Rob Aitken

Rob Aitken is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science within the Faculty of Arts at the University of Alberta. He teaches a range of courses from introductory politics to advanced seminars on international political economy and research methods.

His educational background includes a BA in Political Studies and Comparative Development Studies from Trent University, followed by MA and PhD degrees in Political Science from Carleton University.

A leading scholar in International Political Economy, Aitken's research examines the cultural dimensions of financial systems, particularly how everyday people interact with global financial markets. His work bridges governmentality studies, cultural economy, and post-structuralist methods to understand how financial institutions mobilize working-class populations and how resistance to financial practices emerges.

His publications reveal a consistent focus on the cultural aspects of finance, with recent work exploring payday lending, debt relationalities, and the financialization of micro-credit. His research demonstrates how financial practices are embedded in cultural contexts and power relations.

As an educator, Aitken supervises graduate students interested in critical approaches to IPE and welcomes those working on cultural analysis of economic life. He teaches courses including POL S 101 (Introduction to Politics), POL S 462 (Political Economy of Global Governance), and POL S 680 (Theories and Methods of Political Inquiry) for PhD students.