Oriol Costa is a Senior Associate Researcher at IBEI and Associate Professor of International Relations at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, where he currently acts as Vice-Dean for Academic Affairs. His research looks at the interaction between the European Union and international institutions, with a special interest on how the latter shape the ways in which the EU acts in the international arena. He also does research on international environmental politics. He has edited two special issues (European Security, Politics and Governance) and two edited volumes (Palgrave), and has (co)authored several articles at journals such as Journal of European Public Policy, Comparative European Politics, European Security,  Cooperation and Conflict, Politische Vierteljahresschrift, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Politics and Governance, South European Society and Politics, Mediterranean Politics, and others, as well as chapters in edited books (Palgrave, Springer, Policy Press, Routlede, Tecnos).

From 2007 to 2009 he held a Postdoctoral grant (Beatriu de Pinós) to conduct research at the Freie Universität Berlin (Arbeitsstelle Europäische Integration, OSI).

He teaches courses on the contemporary international system, international environmental politics, and IR theory. He is part of the Observatory of European Foreign Policy, a research group based at IBEI.