues since 1990. Since 2002 he has studied organized crime, smuggling, corruption, security and armed conflicts. He has participated in and supervised international conferences and authored international publications on organized crime, corruption, security and armed conflict. Currently he lectures on Political corruption and organized crime; Political research methods; Modern safety studies; Emergency management; Introduction to Political Science; and Social science methods.