Ms Zainab Younes

- I am a PhD student in International Relations at the Division of Law and Social Sciences (LSS). I am also a lecturer in International Relations at LSBU.

- My research interests are grounded in the politics and IR of the MENA region, specifically the Levant. They cover geopilitics, great-power politics, soft power, and the post-colonial experience in the region. Broader interests relating to security studies and include assymetrical and hybrid warfare, and the Arab-'Israeli' conflict. 

- I am an aspiring early career researcher and regularly engage and contribute to research on the region beyond my position at LSBU.

My PhD research is a critical study that interrogates the liberal concept of 'soft power' from a constructivist-postcolonial perspective. It situates soft power in a hegeonic and neo-imperialist discourse of continued Western domination. It also presents non-Western interpretations of soft power. Empirically, the research explores Lebanese attitudes and experiences of western soft power in light of ongoing foreign intervention. The project's main contribution is within the growing field of global IR, by offering alternative subjectivity and placing the post-colonial at the heart of knowledge production in social enquiry. It also contributes to the wider efforts of 'decolonising' the descipline.

I cotribute to the teaching of the Level 4 (Year 1) module "International Relations in Theory and Practice". Topics I have taught include:- Gender and IPE ; Post-colonialism ; the Resurgence of Nationalism and the rise of Populism.