From 1987 to 1990, Kian was a lecturer in political sociology at UCLA. In 1995 she joined the faculty of University Paris III, and later the University of Paris VIII Saint Denis. She is a research expert on Iranian and Maghreb studies, and is a researcher for the Iranian laboratory CNRS. Notable works include Avoir vingt ans en Iran (Alternatives, 1999), Les femmes iraniennes entre islam État et famille (Maisonneuve & Larose, 2002) and La République islamique d'Iran : de la maison du Guide à la raison d'État (Michalon, 2005).^[3] In 1996 she published the article Des femmes iraniennes contre le clergé: islamistes et laiques pour la premiere fois unies in Le Monde diplomatique,^[4] and in 2010 she published the article Islamic Feminism in Iran: A New Form of Subjugation or the Emergence of Agency? in Critique internationale journal.^[5] In her works, she is critical of Islamic laws (shari'a) in Muslim countries and sees them as a threat to women's rights of equality.^[6]

The Servizio d’informatione religiosa (SIR) defined her “the most listened woman of the Iranian diaspora”.^[7]

She is among the most consulted Iranian diaspora women in the world to comment the social and political evolutions of her native country.^{[8] [9]}

She described the moment of the death of Mahsa Amini as a turning point where civil society openly contradicts Iranian power (“What's unprecedented about these protests is that women are leading the chargel”)^[10][11] and she delivered a pitch as invited guest in the European Parliament in october 2022 after a meeting with European Parliament President Roberta Metsola.^[12] She spoke at Les Echos Belgium about talebanization of power in Iran. [1] In November 2022, she affirmed that the crisis in Iran is a revolution aiming to change the regime, and not just a protest from civil society.[2]

• Thiébaut, Azadeh. Secularization of Iran: a Doomed Failure? The New Middle Class and the Making of Modern Iran (Travaux et memoires de l'Institut d'Etudes iraniennes). Leuven: Peeters Publishers, 1998. ISBN 9042900326
• Thiébaut, Azadeh. Les femmes iraniennes entre islam, Etat et famille. Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 2002. ISBN 2706816147
• Eshraghi, Isabelle, Azadeh Thiébaut Thiébaut, and Seyyed E. Nabavi. Avoir 20 ans à Téhéran. Paris: Ed. Alternatives, 1999. ISBN 2862271942