Research 

​My research focuses on the technologies and strategies that states develop to prepare for, threaten, and actually fight war. Specifically, I work on how states construct their military arsenals (procurement of military technology and the global arms trade), the development of key strategic concepts (deterrence and dual-use capabilities), and the linkages between divergent issue areas in the context of global crises (the nuclear-conventional nexus and the commonalities between COVID-19, nuclear dangers, and climate change). To answer these questions, I use a wide range of methods, including qualitative case studies built on archival data and interviews, text analysis, wargames, survey experiments, and descriptive statistics.

Book Project

My book project, entitled "Imagining the Unimaginable: War, Weapons, and Procurement Politics," asks why and how do states decide to develop different weapon capabilities within a similar military domain. Contrary to the existing literature, I argue that ideas, particularly those about the future, play a critical role in shaping states’ decisions about military technology. Based on original archival evidence from fourteen archives and one hundred in-depth interviews with key defense stakeholders, I contend that domestic actors’ ideas about future warfare—what I call the “images of warfare,” consisting of actors’ perceptions of the future 

Picture from Pexels

environment and their theory of victory—shape actors’ preferences for particular military capabilities. Not all of these ideas, however, are equally influential. I therefore trace how those within the military, the legislative and executive branches, the industry, and the community of defense analysts bargain over their technological preferences. In order to transform ideas into actual capabilities, I argue that actors need to build a cross-cutting coalition within the broader defense community around their “imagined security interests,” while exploiting the state's political opportunity structure. To test this theory, I use in-depth case studies, in which I compare and contrast the development and operationalization of missile defense (1980s-2010s) in the United States, France, and the United Kingdom. I also include evidence from two shadow cases on the pursuit of military aircraft (1920s-1930s) and aircraft carriers (1950s-1960s) in those same states. 

Other Work in Progress

• Up in Arms: The Influence of Political Parties on Compliance with the Responsible Arms Transfer Norm.(Revise and Resubmit with Journal of Global Security Studies)
• Writing IR after COVID-19: Reassessing Political Possibilities, Good Faith and Policy Relevance. With Benoît Pelopidas. (Revise and Resubmit with Global Studies Quarterly)
• The Eternal Promise of Missile Defense. (working paper)
• Prevailing over the Future: The Role of Imagination and Elite Bargaining in the Construction of Military Technology. (in preparation)
• ​​Missile Defense and the Future of Arms Control. (in preparation)
• What's in a Name? The Many Faces of Nuclear Deterrence. With Daniel Post. (in preparation)
• Elite Perceptions of Dual-Use Weapons. With Lauren Sukin. (in preparation) 
• Challenging the Nuclear Stand-Off. (in preparation for Routledge Handbook of the Future of Warfare, edited by Sebastian Kaempf and Artur Gruszczak)

Buffer Zone, Nicosia, Cyprus. Picture by Sanne Verschuren