Dominik Giese
GEM-STONES Doctoral Fellow
PhD POSITION IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS & COMPARATIVE REGIONALISM ON ”COMPARING REGIONAL SECURITY GOVERNANCE IN EUROPE, AFRICA & ASIA”
Host Institutions
Supervisors
Thesis Title
Comparing Regional Security Governance in Europe and South-East Asia: revisiting Political Realism
Research Abstract
The GEM STONES Rubies work package focuses on how interregional interactions affect the EU's capacity to provide regime complex management. Instead of approaching the topic with yet another empirically puzzled project, this particular project (ESR10) intends to contribute an answer to the question on primarily theoretical grounds. It seeks to compare and contrast the various works of International Relations scholars dealing with the concept of a regional, and thus supra-national, world order and society. The project’s contribution to this debate derives from a reappraisal of the theoretical origins of the discipline, namely by re-analysing and re-interpreting the work of ‘Classical Realist’s’ in today’s increasingly regionalised political context. The project will highlight not only how Classical Realist thought has been misunderstood in contemporary IR theory on ‘regionalism’, but also how its proper interpretation allows for politically realistic guidelines policy-makers can adopt while dealing with the intricacies of managing political conflicts transcending the individual nation-state’s influence. The empirical focus where this project anchors its theoretical analysis will feature a comparison of regional security governance mechanisms of the European Union (EU) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Focusing on maritime security, the institutional commonalities and differences of, as well as the interactions between, regional security institutions of the EU and ASEAN, will be analysed in light of how institutionally-based and state-based actors build ‘security’ across different socio-political contexts and to what extent these institutional mechanisms feature Classical Realists’ vision for a post-Westphalian world order.
Case-studies
Comparing the commonalities and differences in approaches to regional security governance in the European Union (EU) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) with a specific focus on maritime security. Concrete case: combatting piracy at the Horn of Africa and the Malacca Strait.
The unintended consequences of interregionalism: ASEAN-EU maritime security cooperation.
Findings
Four conclusions can be drawn from a survey of the literature on comparative regionalism and regional governance. First, depending on which conceptual lenses scholars wear, explanations for what constitutes a region and what factors facilitate or hinder regional governance will vary. Whereas this is mainly a philosophical problem related to how social scientists choose to study empirical realities differently, it becomes a problem while bringing the academic debate to the practical ground. Second, and perhaps related to the first issue, there is little methodological plurality in the study of comparative regionalism: the amount of within case-study research largely exceeds that of systematic cross-case research. Third, security-centred analyses of regional institutions is scarce in comparison to economistic explanations. Fourth, an empirical puzzle presents itself while trying to understand that security cooperation among states in some regions (ex. Africa & African Standby Force) goes in hand with transfer of sovereignty, whereas in other regions such process is arguably under way (ex. EU and Permanent Structured Cooperation in Defense) or openly opposed (ex. Shanghai Cooperation Organisation).
In conclusion, the literature on comparative regionalism and regional governance would benefit from
- A dialogue between different theoretical paradigms & extension of non-Eurocentric conceptualisation of regionalism,
- A combination of qualitative case-based with quantitative cross-case analysis,
- A security-centred analysis of regional institutions,
- And an analysis of the role of sovereignty in different regional institutions across regions.
Point (1) and (3) advance a theoretical agenda, point (2) highlights necessary methodological advancements, and point (4) captures an empirical puzzle.
This project intends to tackle points 1, 3 and 4.
Societal Relevance
In a globalising and internationalising world, regional security institutions are becoming increasingly important for sovereign states to coordinate their affairs above the national level. By cooperating in regional security institutions, states seek to deal with developments of an international system that is evolving an ever more interconnected and interdependent character in relation to politics, economics and society. Despite this interconnected and interdependent character of international politics, individual state interests do not cease to exist. Given the rising number of influential actors in the global political game since the end of a bipolar order, implementing individual interests becomes ever more complicated. Comparing different forms of regionalism(s) across the globe becomes important to understand how regional security institutions allow states to organise inter-state and inter-regional cooperation in different regional contexts. Awareness of contextual commonalities and differences across regions and their respective security frameworks becomes especially relevant to policy-makers while conducting policies that transcend their immediate regional sphere, such as the EU's Global Strategy on Foreign and Security Policy.
General Research Interests:
I am generally concerned with understanding and explaining regional governance, specifically how, when and why states transfer political authority to (supranational) institutional frameworks. I am furthermore interested in what ways the balancing of power, problem-solving and norm construction have an influence on this process.
My research to date has primarily focused on European integration. In my undergraduate dissertation, I focused on ‘differentiated integration’ as a method for European member states to progress with the European integration project, even though at different levels and speeds. In my postgraduate dissertation I consolidated my knowledge on European integration while explaining the absence of supranational integration in the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) in the context of the 2002-2003 European Convention through the lenses of neo-realist and neo-liberal causal mechanisms and by using the Process-Tracing method. During my PhD I now seek to compare the diverging institutional designs of regional security governance while focusing on the European Union (EU) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Educational Qualifications
01.12.16 – ongoing PhD in International Relations and Comparative Regionalism
09.2014 – 11.2015 University College London, London (GBR) – M.Sc. in Security Studies
Dissertation title: The Role of Problem-Solving and Interest-Bargaining in EU Treaty Reform: Explaining the Absence of European Foreign Policy Communitarisation in the Context of the European Convention – Supervisor: Dr. Christine Reh
08.2012 – 06.2013 Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Strasbourg, Strasbourg (FR) – Diploma of International Studies
10.2010 – 07.2014 Loughborough University, Loughborough (GBR) – B.A. in International Relations
Dissertation title: Assessing differentiated integration in the European Union – understanding, explaining and predicting ‘an ever closer Union’? – Supervisor: Prof. Helen Drake
09.2002 – 06.2010 Dresden International School, Dresden (DE) – International Baccalaureate Diploma
Work experience (extract)
12.2016 – ongoing Universität Hamburg, Hamburg (DE) / University of Warwick, Coventry (UK)
Research Associate and PhD Fellow in the Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences (WiSo) at the Universität Hamburg and PhD Fellow in the Department of Politics and International Studies (PAIS) at the University of Warwick
04.2016 – 09.2016 Bertelsmann Stiftung, Gütersloh (DE)
Project Management in the Program “Learning for Life“ (Intern for 6 months)
06.2013 – 07.2014 European Association for Young Entrepreneurs (AEJE), Strasbourg (FR)
Project Officer (Part-time)
Giese, D. and J. Joseph. “Critical Realism” in Key Concepts in Research Methods edited by J-F. Morin, C. Ollson and E.O. Attican (forthcoming 2019)
Giese, D. and K-U. Schnapp. “Deduction, Induction and Retroduction” in Key Concepts in Research Methods edited by J-F. Morin, C. Ollson and E.O. Attican (forthcoming 2019)
Giese, D. and H. Karkour. “Estranged from its age: re-debating IR pluralism with Hans J. Morgenthau” (co-authored working paper with Haro Karkour, presented at the ‘What does it mean to do theory from a global perspective’ panel at IPSA World Congress 2018 in Brisbane)
Giese, D. “The Unintended Consequences of EU-ASEAN Maritime Security Cooperation” in Unravelling Ties? The Unintended Consequences of Interregionalism edited by C. Jakobeit and E. Lopez Lucia (forthcoming 2019/2020)
