Other News

We are delighted to introduce you to our new academic staff who have joined the department this week.

Dr Mathew Coakley (Teaching Fellow, Political Theory)

Dr Coakley studied Social and Political Sciences at King's College Cambridge before doing an MA in War Studies at King's College, London and then a PhD in Political Theory at New York University. Prior to coming to PAIS he taught at the London School of Economics & Political Science. His primary areas of research are political theory and ethics, with interests in epistemology and the philosophy of economics.

Mathew has published on the value of political legitimacy, the ethics of sweatshops and the problem of how to add up interests / make welfare comparisons, with his first book - "On the Structure of Moral Theories" (forthcoming Bloomsbury 2015) - looking at the options for how to simultaneously morally evaluate both agents and the actions they undertake, and the impact institutions might have on such evaluations.

Dr Georg Loefflmann (Teaching Fellow, US Foreign Policy and American Politics)

Between 2011 and 2014 Dr Georg Loefflmann undertook his PhD studies at PAIS. His PhD thesis is titled: "The Fractured Consensus - How competing visions of grand strategy challenge the geopolitical identity of American leadership under the Obama presidency," and was supervised by Professor Stuart Croft and Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams.

Previously, Dr Loefflmann has studied International Relations in Germany at the FU Berlin, the Humboldt-University, and the University of Potsdam, with a focus on German and European foreign and security policy and constructivist research perspectives.

His research focuses on the geopolitical contextualization and representation of national identity and how this informs the formulation of grand strategy and foreign and security policy.

Dr Briony Jones (Assistant Professor, International Development)

Briony Jones is joining PAIS from swisspeace, an Associate Research Institute of the University of Basel, Switzerland where she has worked since 2011. She in fact studied at PAIS as an undergraduate and has since then completed a MA and PhD in International Development at the University of Manchester. Developing her research and teaching focus on International Development Briony first worked as a Lecturer in International Development at Manchester and then moved to Switzerland where she has been based in Political Science.

Briony will be teaching on the core MA in International Development module 'Theories and Issues in International Development'. She will be continuing her research work focused on the intersection between development, peacebuilding and transitional justice with a special interest on the politics of intervention, knowledge production, citizenship and political identities at times of transition. She has worked on the case studies of Uganda, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Cote d'Ivoire, specialising in qualitative research methodologies.

Dr Chris Rossdale (Teaching Fellow, International Relations)

Dr Chris Rossdale previously lectured at Royal Holloway and City University London. He has a PhD from PAIS, and in 2014 was awarded the BISA Michael Nicholson Prize for best thesis in International Studies.

His research sits at the intersection between international relations theory and the study of resistance, looking at the ways in which our understandings of international politics shift when we begin from the perspective of radical social movements. His PhD thesis looked at the ways in which anti-militarist social movements can help us rethink (and better resist) the concepts and politics of security and militarism. Dr Rossdale is currently in the process of developing a new research project which seeks to interrogate the role of political solidarity in the international system.

Dr Reiko Shindo (Teaching Fellow, International Security)

Before joining PAIS, Dr Shindo was based at the University of Tokyo (Japan) as an Assistant Professor in the Graduate Program on Human Security. She received her PhD from Aberystwyth University (UK).

Reiko’s research is situated at the intersection between politics and geography. Most of her work derives from a general interest in citizenship and community. In particular, she examines how the ambiguous boundaries of citizenship are transforming conventional meanings of politics and the space of political community. Reiko has been committed to interdisciplinary research by drawing on works mainly from citizenship studies, migration studies, border studies, and critical International Relations.

PAIS academics Professor Shirin Rai and Dr Juanita Elias have been selected as members of the Political Studies Association’s research commission on The Crisis of Care in Austerity Britain which was launched last week. Other members of the Commission include The Fawcett Society, The Women’s Budget Group and Sheffield University.

The Commission will examine the governance and regulation of care in the UK, with a particular focus on the care of older people. Prof Rai commented:

‘The crisis of care in the UK. is intensifying. While there has been considerable attention paid to this crisis in terms of the rising costs of this care to the state, less attention has been paid to the social consequences of this for older populations and those who care for them - who are overwhelmingly women. The Commission will address this gap.’

Dr. Elias noted:

‘Because the British welfare state has been important in organising, resourcing and delivering care work in the county, the restructuring of state provision of care is producing specific gendered effects which need to be more fully understood’

Prof. Nick Vaughan-Williams, head of PAIS said:

‘We are delighted to have two of our colleagues working on the critically important issue of care of older people in the UK in collaboration with leading experts and organisations working in this area. This underlines PAIS’s commitment to high quality research that has the ability to address urgent social issues and shape policy agendas’

You can read more on the comission here.

PAIS Honorary Professor, Her Excellency Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, President of Malta, has recently met with the UNESCO Director-General, Irina Bokova, and has also addressed the UN Assembley in New York.

On 24 September, UNESCO Director-General met H.E. Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, President of the Republic of Malta, in New York, in the context of the UN Summit on Sustainable Development and the 70th session of the UN General Assembly‎.

President Coleiro Preca spoke of the importance of bridging exclusion, living together and dialogue in all societies today. She underlined the activities of the newly launched Foundation for Well-Being in Society, in Malta, with a focus on providing spaces for children of all backgrounds to exchange and share.

Director-General meets President of Malta in New York

Whilst addressing the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals summit, attended by more than 150 world leaders, President Marie Louise Coleiro Preca said "Global solidarity and a renewed commitment to safeguard human dignity and rights were needed now more than ever before."

“As leaders, we cannot look away. As leaders, we must be steadfast champions of social, economic, and political inclusion. As leaders we must always give voice to the shared truths of our global community. As leaders, we must become advocates for peace and the wellbeing of all,” the President said.

Although, at times, this might not be the most popular position “we must be bold, and defend the rights of vulnerable people wherever they are found”. She added “human dignity, integrity and freedom should be at the heart of our concerns”.

Poor people have waited long enough, President tells UN general assembly

Her Excellency also attended the opening of the General Assembly of the United Nations in New York for the speech of Pope Francis the First.

PAIS has made significant gains moving up four places to 3rd in the rankings in Politics in The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2016 league table.

We are also placed at No 1 for the student experience in the entire Russell Group of elite departments.

Head of Department, Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams is delighted with the rankings.

Professor Vaughan-Williams said: “This latest ranking in The Times/Sunday Times is yet further evidence of PAIS’ position as one of the UK’s leading Politics Departments. Research and teaching excellence are at the heart of who we are and what we stand for.

Staff and students should feel deservedly proud of this result. With a newly refurbished building and an ambitious agenda for the future, we look
forward to building on this success in 2015/16 and beyond.”

Thank you to all our students and staff for our continued success.

The complete Politics rankings can be viewed here.

Burkina Faso, which has been experiencing a political transition since October 2014 when former President Compaoré saw his attempts to remove term limits from the constitution fail and had to leave the country, is experiencing turmoil again, less than four weeks before scheduled elections to return the country to a constitutional order.

On 16 September, members of the Presidential Guard (RSP) disrupted the transition by kidnapping transition authorities, and attempting to impose their chief to lead the country. This was faced by massive resistance from the population, in the capital Ouagadougou but also in many towns and cities across the country.

PAIS PhD student Eloïse Bertrand provides analysis of this popular resistance on African Arguments.

You can read Eloïse's articule here: http://africanarguments.org/2015/09/21/popular-resistance-to-the-burkina-faso-coup-who-where-and-what-next-after-the-draft-deal/