Review of International Studies – The podcast

In this episode, we talk about ‘seeing and sensing world politics’, the title of the keynote address which was delivered by Roland Bleiker at the 2025 BISA conference. 

Roland is a Professor in International Politics at The University of Queensland. A latecomer to academia, Roland’s research has always pushed boundaries and opened new avenues for our thinking about world politics. And his latest work on visuality and emotions, or ‘seeing and sensing world politics’, equally challenges us to broaden our intellectual imagination of what IR research could look like.

Roland’s BISA keynote address can be accessed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBWgo_PYMwQ

October 31st 2025 marks the 25th anniversary of the adoption of United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1325, the first of ten resolutions which constitute the UN’s Women, Peace and Security (WPS) thematic agenda. It remains a significant international policy agenda that seeks to highlight the gendered nature of armed conflict, prevent or address the uniquely pernicious impacts conflict has upon women, and promote women’s roles in peace and security. 

In this episode, we talk to Professor Katrina Lee-Koo (The University of Queensland) about this important milestone, the research that has it has generated, the challenges it faces, and the articles she has curated for her RIS editor's selection. 

Katrina’s selection can be found at https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-international-studies/special-collections/editors-selection-by-katrina-lee-koo 

War and the moral and legal attempts to regulate it have a long history. In this episode, Dr Thomas Gregory (University of Auckland), talks to Dr Seb Kaempf, about his selection of key articles published in RIS which have tried to grapple with the phenomenon of regulating war. 

In this episode we talk about 'global environmental issues', the editor’s selection put together for the Review by Professor Poppy S. Winanti from the Universitas Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

Poppy’s editor’s selection can be found here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-international-studies/special-collections/editors-selection-by-poppy-winanti

International politics is not short of the ceremonial and the performative. Yet the field dedicated to its study has only recently begun to pay focused attention to ritual processes, actors and elements in world politics. In this episode, Professor Maria Mälksoo, one of the members of our editorial team, talks to Dr Seb Kaempf, about her selection of key articles published in RIS which seek to conceptualise, apply and/or rethink ritual dynamics and phenomena in the context of international relations. 

Maria's selection can be found here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-international-studies/special-collections/editors-selection-by-maria-malksoo

Bringing together articles from across 50 years of the Review of International Studies that speak to similar topics is the purpose of our editor's selections. In this episode, Associate Professor Dahlia Simangan, one of the members of our editorial team, talks to Dr Seb Kaempf about those seminal RIS articles that have focussed and driven research on the topic of peacebuilding. 

Dahlia's selection can be found here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-international-studies/special-collections/editors-selection-by-dahlia-simangan 

Creating conversations across articles, identifying linkages, bringing together articles that speak to similar topics is the purpose of our editor's selections. In this episode, Dr Benjamin Martill, one of the members of our editorial team, talks to Dr Seb Kaempf about those RIS articles that for him speak to the relationship between theory and ideology. 

Ben's selection can be found here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-international-studies/special-collections/editors-selection-by-benjamin-martill

In this episode, we debate the need to forge a different International Relations. Our guest are Dr Sarah Dunstan (University of Glasgow), Dr Ben Zala (Australian National University) and Associate Professor Naosuke Mukoyama (University of Tokyo). Hosted by Associate Professor Sebastian Kaempf (The University of Queensland).