As well as his work at the London School of Economics, Westad has held Visiting Fellowships at Cambridge University and New York University. He has received major grants for research from the British Arts and Humanities Research Board, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Leverhulme Trust. He also worked as the International Coordinator of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Advisory Group on Declassification and Archival Access. In 2011 he was nominated as one of two candidates for president of the American Historical Association. From 2013 to 2016 Westad also served as Distinguished Visiting Research Professor at Hong Kong University, and since 2016 he has been a guest professor in the History Department at Peking University.