My research is aimed at understanding the ways in which recognition at the international level shapes the way that groups conceive of their identities and then respond to that recognition in an attempt to renegotiate how the international community understands their identities. Through a return to studying the first image in the IR literature, my research explores the ways in which varying forms of recognition in international institutions (states, collections of law, and IO positions, agreements, and membership rules) impact the way that people view themselves within the larger global order and how that alters the way they behave politically over time.
This project is the starting point for my long-term research goals of expanding the scope of the field of international relations to study the impact that international politics at the meta-level alters the everyday reality of people on the ground. I view my research as existing in the nexus between international relations and political theory, drawing concepts from the latter to help inform the full potential and actual impact of the former. My future research projects will develop this intersection and focus on the deep impacts of international relations as it is practiced in the areas of land grabs, water rights, and food politics.
Working Papers
From Acceptable Loss to Unacceptable Harm: How Norm Entrepreneurs Co-opted the Human Rights Discourse
Game of Drones: The Consequences of Technological Proliferation and the Changing Nature of Conflict
Institutionalized Hegemony: A Constructivist Look at IO Socialization
Losing the Individual: Nationalism’s Destructive Nature