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  • Room 114, Rolle Building

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The MAIR Research Seminar Series brings together scholars focusing on topical aspects of contemporary global politics. It hosts a seminar programme packed full of events throughout the academic year.
The series focuses on the issues in international affairs that concern us all and continues to promote and enhance the research base of staff working in several disciplines and geographical areas. These include International Relations, Human Geography, US politics and US foreign policy, European Union studies, Middle Eastern and Africa studies. Each year, the MAIR Research Seminar Series plays a critical role in encouraging the exchange of ideas among our scholarly community and provides students with the opportunity to hear about the research being conducted by University of Plymouth academics as well as scholars from different universities in the UK and internationally. The seminars also feature practitioners from the political and policy communities who provide insights and first-hand experience of the political and policy machinery at work (or not working).

The MAIR (Masters in International Relations) Research Seminar Series 2024

The MAIR Research Seminars are open to all University staff and students. All talks take place from 13:00–14:00.
  • Wednesday 30 October: A Journalist's View of Israel (speaker: John Dobson, Visiting Fellow at the University of Plymouth. Former diplomat, and Journalist at the Sunday Guardian)
  • Wednesday 13 November: The Meaning of Scholasticide: The Historical Context of Targeting Palestinian Education (speaker: Dr Nadia Naser-Najjab, Senior Lecturer in Palestine Studies, University of Exeter)
  • Wednesday 20 November: Vibes and Alchemy: British Defence Reviews since 1998 (speaker: Professor Jamie Gaskarth Professor of Foreign Policy and International Relations at the Open University)
  • Wednesday 4 December: Still with us? EU Hegemony and its European Neighbours (speaker: Dr Patrick Holden , University of Plymouth, Leader of the Online MA in International Relations)
  • Wednesday 11 December: Fragmentation and Realignment: The Changing Face of German Politics (speaker: Professor Karl Cordell, Professor Emeritus at the University of Plymouth (former editor of EthnoPolitics Journal)
Please contact Dr Patrick Holden (patrick.holden@plymouth.ac.uk) for further information.
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Previous seminars

2016 seminars

2016 seminars

Wednesday 19 October: Brexit Roundtable What is the possible impact of Brexit upon the UK's relationship with the EU and the UK's place in the international system
Academics from the School of Law, Criminology and Government tackled these questions by looking at the impact of Brexit in their own areas of expertise.
  • Professor Mary Farrell addressed the question 'Is the UK heading for a Hard Brexit?'
  • Dr Lorenzo Cladi then looked at the possible impact of Brexit for European Security.
  • Dr Patrick Holden discussed the impact of Brexit on the International Political Economy.
  • Finally, Dr Piers Revell focused on Brexit's likely effects on the global environmental governance.
Wednesday 9 November: Power and Poverty in Africa-EU Relations – Assessing West Africa's Free Trade Deal (speaker: Mark Langan, University of Leicester)
West African countries will soon implement an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with the European Union. The EPA will bring about 'reciprocal' free trade between the blocs, requiring substantial tariff liberalisation on the part of the West African signatories. In his talk, Dr Mark Langan examined the potential development impact of the EPA in terms of poverty reduction and livelihoods in the region. In particular, it underscores potential food security implications of tariff dismantling for local agricultural producers in sectors such as poultry and tomato agro-processing.
Wednesday 30 November: Post US-Presidential Elections Debate (speakers: Dr David Brockington and Dr Chris Emery, University of Plymouth)
Dr David Brockington’s presentation: "How the Electoral College turned a 1.3 million vote win into a loss, and other musings"
Even though the Democrats have won the popular vote in six of the last seven Presidential elections, they’ve only won the Presidency in Constitutional terms in four of those. Indeed, the result came down to around 60,000 votes in three states. The world was surprised, because polling data estimated Clinton as having a 3% nationally as well as a comfortable lead of over 4% in what turned out to be the three key states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. However, the political science “fundamentals” models estimated about a 1.5% Clinton victory nationally, which is roughly in line with the final result. David's brief talk considered the role of the Electoral College, the potential of polling failure, as well as discussing the futility of trying to find broad, generalisable lessons from an election ultimately decided by 0.0005% of the electorate due to the artefact of the Electoral College.
Dr Chris Emery’s presentation: "The triumph of Trumpism: how the radical politics of cultural grievance won and what it means for the world"
The first part of this talk argued that Trumpism represents a reconstitution of popular authoritarianism, and the politics of race and cultural grievance in America. Challenging the mythology of Trump's working class support, this section of the talk presented a complex picture of how economic grievances translated into support for Trump. Geography, education, race, and gender are all identified as key factors in the 'Trump coalition. The second part of the talk briefly discussed Trump's victory in the wider context of the global crisis in liberal order and asks 'What next for the world?'
Wednesday 14 December: What's in a Frame? The Moral Framing of Conflict in the Mass Media (speaker: Nicola Langdon, PhD student, University of Plymouth)
How do the media report on conflict and interventionism? How does the utilisation of particular linguistic tools shape our understanding of conflict events and foreign policy responses? This presentation examined the British media framing and foreign policy response to recent conflict events in Libya, Syria and Iraq. Proposed is the idea that cosmopolitan morality is used to discursively frame conflict and in so doing legitimises and naturalises particular policy reactions. Linguistic choices may therefore be instrumental in shaping opinion and making possible the pursuit of foreign policy interests.

2017 seminars

2017 seminars

Wednesday 8 February: Stronger than Strong. Perceptions and Misperceptions of Power (speaker: Jeff Bridoux, Aberystwyth University)
Addressing the question of decline or resilience of US power in the contemporary international system, this paper attempted to generate a reflection on how knowledge on power is generated by US foreign policymakers. Questioning the dominance of neoliberal rationality and positivist epistemology in knowledge production, the paper argued that, in addition to existing analysis of the material foundations of power, it is essential to also understand how power is perceived by US decision-makers. Going beyond classical neorealist analyses of perceptions of power, and inspired by Gramsci, the paper investigated the ideational and epistemological roots of such perceptions of power and seeks to answer the following question: How is knowledge on power produced and how does it affect its perceptions and misperceptions in US foreign policy-making?
Wednesday 15 February: Revisionist? Neo-imperialist? Anti-Western? Deconstructing Russia's policies in Ukraine and Syria (speaker: Dr Derek Averre, Reader in Russian Foreign and Security Policy, University of Birmingham)
Russia’s alleged breaches of international law following the Crimea annexation and apparent disregard for humanitarian considerations in its military support for the Assad regime have damaged Russia’s relations with the West to the extent that, according to one commentator, we are going through ‘not just a spell of bad weather but fundamental climate change’. Concerns have been expressed about a continuing ‘spoiler’ role for Russia in European security governance and a ‘sphere of interest’ extending from Russia’s western neighbourhood to Europe’s southern periphery. This paper offered a closer examination of recent developments and analyses the opportunities and constraints Moscow faces in its foreign policy.
Wednesday 8 March: The History of Human Rights and the Sovereignty of Ideas (speaker: Robert Lamb, University of Exeter)
The idea of human rights is key to contemporary politics and international relations, and yet there remains no scholarly consensus about its origins. In this paper, Robert argued that scholarly disagreement about the emergence of human rights can be explained through attention to problematic methodological commitments within historical narratives. He discussed two such narratives, explained where they go astray, and unpacked an alternative approach to thinking about the history of the idea of human rights.
Wednesday 10 May: The Ages of History: Periodisation and 'Global IR' (speaker: Brieg Tomos Powel, Aberystwyth University)
In recent years, several scholars have sought to 'globalise' the discipline of International Relations by moving it away from its supposedly Eurocentric foundations. This stems in part from a call by Acharya (2014: 650) for more extensive coverage of ‘the ideas, institutions, intellectual perspectives, and practices of Western and non-Western societies alike’, grounding the discipline in world rather than selective histories. Yet whilst such work has recounted at length examples of Eurocentricity in IR, proposals for a means to decentre its history are harder to discern. This paper therefore aimed to move the debate beyond criticism of the discipline’s Eurocentricity in search for a new, decentred, and global means of understanding the history of international relations, based on periodisation rather than a 'benchmark' approach to this history.
Tuesday 17 October: Failed States and the ‘Big Man’ Phenomenon: The Case of Zimbabwe (speaker: Marta Nowakowska)
Marta Nowakowska is our visiting ERASMUS scholar. She is an anthropologist of culture with a specialist ethnologist perspective in the culture, politics, economics, history and security of southern African countries. Her research focuses on post1994 South Africa where she has published on the topic of ethnicity and identity in the Zulu population, problems of ethnic and cultural identity in sub-Saharan Africa and issues of culture security and migration in the region.
Wednesday 25 October: Brexit debate (speakers: Professor Mary Farrell, Dr Patrick Holden and Dr Lorenzo Cladi , University of Plymouth)
The UK is due to depart the EU on 30 March 2019, however there remains uncertainty over the terms of Brexit. With negotiations between the European Union and the UK having recently entered a fourth round, academics from the Department of Politics and International Relations within the School of Law, Criminology and Government take the opportunity to reflect upon what Brexit entails in their own areas of expertise.
  • Lorenzo shared his insights on how Brexit is likely to affect NATO.
  • Mary provided an overview on the UK government's response to Brexit from the initiation of Article 50 to the state-of-play in the negotiations with the European Commission.
  • Patrick delved into Brexit and the resurgence of power politics in Europe, with brief case studies of trade and Anglo-Irish relations.
Wednesday 15 November: Britain as a Global Actor: in Search of a Post-Brexit Role (speaker: Professor Mike Smith, Warwick University)
This paper analysed and assessed the prospects for ‘Global Britain’ in the post-Brexit environment, within a framework of role theory. The first part of the paper identified key elements of the ‘Global Britain’ discourse and placed them into the context of role theory, with particular attention to ideas of role conceptions, role performance and role impact. The second part of the paper explored the implications of these ideas in four arenas of UK external action: trade, the ‘special relationship’ with the United States, the United Nations and the Commonwealth. The final part of the paper identified and evaluated key constraints on Britain’s ability to perform the role of ‘Global Britain’ in the post-Brexit environment, in particular the vulnerability of the economy, continuing institutional constraints and the changing international opportunity structure.
Wednesday 22 November: Reactive Rearmament: The Instability of a Post-Nuclear World (speaker: Dr David Blagden, University of Exeter)
If a world multilaterally disarmed of its nuclear weapons was ever achieved, just how strategically stable would that world be? This paper begins from the premise that the scientific capability to reconstruct nuclear weapons can never be expunged. That being the case, an escalatory race towards nuclear reconstitution would always be possible during international crises between latently capable major powers. Crucially, moreover, unlike contemporary deterrence – which is stabilised by the survivability of the major powers’ seaborne nuclear arsenals – the facilities of rearmament would not be survivable, creating acute first-strike incentives and thus crisis instability. As such, the argument that conventional military aggression would be more likely in a world free of nuclear weapons may indeed be commonplace, and a risk that disarmament advocates are willing to bear. But this paper’s rationalist analysis demonstrates that nuclear aggression would also be more likely in a world that had dismantled its extant nuclear warheads, casting doubt on the desirability of the disarmament goal.

2018 seminars

2018 seminars

Wednesday 14 February: Understanding India’s Partition Using Game Theory (speaker: Dr Atul Mishra , University of Plymouth)
One of the puzzles of modern Indian history is the partition of India in the form it took in 1947. Jinnah accepted a 'moth eaten Pakistan' in 1947 which he had twice rejected before. Using elementary notions from game theory we saw how this became highly likely, if not inevitable.
Wednesday 7 March: The Multidimensional Kurdish Model and Unpredictable Season of Kurdish Geopolitics in the Middle East (speaker: Dr Omer Tekdemir, University of Leicester)
The so-called Kurdish question is an outcome of the imperial and colonised history. The Kurds, as an emerging power, are at a historic crossroads and redrawing the borders of the Sykes-Picot map. However, having a possible 'independent Kurdistan' and radical democratic autonomy in the 'new' Middle East created a hegemonic articulation, power struggle, and antagonism with the region's nation(alist) states (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, and Iran) and beyond.
Wednesday 21 March: Kant's Political Theology of Perpetual Peace (speaker: Dr Sean Molloy, University of Kent)
Sean Molloy argued that Kant should not be read as a forerunner of Cosmopolitanism or Democratic Peace theorists, but as a thinker absolutely determined to square the requirements of political necessity and the commands of the moral law. Molloy stressed that the key to this process lies in Kant's articulation of a specifically theological way of conceiving political existence, one in which the "foul Stain of our species" is redeemed by the sacrifice of knowledge to faith.
Wednesday 16 May: Responding to planetary environmental change: geoengineering, Pachamama and ecopedagogy (speaker: Professor David Humphreys, Open University)
Options for responding to global environmental change range from the highly hubristic and technocentric proposal to control the Earth’s temperature through controversial and unproven geoengineering techniques, to the suggestion that a new jurisprudence be developed in which nature’s rights are central. Planetary change also raises questions about the role that should be played by educators.
June 2018: Keynote address at the Faculty of Business Doctoral Conference
Brexit Opportunities and Challenges for Researchers ( Dr Patrick Holden and Professor Mary Farrell).
Watch the keynote address
Wednesday 24 October: Using Turning Technologies/Responseware in large groups (lectures) (speaker: Dr Lorenzo Cladi , University of Plymouth)
With its promise to keep students engaged in an interactive way, the use of Turning Technologies/Responseware is becoming an increasingly common practice in higher education. Lorenzo discussed his experience of using Turning Technologies/Responseware during lectures to large groups of students at stage 2 of their degree at the University of Plymouth. Moreover, Lorenzo shared some of the lessons that he has learnt so far by using Turning Technologies/Responseware in large groups.
Wednesday 31 October: Space warfare and the implications for extended deterrence, capabilities and the character of war in the 21st century (speaker: Dr Simon Smith, University of Staffordshire)
US space policy signifies the resolve to contribute to the defence of allied space systems. Yet, there is little in the literature examining theoretical or policy implications in terms of applying extended deterrence theory to the domain of space and in connection to collective security organisations. This research is a first step into examining the theoretical implications of what space deterrence means at the collective security level.
Wednesday 5 December: The Politics of Healthcare (speaker: Professor Stephen Green, Sheffield Hallam University)
Some, not infrequently politicians, consider health to be of lesser importance than many other matters in the political sphere. However, health is undoubtedly important at both the individual disease level and at population/epidemic levels. A vast number of issues come into the mix, including matters of profit and social responsibility, the private-public debate, cross-border movement of healthcare staff, medical research, maintenance of standards, healthcare tourism, and international co-operation over public health issues (such as Ebola and influenza), biological and chemical warfare, pollution and climate control, and much else. Furthermore different countries do things differently. Health is in fact of great importance to politics and international relations...

2019 seminars

2019 seminars

Thursday 11 February: A conversation with Marina Litvinenko
An engineer by training, and a former professional ballroom dancer, Marina is the widow of Alexander Litvinenko, a former Russian FSB officer who was assassinated in London in 2006. Marina played an active role in seeking justice for her husband, culminating in a British public inquiry, which concluded in 2016 that the FSB probably directed the killing. Marina was interviewed by John Dobson (former UK naval attaché to the Soviet Union/Russia and Chairman of the Plymouth branch of the University of the Third Age) and Dr Patrick Holden (programme leader for the Masters in International Relations degree at the University).
The conversation was open to the audience for a question and answer session.Topics ranged from Marina’s personal story, including her struggle for justice for her husband, to broader political questions including Russian politics, Russian relations with the West and the challenge of ‘fake news’ and disinformation. This event was sponsored by the School of Criminology, Government and Law in partnership with the University of the Third Age.
Wednesday 6 March: Brexit: Where are we now?
Dr Patrick Holden (Reader in International Relations) gave a briefing on the current state of Brexit negotiations and the UK’s departure from the EU with contributions from @ Jason Lowther Jason Lowther (Reader in Law), both from the School of Law, Criminology and Government. This then opened out into an interactive Q&A and discussion format. After the end of the presentation a lively discussion continued outside the lecture theatre with University of Plymouth students and staff form the UK and EU.
Wednesday 13 March: The Chinese People’s Trust in Their Government (speaker: Shuqiao Li, Visiting Researcher)
According to the investigation of Edelman Public Relations Worldwide, the Chinese people’s trust in their government ranks first. This may reflect the huge improvement of Chinese people’s life since 1978 and this is also related to the culture of China. Chinese people are inclined to trust their government. It is very different from Western. The Western may be inclined to doubt their government and this is the origin of the Democracy. Another interesting phenomenon, compared with the Western, Chinese people trust their central government more than their local government. This is related to the factor of system, culture, the control of mass media, and etc.
Wednesday 20 March: Power and Cyber-diplomacy in the Post-Liberal Order (speaker: Dr Andre Barrinha, University of Bath)
It is becoming increasingly consensual that we have or are now transitioning from an international liberal order to a different reality. Whether that reality is different solely in terms of power dynamics, or also in terms of values and institutions is up for discussion. This presentation aimed to explore how that transition applies to cyberspace by focusing on the concept of cyber-diplomacy. As was argued, if cyberspace is a creation of the liberal order, cyber-diplomacy is eminently post-liberal. What role it plays in shaping this new order and what it mean in terms of the future of cyberspace, constituted key points of discussion.
Wednesday 3 April: 40th Anniversary of the Iranian Revolution (speakers: Dr Shabnam Holliday and Dr Christian Emery)
This round table explored the legacy of the 1979 Revolution. This was done in two parts. Dr Emery provided an analysis of Iran’s foreign policy while Dr Holliday explored political identities and political transformation.

2021–22 seminars

Wednesday 13 October 2021: Dr Shabnam Holliday, University of Plymouth | ‘Liberal world order’, ‘rogue state’ status, and legitimacy: Iran-US relations and world order’
Wednesday 2 February 2022: Dr Piers Revell, University of Plymouth | COP26 – A Post-Mortem
Wednesday 9 February 2022: Nelson Agbor, University of Plymouth PhD candidate | Researching the Political and Human Rights Crisis in Cameroon?
Wednesday 16 February 2022: Dr Gregorio Bettiza, University of Exeter | Civilisationism and the Ideological Contestation of the Liberal International Order
Wednesday 23 February 2022: Dr Paola Rivetti, Dublin City University (online) | Revolution and Counter-Revolution in the Middle East and North Africa
Wednesday 16 March 2022: Dr Eric Woods, University of Plymouth | The New Nationalism in America and Beyond: Ethnic Nationalism in a Digital Age

2023–24 seminars

The MAIR (Masters in International Relations) Research Seminar Series 2023–24

Wednesday 1 November 2023: Port Infrastructure, Contested Narratives and Everyday Life in the Horn of Africa (speaker: Professor Mary Darwich, University of Birmingham)
Wednesday 6 December 2023: Ukraine and Russia: Understanding the Sanctions (speaker: Olivia Allison, Associate Fellow at RUSI and an independent researcher)
Wednesday 28 February 2024: Smuggling in Iran (speaker: Peyman Zinati, Associate Lecturer and PhD candidate at the University of Exeter)
Wednesday 13 March 2024: The British Public's Framing of the Environmental Crisis (speaker: Ellie Massie, PhD candidate at the University of Plymouth)
Wednesday 20 March 2024: The Securitisation of Islam by the Right and the Left in the UK, France and Italy (speaker: Ugo Gaudino, Associate Lecturer at Kingston University and the London School of Economics)
Wednesday 8 May 2024: The Legacy of Stalinism in the People's Republic of China (speaker: Thomas Burnham, Lecturer in Chinese at the University of Exeter)
 

PISC members

Selected publications

Holliday, S. (2019). Populism, the International and Methodological Nationalism: Global Order and the Iran–Israel Nexus. Political Studies. DOI
Cladi, L. & Andrea Locatel (2018). Why did Italy contribute to UNIFIL II? An analytical eclectic analysis. Italian Political Science Review/Rivista Italiana di Scienza Politica, Vol. 49 (1), pp. 85–97. DOI
Holden, P. (forthcoming). Finding common ground? The European Union and European Civil Society framing of the role of trade in the Sustainable Development Goals. Journal of Common Market Studies
Emery, C. (forthcoming). ‘Social revolutions and state-formation: the case of Revolutionary Iran’ In: Giessmann, H.-J. & Ginty, R. M. (Eds.), How Regimes Change. Post-Conflict Transitions Revisited. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar
Cladi, L. (2017). ‘Free Rider Problem’. In: F.M. Moghaddam (ed.), SAGE Encyclopedia of Political Behaviour, Thousand Oaks California: SAGE Publications.
Cladi, L. (2017). ‘Bandwagoning State’. In: F.M. Moghaddam (ed.), SAGE Encyclopedia of Political Behaviour, Thousand Oaks California: SAGE Publications.
Cladi, L. (2016). ‘The EU’s foreign policy towards the Israeli–Palestinian conflict: a story of underachievement?’. In: L. Cladi and A. Locatelli (eds.), International Relations Theory and European Security: We Thought We Knew. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge
Cladi, L. & Locatelli, A. (2016). ‘Structural Realism: balancing, bandwagoning or what?’ In: L. Cladi and A. Locatelli (eds.), International Relations Theory and European Security: We Thought We Knew. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge
Cladi, L. & Webber, M. (2016). Between Autonomy and Effectiveness: Reassessing the European Union’s Foreign Policy Towards the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict. European Foreign Affairs Review, Vol. 21(4), pp. 559–577. Abstract
Holliday, S. (2016). The legacy of subalternity and Gramsci’s national–popular: populist discourse in the case of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Third World Quarterly, Vol. 37(5), pp. 917–933, DOI
Holliday, S. & Leech, P. (2016). Political Identities and Popular Uprisings in the Middle East. London: Rowman and Littlefield International
Holden, P. (2017). ‘Globalization and the Mediterranean’. In R. Gillespie (Ed.), London: Routledge Handbook of Mediterranean Politics. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. pp. 244–255
Holden, P. (2017). Neoliberalism by default? A critical discourse analysis of the European Union’s trade and development policy in an era of crisis. Journal of International Relations and Development, Vol. 20 (2), pp 381–407. DOI
Warren, T., Holden, P. & Howell, K. E. (2017). The European Commission and fiscal governance reform: a strategic actor?. West European Politics, Vol. 40 (6), pp. 1,310–1,330 DOI
Hynes, W. & Holden, P. (2016). What future for the Global Aid for Trade Initiative? Towards an assessment of its achievements and limitations. Development Policy Review, Vol. 34(4), pp. 593–619. DOI
Cordell, K., O'Leary, B. & Wolff, S. (eds) (2017). Israel & Palestine: the Politics of Stalemate. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge
Cordell, K. & Abulof, U. (2016). Self-Determination, a Double-Edged Sword. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge
Agarin, T. & Cordell, K. (2016). Minority Rights & Minority Protection in Europe. London: Rowman & Littlefield
Cordell, K. & Wolff, S. (eds) (2016). The Handbook on Ethnicity and Conflict Resolution (2nd edition). Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge
 

Event photography and video

Please be aware that some of the University of Plymouth's public events (both online and offline) may be attended by University staff, photographers and videographers, for capturing content to be used in University online and offline marketing and promotional materials, for example webpages, brochures or leaflets. If you, or a member of your group, do not wish to be photographed or recorded, please let a member of staff know.