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Staff profile: Dr. Carla Winston is a Senior Lecturer in International Relations. She is interested in International Relations theory, human rights and transitional justice, peace and conflict, and the uses of popular culture in politics and international affairs. We asked her some questions about International Relations and why she loves teaching it.
Can you give us a broad overview of the field of international relations?
The field of international relations covers all the things that happen across and between states. It is concerned with companies, international organisations and non-state actors like NGOs, and sometimes even very wealthy individuals like Angelina Jolie or George Clooney. All of the things that don't neatly fit within one state’s borders are at least, in some way, international relations.
What do you teach within the discipline?
All International Relations students study core subjects on international theory and international history. From there you can choose a number of specialisations, including international trade, international security or international governance and law. I teach the latter. In international governance and law we look at topics like the United Nations, and study the management of international issues that are not strictly related to either security or trade.
One of the classes I teach is an elective on human rights, within the politics discipline. It focuses on the politics of international human rights rather than strictly the law. We consider both the abstract and legal frameworks of treaties and how they actually work on the ground. What do negotiations look like? What are the practical issues working in a place where safety is not assured and where your rights are not assured? I think students come out with a better understanding of their ideals and their goals and how their knowledge is going to have to function as they go out into the world.
Human Rights is idealism in a nutshell. So the question becomes: how do we understand what the ideals are and how they got there, whether or not they are actually universally representative, or whether or not they actually help in particular ways. How do we get a little bit more granular? How do we take our ideas and enact them in practice? What kinds of trade-offs do we have to have? What kinds of resources do we need?
What motivates and interests you as a teacher of International Relations?
I love being able to watch somebody go through a reading, go through an activity, ask a question, get an answer, and have their brain sort of click.
Watching students who may be frustrated with the way the world is (or is not) working, and then come to understand the mechanics of that is very satisfying. I love to watch students explore things that they're passionate about and come up with clear, nuanced, well-researched work that draws on their own experience of the world and their own understanding of what they think is important.
What is something great about studying IR that you don’t find out from the handbook?
The diversity of the cohort. Some of our students are Australian, fresh out of undergrad. Some of them are mid-career and returning to study from a few years working in the field. Some of them are international students with varying degrees of experience and knowledge, and that combined in the classroom is a really excellent learning resource.
Where can International Relations take you?
Our graduates go pretty much everywhere. Towards the government, the Foreign Service or the defense industry in various capacities. I've had students go on to work in the Human Rights Committee at the UN, for refugee NGOs or for major NGOs like Doctors Without Borders. I have had students who work in the international arm of businesses here in Australia that have an international component. I've even had a few go on to a PhD.
Graduate profile: Isabel FitzGerald – Senior Coordinator, Policy and Research, Centre for Resilient and Inclusive Societies
Isabel Fitzgerald was working in the arts and community engagement sector when she decided to apply for the Master of International Relations.
“My role at the time was as a senior producer at the Footscray Community Arts Centre, where I was working across both local and international programs,” she explains. “This, combined with ongoing interest in global issues and politics, stirred my appetite for international engagement and diplomacy. I wanted to engage more deeply with theories, debates and issues and extend my knowledge across various areas within international relations.”
While studying part-time, Isabel took on a senior role within the Victorian Government’s Department of Premier and Cabinet in the Community Resilience Unit, developing policies relating to preventing and countering violent extremism.
“The course aligned nicely with the practical policy work I was doing,” she says, “and because of the elective subjects I chose, I ended up having a thematic focus on security, governance and policy with a geographic focus on South and Southeast Asia and the Middle East”.
Isabel is now part of the newly established Centre for Resilient and Inclusive Societies, a consortium think tank which brings together academia, government and communities. “We develop research and programs and influence policy by understanding how we can build a healthy and cohesive society in order to reduce and respond to polarisation, hate and discrimination with an overall focus on preventing and countering violent extremism”, she says.
“My current role continues to build on my masters knowledge and my role in government because of the intersection between global security issues, the effect of our globalised world and connectedness, and the strengthening of localised community resilience and social cohesion responses to complex global problems.”
Graduate profile: Connor Clery
After completing high school, I gained entry to the Bachelor of Arts at the University of Melbourne through the Access Melbourne scheme. After completing an additional honours year I chose the Master of International Relations because I knew it would lead to graduate research opportunities.
I particularly enjoyed both my year-long supervision under Dr Daniel McCarthy, and Dr Sara Meger’s class on global security. Also, Dr Peter Christoff from the School of Geography delivers a wonderful subject Climate Change Politics and Policy that was equal parts confronting and fascinating.
Melbourne attracts a diverse array of domestic and international students which often made for broad and varied class discussions. This also helped to make the degree feel fulfilling, both intellectually and socially.
I enjoyed my master’s degree because I found the minor thesis both challenging and rewarding – others in my cohort participated in graduate societies or undertook internships, which can also make for a satisfying degree.
I’m excited to have just begun the Doctor of Philosophy - Arts. My research engages a novel approach to understanding security, to examine what resistance practices articulated by rebel political organisations can tell us about the politics of state sovereignty. It will involve engaging with exciting literatures and complex political issues, and the challenging task of communicating my analyses and interpretations to others.