Robert Austin

Robert C Austin is a specialist on East-Central and Southeastern Europe in historic and contemporary perspective at the Centre for European and Eurasian Studies (CEES) at the University of Toronto. In the past, Austin was a Tirana-based correspondent for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty; a Slovak-based correspondent with The Economist Group of Publications; and a news writer with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in Toronto. Austin has written articles for The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, Southeast European Times, Orbis, East European Politics and Societies and East European Quarterly. He has lectured widely in Europe and North America and has been a visiting scholar in Graz (University of Graz) and Vienna, Austria (Institute for Human Sciences) and Regensburg, Germany (Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies). His most recent book is Enver Hoxha: Biography of a Tyrant, co-authored with Artan R. Hoxha. Prior to that he published Royal Fraud: The Story of Albania’s First and Last King (2024), A History of Central Europe (2021), Making and Remaking the Balkans: Nations and States since 1878 (2019) and Founding a Balkan State: Albania's Experiment with Democracy, 1920-1925 (2012).  At CEES, he coordinates the Undergraduate and Graduate European Affairs Program, the Hellenic Studies Program and the Hungarian Studies Program. In 2020, the U of T's Arts and Science Students' Union gave him the Ranjini (Rini) Ghosh Excellence in Teaching Award. In 2022, he was awarded the Faculty of Arts and Science Outstanding Teaching Award. In 2025, he was awarded the President's Teaching Award.