Oxana received her first degree in International Relations from Lomonosov Moscow State University, Russia. She completed her Masters degree in Public Administration at Robert Gordon University, UK. Having started her career as a translator and after a few other roles, she worked for the international renewable energy organization, the International Center on Small Hydro Power in China, which she is still involved with as a consultant helping draft a report for UNIDO. She also used to volunteer for Less Meat Less Heat and helped launch a coalition advocating for an update of the greenhouse gas accounting framework used under the UNFCCC in order to better account for emissions from the agricultural sector. Oxana is also a Strategic Advisor at Swarm Dynamics, a not-for-profit working on the creation of a counter-narrative to the dominant neoliberal, growth-based economies via arts.

Oxana joined IPE as a Junior Research Fellow 2018 to do research on the biophysical metabolism connected to financialisation in the countries of the former Eastern Bloc. Her current research interests broadly include system change, degrowth, energy and sustainable food systems.