Katharina is a first-year doctoral student in International Relations at New College, Oxford. Previously, she completed the MPhil in International Relations at Mansfield College, Oxford, as the 2023-2025 Adam von Trott Scholar.
Her main interests involve international security and technological change, military history, and strategic studies. Katharina's thesis research focusses on the securitisation of dual-use technologies and explores through which processes some dual-use technologies become integrated into national security agendas whilst others do not or to a lesser extent. In so doing, her research bridges analytical gaps between material and discursive drivers of securitisation, considering high politics, military practices, technological research, and commercial defence-industrial complexes alike. Katharina focusses her work on cyber-, quantum-, and space technologies, as well as artificial intelligence and blockchain.
Alongside her degree, Katharina researches strategic and ethical implications of the employment of AI in space as a research assistant at the Oxford Internet Institute, participating in the ‘Ethical Principles for the Use of AI for National Security and Defence’ project funded by the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory. Additionally, as a fellow at the Oxford China Policy Lab, she investigates the implications of quantum technologies and the fusion of AI and quantum technologies for the Sino-American tech race. Finally, Katharina also works for a geopolitical and macroeconomic advisory, where she applies her work at the intersection of emerging technologies and security and also covers European politics and macroeconomics.
Prior to joining the DPIR, Katharina completed a BA in Philosophy and Economics at LMU Munich as the top of her cohort and the highest-ranked philosophy student at the university. This included a bachelor thesis titled 'Bellum Iustum. An Encounter Between Ancient Ideas, Post-World War II Theories, and Modern Realities' which investigated the historical contingencies and logical status of just war theory from antiquity to the 1990s.
Research Interests
Dual-use technologies
International security
Ethics of international security
International Humanitarian Law
Military History
Political and International Theory
Scholarships and Awards
Adam von Trott Scholarship 2023-2025, University of Oxford
German Academic Scholarship Foundation | Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes
Scholarship of the Foundation of the German Economy | Stiftung der Deutschen Wirtschaft
LSE Academic Director's Scholarship
MLP Scholarship for Academic Performance
Glemser Scholarship For Future Excellency
Undergraduate Teaching
International Relations (Core Paper), Wadham College and Regent's Park College
Languages
German (native)
English (C2)
Italian (B2)
Latin (Proficiency)
French (A1)
