Dr Janina Dill awarded PSA Lord Bryce Prize for best dissertation in International Relations/Comparative Studies

Congratulations to Janina Dill, a recent DPhil International Relations alumna, who has been awarded the Political Studies Association 2012 Lord Bryce Prize for best dissertation in International Relations/Comparative Studies. Her thesis was entitled The Definition of a Legitimate Target in US Air Warfare: A Normative Enquiry into the Effectiveness of International Law in the Conduct of Hostilities.

Janina is currently the Hedley Bull Research Fellow at Oxford’s Department of Politics and International Relations.

More information on the Lord Bryce Prize can be found on the PSA’s website here.

"This study explores the effectiveness of international law in regulating combat operations during international armed conflict. This is undertaken through an excellent approach to theory building via a theory of effective international law and in particular whether the legal definition of a legitimate target of attack makes a difference for target selection alongside material interests and normative aspirations.

The theory provides a solid foundation to the empirical investigation of US air targeting in US air warfare between 1965 and 2003. The study examines the hypothesis that recourse to law has a distinguishable effect on US behaviour in air warfare.

The thesis is highly ambitious in its empirical range. Where it is distinctive – and worthy of the award of the prize – is its examination of the impact of the norms of international law on patterns of decision making and the processes of decision-taking by chains of command. This allows the candidate to draw the conclusion that international law norms do make an identifiable contribution to decision-making behaviour, structures and processes. As a consequence, and an analytical study of the influence of norms on decision-making, it is highly impressive."

Professor Richard G. Whitman