The Global Security, Rights and Development (GSRD) research group focuses its expertise to make major contributions to research and debates in two principal thematic areas of International Relations research: 

  • Security and Governance 
  • Rights, Justice, and Development 

GSRD serves as a hub for research and teaching on the normative theoretical and empirical debates on historical and contemporary challenges in global politics, the implications for such challenges through area studies and proposals towards addressing some of the world’s enduring and emerging challenges.  

As such, members of the group conduct research that addresses AHRC priorities of researching contemporary challenges and discovering ourselves, and ESRC’s strategic theme of building a secure and resilient world. 

Researchers in the centre are recognised for their expertise in areas ranging from international security and development to global drug policy, environmental politics, migration, race relations, gender and human rights, and for their knowledge of particular geographical areas such as Africa, the US, Europe and Southeast Asia. 

The research group hosts three of the department’s Masters programmes in International Relations, Development and Human Rights, International Security and Development. Members of the group also supervise PhD research and welcome PhD proposals from potential students on a range of themes in International Relations. 

Projects

The CIA, Congress, and Covert Action

GSRD member Luca Trenta ‘The CIA, Congress, and covert action’ is a British Academy Funded Project that explores signalling mechanisms within the domestic sphere. It highlights the role of ‘selective disclosures’ regarding covert operations. Contrary to leaks, ‘selective disclosures’ help policymakers in achieving domestic political objectives. Preliminary findings suggest that these include pacifying domestic and partisan constituencies and pursuing electoral success. Using an innovative combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, the project explores under what conditions policymakers use selective disclosures. It also aims at assessing the mechanisms (private or more public) through which these disclosures happen, how this knowledge travels within and outside government, and its impact both on the nature and conduct of covert actions, and on domestic (electoral) politics. You can find more details about the project here.

Global Drug Policy Observatory Out of the Shadows State-Sponsored Assassinations The President’s Kill List

People

Co-Director

Dr Dawn Bolger is a Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Swansea University. Her main areas of research focus on the studies of race, racism, and migration, with a particular focus on racial capitalism, border politics, and the politics of fear in discourses about refugees and asylum seekers.

Dr Dawn Bolger
Dr Dawn Bolger

Co-Director

Dr Emmanuel Siaw is a Lecturer in International Relations. He holds a PhD in International Relations from Royal Holloway University of London and an MPhil degree in Political Science from the University of Ghana. Before joining Swansea University, he held teaching positions at the University of Ghana, Royal Holloway University of London, and Study Group, UK.

Dr Emmanuel Siaw
Dr Emmanuel Siaw

Academic Publications

student in library

PhD Projects