International Sociology and International Sociology Reviews

‘Transnationalization of elites’ is our Topic of the Month for January 2024. On this topic, enjoy Free Access to this article by Diliara Valeeva (KU Leuven, Belgium), Frank W Takes (Leiden University and University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands), and Eelke M Heemskerk (University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands) published in International Sociology, Beaten paths towards the transnational corporate elite. Read on to know more about the first author’s trajectory and work.

Diliara Valeeva

Frank W Takes

Eelke M Heemskerk

Why are you working on this topic? Could you share an experience, a fact or a person who made you get engage on that research?

D. Valeeva: I study elites. And I study them because recently, it has become increasingly clear how wealth around the world is unequally concentrated in the hands of a few. We now talk about the ‘one-percent’, and we see the growing power of billionaires in political and social life. All these developments have contributed to my interest in the investigation of economic elites – the individuals at the summit of corporate hierarchies that possess significant power, have a disproportionate amount of wealth and influential connections.

In this paper, we were trying to engage with the literature on the globalization of elites. My co-authors asked ourselves the question: Hey, everyone is talking about elites working and traveling across the globe, and living more globalized lifestyles. How does that work? Are there any patterns of mobility to discover? Are there similarities in how economic elites follow career paths? These were the primary questions motivating our study.

What would you emphasize about your academic trajectory? Can you highlight which have been your academic positions, universities, awards, departments and research centers?

D. Valeeva: I am an Assistant Professor in Computational Social Science at the Department of Political Science of the University of Amsterdam. I received my PhD at the Amsterdam School for Social Science Research in 2021. Before joining the University of Amsterdam, I worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Geography Department of the KU Leuven. My ongoing research focuses on business and finance, corporate elites, and power dynamics within social networks. I employ computational methodologies to analyze corporate power structures and elite behavioral patterns.