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Co-Director of the Centre for Security Research (CeSeR)

Qualifications

• PhD, MA, Political Science (The Ohio State University)
• BA, Political Science (University of Oklahoma)

Biography

Juliet Kaarbo joined the Politics and International Relations department in 2011 as Senior Lecturer and was promoted to Professor with a Personal Chair in Foreign Policy in 2015. She served as Postgraduate Adviser for Politics & International Relations (2013-2016) and is the founding co-Director of CeSeR.  She is an Associate Editor for the journals Foreign Policy Analysis and British Journal of Politics and International Relations.

Julie previously held posts at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva and the University of Kansas where she served as Director of Faculty Programs in the Office of International Programs, and as Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Political Science. In 2009, she was awarded a Visiting Scientist Fellowship by the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey. 

In 2018, Julie was named the  Distinguished Scholar in Foreign Policy Analysis for the Foreign Policy Analysis section of the International Studies Association. In 2019, Julie won the Best Supervisor Award at the University of Edinburgh.

Research Interests

Julie’s research focuses on political psychology, leadership and decision making, group dynamics, foreign policy analysis, foreign policy roles, and parliaments and coalitions in foreign policy. Areas of specialization include German, British, Israeli, Dutch, Japanese, Turkish, and U.S. foreign policy. Her research has appeared in various journals, including International Studies Quarterly, European Journal of International Relations, British Journal of Politics and International Relations,  International Studies Review, Political Psychology, Cooperation and Conflict, Foreign Policy Analysis, and Leadership Quarterly. She has co-written multiple versions of two textbooks -- Global Politics and Foreign Policy in Comparative Perspective.

Selective Recent Publications

• ‘Turkish Leaders and Their Foreign Policy Decision Making Style From a Comparative Perspective: A Multi-Method Approach’, with Esra Cuhadar, Baris Kesgin, & Binnur Ozkececi-Taner,  Turkish Studies (2020).
• ‘British Foreign Policy After Brexit:  Losing Europe and Finding a Role’, with Kai Oppermann & Ryan Beasley,  International Relations (2020).
• ‘IR in the Middle East:  A Foreign Policy Analysis Perspective on Domestic and Decision Making Factors in Theoretical Approaches’ with May Darwich, International Relations (2020).
• 'Party Politics at the Water’s Edge:  Contestation of Military Operations in Europe', with Wolfgang Wagner, Anna Herranz-Surralles & Falk Ostermann  European Political Science Review (2018).
• 'Casting for a Sovereign Role: Socialising an Aspirant State in the Scottish Independence Referendum,'  with Ryan Beasley, European Journal of International Relations (2018).
• ‘Prime Minister Leadership Style and the Role of Parliament in Security Policy,’ British Journal of Politics and International Relations (2018).
• Domestic Role Contestation, Foreign Policy, and International Relations, Editor, with Cristian Cantir Routledge (2016).
•  ‘A Foreign Policy Analysis Perspective on the Domestic Politics Turn in IR’ International Studies Review (2015).  

Personalities of Political World Leaders     This research includes several tracks, including  a collaborative project on Turkish leaders and a new project (Breaking Bad) on how leader personalities change over time.  Related to this research, I co-edited the (forthcoming)  Oxford Handbook of Political Executives.  

National Roles:  Contestation & Socialisation    This research extends my prior theoretical and empirical analyses of internal disagreements over national role conceptions and their influence on foreign policy.  A collaborative project examines the relationship between sovereignty and roles in the Brexit referendum.  

Coalition Cabinets, Political Parties, & Parliaments in Foreign Policy     My research continues to examine the effects of coalition cabinets and political party disagreements on foreign policy. I am part of a research team doing comparative analyses of parties’ positions on military deployments and the politicization of security policy in parliamentary votes. We have created and extended a database of deployment votes:  http://deploymentvotewatch.eu/.

The Future of Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA)     Following my editorial work on the Oxford Research Encyclopaedia of Foreign Policy Analysis, I am co- editing (with Cameron Thies) the Oxford Handbook of Foreign Policy Analysis.  This Handbook aims to re-position FPA to a central analytic location within the study of International Relations.

Recent Professional Activities

Expert Testimony

Written testimony submitted to the UK House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee's Inquiry on Globa Britain, 17 July 2018.

Invited witness for the UK House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee’s Inquiry on the Foreign Policy Implications of and for a Separate Scotland, London, 15 January 2013.  

Invited witness for the Scottish Parliament European and External Relations Committee’s evidence session on ‘The Scottish Government’s Proposals for an Independent Scotland’, Edinburgh, 12 June 2014.

Selective Presentations

 'The Scottish Question,' Brookings Center on the United States and Europe, Brookings Institution, 12 September 2014 (broadcast nationally in the U.S. on CSPAN)

'An Independent Scottish Foreign Policy,' in “The Independence Debate with Kirsty Wark,” at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, 13 August 2013.

Selective Blogs

'As Others See Us:  The Striking Similarities between Brexit and Scottish Independence Debates,’ Herald Scotland, 21 June 2016.

'Too small for the big leagues? Foreign policy in an independent Scotland,' on the University of Edinburgh’s Blog Scotland’s Referendum:  Informing the Debate, 25 January 2013.

Topics interested in supervising

foreign & security policy * political psychology * political leadership * group decision-making * parliamentary systems * the role of individuals and domestic politics in international relations

If you are interested in being supervised by Juliet Kaarbo, please see the links below for more information: