Our Team

Short info

Hristo Dokov is the President of CSDSA and Head of “Social and economic development”. He is also a Senior Assistant Professor at Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, in the Department of "Regional and Political Geography". His primary research experience and academic interests span sustainable development; economic, social, and political geography; regional geography; regional planning and policy; European integration and EU policies; international relations and geopolitics; as well as statistics and quantitative methods. Hristo has numerous publications related to these topics. He completed his master’s and doctoral studies through programs at Sofia University, the University of Cologne, the University of Vienna, and the Austrian Institute for International Affairs.

Hristo has participated in numerous international, transdisciplinary and interdisciplinary projects addressing spatial planning, territorial governance, regional resilience and transformation, capacity building, and the advancement of sustainability models and systems. His professional affiliations include the Earth System Governance Taskforce on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs Taskforce); the River Cities Network (RCN); the European Regional Science Association (ERSA); the Western Balkan Network on Territorial Governance (TG-WeB); the Association of Professional Geographers and Regionalists (APGR); and the Bulgarian Regional Science Association (BRSA). He currently serves as a Co-Lead of the SDGs Taskforce’s group on “Global governance” and is the Principal Investigator of the RCN-based project “Reviving the Least Developed Danube-Adjacent Region: The Case of Vidin”.

Selected projects

- “COALition - Promoting Innovation Excellence in Transformation of Coal Regions to Climate-Neutral, Thriving Economies” (EU Horizon programme; 2023-2027)

- “Territorial Governance of Non-standard Geographies” (Role: National expert; EU ESPON programme; 2023-2025)

- “Reviving the Least Developed Danube-adjacent Region: The Case of Vidin” (Role: Principal investigator; RCN project; 2022-2026)

- “OASIS - Open-source Technologies Acceleration for a New Generation of Student Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Sustainable Development“ (EIT HEI Initiative – Innovation; 2022-2024)

- “AMELIA” (Erasmus+; 2022-2024)

- “RIGHTS” (Erasmus+; 2021-2022)

- “HEPNESS” (Erasmus+; 2017-2018)

- “ATHLISI” (Erasmus+; 2016-2017)

- “Regional Inequalities and Regional Management of Complex Natural-social Systems (the Case of the Northwest Planning Region)” (Sofia University; 2016-2017)

- “Establishment of Initiative-Based Regional Centers for Geography Teachers” (Sofia University; 2015-2016)

- “HP@SC” (Erasmus+; 2014-2016)

- “Information Network of Geography Teachers: Survey-Based Development of an Electronic Catalogue” (Sofia University; 2014-2015)

- “Cultural-Political Aspects of Cross-Border Cooperation between Bulgaria and Serbia – Spatial Diffusion Aspects” (Sofia University; 2013-2014)

- “Assessment of the Economic Cooperation in the Bulgaria-Greece Cross-border Region” (Sofia University; 2012-2013)

Selected publications

- Dokov, H. (2025) “Inequality (global and national)”, In: Biermann, F., Hickmann, T., Kang, Y.H. and Sénit, C-A. (eds) Essential Concepts for Implementing the Sustainable Development Goals: An A-Z Guide, London and New York: Routledge, pp. 63-64.

- Dokov, H. and Stamenkov, I. (2025) “Modelling the Spatial Development of Europe: Insights from 2015”, Space – Society – Economy, vol. 7, pp. 91-109.

- Dokov, H. (2024) “Bulgaria’s regional policy: Analysing paradigm shifts and dynamics of territorial inequalities”, Environmental & Socio-economic Studies, vol. 12(3), pp. 37-50.

- Dokov, H. and Paneva, A. (2023) “Development trends in the Balkans: How much is enough to reach the ‘desired state’ of sustainable development?”, Annual Review of Territorial Governance in the Western Balkans, vol. 4, pp. 15-34.

- Stamenkov, I. and Dokov, H. (2023) „The role of placemaking and tactical urbanism for promoting active cities: analysing experts' perceptions“, Activities in Physical Education and Sport (APES), vol. 13(2), pp. 30-36.

- Rusev, M. and Dokov, H. (2022) “Typological classification of the world’s countries as of 2020”, Year-book of Sofia University, FGG, vol. 114, book 2 – Geography, pp. 308-338. (in Bulgarian)

- Dokov, H. (2021) “Spotlight on Bulgaria” In: Böhme, K., Lüer, C., Besana, F., et al. (eds) The state of the regions, cities and villages in the areas of socio-economic policies: Contribution to the 2021 EU Annual Regional and Local Barometer, Brussels: The European Committee of the Regions (Commission for Economic Policy), pp. 17-18.

- Milkova, K. and Dokov, H. (2021) “Territorial characteristics of the FDI flows in Bulgaria”, SocioBrains, 78 (Febr., 2021), pp. 243-252. (in Bulgarian)

- Dokov, H., Milkova, K. and Stamenkov, I. (2020) “Socio-economic effects of COVID-19 in Bulgaria: A spatial analysis”, Annual Review of Territorial Governance in the Western Balkans, vol. 2, pp. 96-117.

- Dokov, H. (2020) “Transformation of Domestic Regional Policies in the Context of Enhancing European Integration”, Space – Society – Economy, vol. 2, pp. 236-272. (in Bulgarian)

- Toto, R., Shutina, D… Dokov, H., et al. (2019) A Vision for Territorial Development and Governance in the Western Balkans (position paper), Tirana: Polis, ISBN 978-9928-4563-1-1.

- Dokov, H. and Stoyanova, D. (2018) “Contemporary dimensions of the Balkan geopolitical knot and perspectives for sustainable development of the region”, Collection of papers “Sustainable regional development of Bulgaria“, vol. 2, pp. 77-87. (in Bulgarian)

- Dokov, H. and Stamenkov, I. (2018) “A comprehensive literature review on health promotion within active cities’ environment”, In: The HEPNESS perspective for active cities development, Venice: Ca’ Foscari University, pp. 13-26.

- Milkova, K. and Dokov, H. (2017) Spatial socio-economic and investment models in the EU and Bulgaria in the discourse of regional development, Sofia: Tip-top press, ISBN: 978-954-723-199-3. (in Bulgarian)

- Dokov, H. and Stamenkov, I. (2017) “Measuring the complex socio-economic development of the Danube-adjacent NUTS2 regions”, Forum Geografic, vol. 17(1), pp. 150-158.

- Simeonova, V., Stamenkov, I. and Dokov, H. (2017) “A Comparative Study of Different Balkan Spatial Planning Systems: the Cases of Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia and Albania”, The Balkans – Languages, History, Culture, vol. 5, pp. 352-362.

- Dokov, H. and Stamenkov, I. (2017) „Typology of the Bulgarian NUTS3 regions based on author’s index for complex assessment of the regional development“, Collection of papers “Sustainable regional development of Bulgaria“, vol. 1, pp. 84-91. (in Bulgarian)

- Milkova, K. and Dokov, H. (2016) “Comparative analysis of the FDI’s spatial localization models in the Danube provinces of Bulgaria”, Forum Geografic, vol. 15(2), pp. 195-209.

- Stamenkov, I., Dokov, H. and Simeonova, V. (2016) “Dynamics of the spatial inequalities in Bulgaria after its accession in the EU”, Collection of papers from the “4th Serbian Congress of Geographers”, Kopaonik, 2015, pp. 321-326.

- Dokov, H. (2016) “Impact evaluation of the EU cohesion policy - economic aspects”, Year-book of Sofia University, FGG, vol. 107, book 2 – Geography, pp. 259-282. (in Bulgarian)

- Dokov, H., Metodiev, E. and Lioce, R.  (2016) “The Join Action Plan for HP&SC: a common framework for evolving health oriented sport clubs”, In: Health Promotion at Sport Clubs, pp. 15-51.

- Dokov, H. and Stamenkov, I. (2015) “Spatial models for the development of Europe - attesting the most popular concepts”, Mathematics and Natural sciences, vol. 3 - Geography, ecology and environment protection, pp. 50-55.

- Dokov, H. (2014) “Complex assessment of the EU member states’ socio-economic potentials: approbation of specific author’s methodological algorithm”, Geography facing the global challenges, Barcelona: Barcelona Univ., pp. 249-258.

- Dokov, H. (2014) “Europeanization of the EU Member-states’ regional policies”, Collection of papers “Geography and regional development”, Sofia: LOPS Foudation, pp. 267-298.

- Dokov, H. (2011) “The impact of geopolitical ideas and geostrategic imperatives on the USA foreign policy”, Geopolitics, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 144-165. (in Bulgarian)