James Brassett is Reader in International Political Economy (IPE); previously RCUK Research Fellow in the ESRC Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation (CSGR). He works on the everyday politics of globalisation with related interests in: i) ethical discourses of a putative global order; ii) the mediatised performance of global crisis events; and iii) alternative practices of resistance via film and comedy. His current research project on Humour and Global Politics looks at irony, satire and joking as everyday forms of dissent and political engagement, including the growing use of social media memes, self-deprecation and dunking in international diplomacy.

Brassett has published three books/monographs, most recently The Ironic State: British Comedy and the Everyday Politics of Globalization (Bristol University Press, 2021), and some 30 articles in journals such as European Journal of International Relations, International Feminist Journal of Politics, International Political Sociology, International Studies Quarterly, International Theory, New Political Economy, Review of International Political Economy and Security Dialogue. He has edited 8 Journal Special Issues on subjects including 'Ethics in World Politics', 'Legitimacy and Global Governance', 'The Political Economy of the Sub-Prime Crisis', 'Resilience', and 'Humour in Global Politics'. Brassett is a co-author on the new IPE textbook: I-PEEL: The International Political Economy of Everyday Life, Oxford University Press, 2022. His commentary on the rise of comedy in global politics has appeared in media such as The Conversation, The Economist and The New York Times.

Books

• The Ironic State: British Comedy and the Everyday Politics of Globalisation, Bristol University Press, 2021.
• Affective Politics of the Global Event: Trauma and the Resilient Market Subject, Routledge, 2018.
• Cosmopolitanism and Global Financial Reform: A Pragmatic Approach to the Tobin Tax, Routledge, 2010.

Articles

• EU've Got to Be Kidding: Anxiety, Humour and Ontological Security, Global Society, with Chris Browning and Muireann O'Dwyer, 2021, 35(1): 8-26.
• British Satire, Everyday Politics: Chris Morris, Armando Iannucci, and Charlie Brooker, British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 2017, 19(2): 245-262, with Alex Sutton.
• British Comedy, Global Resistance: Russell Brand, Charlie Brooker and Stewart Lee,' European Journal of International Relations, 2016, 22(1): 168-191.
• 'Security and the Performative Politics of Resilience', Security Dialogue, 46(1): 32-50, with Nick Vaughan-Williams.

Funding

• Humorous States: New Diplomacy and the Rise of Comedy in International RelationsLink opens in a new window, with Chris Browning, British Academy Small Grant.
• International Political Economy of Everyday Life, with Juanita Elias, Ben Richardson, and Lena Rethel, IATL Grant For Teaching Innovation.
• Ethics and Global Governance, Research Councils UK: 5 Year Fellowship.
• Roberts Funding for Research Development and Workshops.
• Visiting Fellowships at University of Amsterdam and University of Queensland.

Completed Phds

Dr Frederic Heine, 'The Temptation of Inflation': Masculinities and the Eurozone Crisis', ESRC funded.

Dr Marco Andreu, Impact Bonds and the Ambiguous Politics of Market Ethics, Warwick Chancellors Fellowship.

Dr Aya Nassar, Spaces of Power: Politics, Subjectivity and Materiality in Post-Independence Cairo, Warwick Chancellors Fellowship.

Dr Donna Greene, The Sustainability of the Social Democratic Welfare State: A Case Study of Barbados 1974-1994.

Dr Maurice Stierl, Migration Resistance as Border Politics: Counter Imaginaries of Europe, Warwick Chancellors Fellowship.

Dr Chris Rossdale, Anarchism, Anti-Militarism and the Politics of Security, ESRC Funded, Winner of the BISA Michael Nicholson Prize for the Best Thesis in IR, 2014.

Dr Chris Clarke, The Ethics of Liberal Market Governance: Adam Smith and the Constitution of Financial Market Agency, ESRC Funded.

Dr Mark Fowle, Practices of Emancipation: Security, Dialogue and Change in Post-War Vukovar, ESRC Funded.

Dr Chris Holmes, Economistic Fallacies in Contemporary Capitalism: A Polanyian Analysis of Regimes of Marketised Protection, ESRC Funded.

 

 

 

 

Research Interests

• Everyday Politics of Globalisation
• Alternative Practices of Resistance
• Mediatisation of Global Politics
• Humour and International Relations

Public Engagement

• Review of Charlie Brooker's Anti-Viral WipeLink opens in a new window for The Conversation
• Quoted in Dutch newspaper Volkskrant on the rise of the comedian in politics. Link opens in a new window
• Quoted in The Economist on UK Political SatireLink opens in a new window
• Quoted in Danish newspaper Politiken on the Politics of Brexit Satire.Link opens in a new window 
• E-IR Blog on Social Media Europe and the Rise of Humour in Global DiplomacyLink opens in a new window
• Panel on Humour and Politics at the Leicester Comedy Festival.
• Roundtable on the Future of Political Comedy, London South Bank.
• LSE Democratic Audit Blog on Comedy and the Politics of Resistance.Link opens in a new window
• Carnegie UK Trust Report on Gobal Governance and Democratic Civil SocietyLink opens in a new window.
• UNDP Report on Financial Transactions Taxes and Global Democracy.

Contact Details

Office: E2.12

Telephone: 02476-574420

Office hrs via Teams: Friday 9-11am during term time, except Reading week (Please use booking form)