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People in the Institute
Currently the following people are involved in the work of Richardson Institute:
Full Time Staff
Dr Feargal Cochrane is the Director of the Institute and a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics, Philosophy & Religion
Dr Nina Caspersen is a Lecturer in the Department of Politics, Philosophy & Religion
Dr Amalendu Misra is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics, Philosophy & Religion
Dr Basil Germond is a Lecturer in the Department of Politics, Philosophy & Religion
Associate Member of the Richardson Institute
Claire Mahon is an international human rights lawyer based in Geneva. She is a Senior Researcher at the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights, where she jointly coordinates the Project on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and teaches at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies. She is also the Special Advisor to Mrs Mary Robinson (former President of Ireland and former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights) in Mrs Robinson's role as Chair of the Board of the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunizations. Claire is also an Adjunct Clinical Professor of Law at the University of Michigan. She has previously worked as the legal advisor to the former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, as the Advisor on International Organisations for Amnesty International's UN Geneva Office, as the legal advisor on economic, social and cultural rights for the International Commission of Jurists, a human rights officer at the International Service for Human Rights, and as a consultant for the UN (Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and UNDP).
Claire's research interests include many areas of international human rights law, socio-economic rights (including housing rights, right to food, right to health, right to water, right to education, work and labour rights, cultural rights), international organizations, civil society, human rights litigation, human rights based approaches to development, and UN human rights mechanisms. Claire's recent publications include The Fight for the Right to Food: Lessons Learned (co-authored with Jean Ziegler, Christophe Golay and Sally-Anne Way), London: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming spring 2010, Realizing the Right to Health (co-edited with Andrew Clapham, Mary Robinson and Scott Jerbi), Zurich: Rüffer & Rubb, 2009 and 'Progress at the Front: The draft Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights', Human Rights Law Review , Volume 8(4), Oxford University Press, October 2008.
E-Mail: claire.mahon@graduateinstitute.ch
Dr Steve Pickering
Dr Steve Pickering’s research looks at geographical factors related to war. Chief amongst these factors are rugged terrain, maps, borders and distance. By disaggregating analyses from the state and using new GIS methods, it has been possible to find that there is a strong link between terrain and territorial conflict.
In September 2009, Steve's work was awarded the Cedric Smith Prize for Peace or Conflict Research by the Conflict Research Society.
Steve is currently a Teaching Associate at Lancaster University where he convenes a course on Comparative Politics and also conducts workshops/ seminars on Peace Studies, International Relations, EU Politics and US Foreign Policy.
Previously, Steve has worked for organisations such as the Washington Peace Center and the Nicaragua Network.
Researchers
Judith Large is an Honorary Research Fellow
Judith Large is an Honorary Research Fellow in the Richardson Institute. Her previous posts included Director for Conflict Resolution with CMI (Brussels), Senior Advisor on Democracy and Conflict Management at International IDEA (Stockholm), and consultancies with UN, national and non-governmental agencies. She has been visiting lecturer at Universities in the Netherlands, Austria and the UK on conflict analysis and mediation. As a practitioner (for post-war recovery and strategies for multi-level peacebuilding) her main regional focus areas have been the Balkans (1992-1999) and South/Southeast Asia (1999--current). She has published widely on conflict transformation and human security. Judith's international experience has included assignments in Uganda, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Indonesia (Ambon, Maluku, Kalimantan, Aceh, Java, Sulawesi), Timor Leste, Philippines (Mindanao), Thailand, Nepal and Kashmir. Her current research is concerned with effective devolution of power to overcome structural inequalities, a comparative view.
PhD Students
Michelle Garred
Michelle Garred's research aims to test the applicability of the conflict sensitivity approach, as originally developed in the humanitarian and development assistance sectors, to the role of faith-based civil society organizations in Southeast Asia . In multi-faith societies many such organizations influence, and are influenced by, the interplay between religion, peace and conflict. It is hypothesized that the conflict sensitivity approach, which applies participatory conflict analysis to contextualize organizational planning, may help equip civil society organizations to pursue their service mandates in ways that promote religious tolerance and social cohesion. This action research project is being carried in collaboration with inter-faith partner organizations in the Philippines and Singapore . Michelle is based in Singapore , where she is a Visiting Affiliate at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore.
Publication Link: A Shared Future: Local Capacities for Peace in Community Development
Conflict Sensitivity in Emergencies: Learning from the Asia Tsunami Response
Yinka Olomojobi
Yinka is examining the links between religion and conflict in the Nigeria. His tentative thesis title is ‘Political Economy of Conflicts in Nigeria: Demystifying the position of Islam.'
Emma Plant
Emma has a MA Hons Sociology from The University of Glasgow and and a MA Conflict Resolution from Lancaster. Her PhD will examine the post-war development of nationalisms in Bosnia and isolate the factors which have influenced this evolution so as to pinpoint successful means of conflict-management for the future.
The period to be considered will be the decade following the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement in 1995. Also known as the ‘Dayton phase’ this choice offers a discrete time period from the current ‘Brussels phase’ where the focus has shifted from immediate post-war concerns to future membership of the European Union as marked by the commencement of Stabilisation and Association Agreement negotiations in Bosnia in 2005. This shift in the prime focus of international intervention offers not only a natural juncture to evaluate the effect of recent events on the destabilising force of ethno-nationalism but emphasizes the necessity of such evaluation. If what has been tried and failed in the past is repeated Bosnia’s future as a prosperous, stable and peaceful member of the European Union will be jeopardised.
Kate Seaman
Kate’s current research is focusing on the continuing role of the United Nations in the international system. Her PhD is particularly focusing on the role of the United Nations in interventions and how this has been affected by the developing concept of global governance. By comparing several case studies the research aims to examine how the idea of a legitimate intervention has changed over time, the impact that global governance has had on the formation of this idea and what these changes mean for future UN interventions.
Alumni
My Times at Richardson Institute by Tracy Sartin
'Peace Studies courses at Lancaster seemed to attract some of our finest
students, and it was a pleasure to work with them. The staff at the RI
took great interest in their students, and the Institute felt a bit like
a family within the Department.
During the 2004-05 academic year, I was part of the RI team teaching Introduction
to Peace Studies. The course was one of the first to move from the traditional
lecture and seminar format to a large 1 hr 50 min workshop. This format
allowed the staff and students to work together much more closely, and
I really enjoyed the chance to get to know both the individual students
and the groups they worked in.
Aside from teaching, my work at the RI was centred around my own interests in arms control. I have continued to work in the field of peace and conflict studies as a lecturer in the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London.'
Tracy Sartin, is currently a Research Associate at King's College.