Dr James Souter

Profile

I joined the School in 2014, working as a post-doctoral research fellow before taking up my current post in 2016. Before coming to Leeds, I completed a DPhil at the Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford.

Responsibilities

• Taught Postgraduate Assessment Lead

Research interests

Broadly speaking, I am interested in understanding states’ responsibilities to address pressing global issues, and I have written on topics such as human rights, the responsibility to protect, and nuclear responsibility. More specifically, much of my work focuses on ethical questions surrounding states' responsibilities to protect refugees, notably in my book entitled Asylum as Reparation: Refuge and Responsibility for the Harms of Displacement (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022).

Building on this research background, I am currently engaged in two projects. In the first project, I aim to broaden out discussions of displacement within normative political theory, drawing on work across the social sciences which contends that displacement does not necessarily involve forced migration, but that it may occur in situ. I intend to draw on lived experiences of such ‘displacement without altered movement’ to theorise what reparation for such displacement may look like in diverse contexts worldwide.  In the second project, I am working with Dr Josh Hobbs to seek to better understand the role and responsibilities of ordinary citizens in Western states to address structural injustices, aiming to advance debates on Iris Marion Young’s notion of political responsibility.

Qualifications

• 2014: DPhil, Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford
• 2011: MSc, Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, University of Oxford
• 2009: MA, Understanding and Securing Human Rights, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, London
• 2008: BA (Hons), Philosophy and History with European Study, University of Exeter

Professional memberships

• British International Studies Association

Student education

I currently teach on both undergraduate and postgraduate modules in political theory, and am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

I am happy to supervise students in contemporary political theory and international politics, with particular reference to ethical issues surrounding displacement, asylum, refugees, migration and global justice.

Research groups and institutes

• Centre for Contemporary Political Theory

Current postgraduate researchers

• Adam Joseph Cooper
• Sameerah Mahmood