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Vladimir Rauta

Vladimir Rauta
  • +44 (0)118 378 8501
  • Lecturer in Politics and International Relations

Army Higher Education Pathway (AHEP) Lead

Module Convenor for PO1DCC (Degree Core Competencies), PO1IRS (Introduction to International Relations and Strategic Studies), and PO3DCW (Dynamics of Civil Wars)

 

Building location

Edith Morley Building,Room 312, Whiteknights campus, Reading. 

Postgraduate supervision

I am keen to hear from potential PhD students with research proposals in the area of conflict delegation and proxy war, counter-insurgency, civil wars and sub-state violence, and contemporary conflict with a focus on hybrid and/or grey zone warfare.

Background

I hold a PhD in International Relations from the University of Nottingham and my research sits at the intersection of conflict research and international security. It uses proxy wars as a vehicle to explore the delegation of war from states to armed non-state actors in the contemporary security environment. This is a significant problem spanning global politics. As recently witnessed with the Syrian and Yemeni civil wars, analysing the effects of proxy wars in a broader security and strategic context is at the forefront of international relations. 

 

Published in journals such as Contemporary Security Policy, International Studies Review, Civil Wars, International Relations, Defence Studies, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, and RUSI, my research has contributed to the shaping of a third generation of proxy war studies in which the historical narrative is questioned against the causal concerns of ‘why’ and ‘how’. I have focused on conceptual, typological, and theoretical issues as meta-theoretical building blocks for developing proxy war research into a self-standing sub-field, whilst using both strategic interaction and Principal-Agent theory to address some empirical puzzles surrounding conflict delegation. I am currently working on a book project analysing the contemporary dynamics of proxy wars with a focus on the Middle East, out in 2022 with I. B. Tauris. Together with Assaf Moghadam and Michel Wyss, I am also the editor of the forthcoming Routledge Handbook of Proxy Wars.

Academic qualifications

  • BA (Hons) Politics – Nottingham Trent University (2011)
  • MA International Relations with a Research Track – University of Nottingham (2012)
  • PhD International Relations – University of Nottingham (2017)

Professional bodies/affiliations

  • Non-Resident Research Fellow, Middle East Studies Forum, Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalization, Deakin University, 2020–2021.
  • Associate Research Fellow, Centre for Conflict, Security, and Terrorism (CST), School of Politics and International Relations, University of Nottingham, 2018–2019.
  • Associate Research Fellow, Centre for Conflict, Rule of Law and Society (CRoLS), Bournemouth University, 2018–2019.

Publications