Alumni Profiles

Mr Jonathan Friedler
BSc International Relations and History, 1982

Tutor: Professor George Grun

I emmigrated to Israel in 1989 where I have worked as an English teacher for over two decades. My students have included a Government Minister, a top entrepreneur, football referees and others. I am currently a British Council teacher and also a teacher at the local Open University.

Profile submitted in March 2015

Ms  Paula Henin
BSc International Relations and History, 2010

BSc Advisor: Dr Arne Hofmann
Dissertation Supervisor: Professor Nigel Ashton
Dissertation Title: A French Perspective on the British and American Interventions in the Levant, May - November 1958

Since graduating from LSE in 2010, I have completed a 4-year dual degree program in French and American law (Juris Doctor / Master's) at Columbia Law School and Sorbonne Law School, where I specialized in international law and international arbitration. While in law school, I completed various internships at law firms, an international organization and an international company. Since September 2014, I have been clerking for the Honorable Charles N. Brower, a leading independent international arbitrator, in The Hague, The Netherlands. Next September, I will be returning to New York City to start a job as an associate at a major law firm.

Profile submitted in March 2015.

Ms Lindsay Aqui
MSc History of International Relations, 2013

Tutor: Dr Piers Ludlow
Dissertation Title: Commonwealth Dimensions of Britain and European Integration: Ghana and the 1961 Application

Immediately following the completion of my MSc, I worked for one year as a researcher in the Department for Work and Pensions and then as a private secretary to the Minister for Business in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. I was responsible for advising the minister on a wide-range of policy areas, including: regulation, government asset sales, EU funding and export licensing. In September 2014 I began my PhD at Queen Mary University of London and am now in my third year. QMUL generously funds my research. My thesis is provisionally entitled ‘An Exceptional Case: Britain, Renegotiation, Referendum and the European Community, 1 January 1973 – 5 June 1975’. It examines notions of crisis and exceptionalism as they relate to Britain’s relationship with the European Community from entry to the 1975 referendum. In addition to the recent publication of my Masters dissertation in The International History Review, I have contributed to the BBC and my work has appeared in The Conversation UK, the LSE’s Brexit Blog and the Mile End Institute’s blog. I am also one of the Managing Editors of Cold War History, based at LSE IDEAS.

Profile submitted in November 2016

Ms Madiha Bataineh
LSE-Columbia University Double Degree in International and World History, 2014

Tutor: Dr Paul Stock
Dissertation Title: Transatlantic Rebelles: Mapping the First Decade of the Society of Women Geographers

I'm currently working as a Media and Communications Officer at the Royal Hashemite Court in Jordan and enrolled in a part-time masters program in creative writing at Oxford. In the latter, my goal is to translate my Master's dissertation on a society of women geographers from the 1920s into a novel. It's a work in progress.

Profile submitted in December 2015

Dr Ronald Bobroff
MSc History of International Relations, 1994

Tutor: Professor David Stevenson
Dissertation Title: Diplomacy Enhanced: British Diplomacy and Military Measures after the Dogger Bank Incident, October-November 1904

After completing my PhD in History at Duke University in 2000, I taught several years at Wake Forest University in North Carolina and then earned tenure at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta, Georgia, where I am currently Associate Professor of History and director of our study-abroad program. In 2006 my book Roads to Glory: Late Imperial Russia and the Turkish Straits was published by IB Tauris. Closely related to my studies at the LSE, recently my chapter "War Accepted but Unsought: Russia’s Growing Militancy and the July Crisis, 1914” appeared in J. Levy and J. Vasquez's volume The Outbreak of the First World War: Structure, Politics and Decision-Making (Cambridge, 2014).

Mr Nicholas Butts
LSE-PKU Double Degree in International Affairs, 2016

Tutor: Professor Steven Casey
Dissertation Title: Choosing Sides: The role of British and American reporters during the Chinese Civil War, 1945-1949

While still busy writing my thesis at LSE in August 2016, I begun pursuing an MPA at the Harvard Kennedy School where I am currently a Crown Prince Frederik Fellow. At the Kennedy School, I've continued to pursue my interest in relations between China and the West and I still write articles on Chinese foreign policy with a LSE-PKU classmate, e.g. in the National Interest. In July, I was selected as a Pacific Forum Young Leader by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). I also became a partner in a start-up based in Beijing - our first client is the world's largest LGBT social network and dating app. Finally, I am very involved in a tech-enabled education non-profit called Project Access, where I sit on the Advisory Board. At Project Access we fight inequality in access to the world's best universities - for students, by students and forever free of charge. Having launched only in February, we already have 700 mentors in 15 countries. And we are now working hard to ensure that we, by next year, will be in 60 countries and help more than 2000 students a year - levelling the playing field in access to top universities.

Profile submitted in September 2016

Mr Graham Jenkins
MSc Theory and History of International Relations, 2010

Tutor: MacGregor Knox
Dissertation Title: Aden in the Balance: Airpower and Counterinsurgency in the Aden Emergency

Since graduation from LSE, I have been working in the US defense and national security sector. I was a research assistant in the Institute for Defense Analyses and now am a strategic analyst at the Scitor Corporation. I mostly conduct research and analysis of nuclear issues, including doctrine, posture, and force structures, as well as futures analysis and wargaming. In mid-April, I'm switching things up a bit, and taking a position with Ernst & Young, where I will be staffing the EY Government and Public Sector's enterprise risk management practice.

Profile submitted in March 2015

Ms Zoe Koustoumpardi
MSc Empires, Colonialism and Globalisation, 2012

Tutor: Dr Eirini Karamouzi
Dissertation Title: Greece’s Transition from Dictatorship to Democracy, July 1974 – June 1975: The View from Britain

Currently, I'm the Centre Coordinator at the newly established Saw Swee Hock Southeast Asia Centre, within the Institute of Global Affairs at LSE. This is an interdisciplinary, regionally focused centre that serves as a hub at the School for public debate and engagement, and research dissemination on issues relevant to the region. As Centre Coordinator, I work together with the Director - Prof. Danny Quah - to develop the centre's activities, strategic development and achieve its engagement and fundraising objectives. Prior to this, I worked at LSE IDEAS - the School's foreign policy think-tank, My main focus there was to build a Southern Europe International Affairs Programme together with Dr Eirini Karamouzi. This entailed: building and maintaining a tightly knit research network in the UK, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain; organising conferences, publication launches, workshops and public events; commissioning and editing special reports.

Profile submitted in February 2015.

Mr Kevin McGarry
MSc Empires, Colonialism and Globalisation, 2014

Tutor: Dr Matthew Hinds
Dissertation Title: U.S.-Mexico Relations Between WWII and the Cold War (1945-1948)

After LSE, I moved back to Southern California where I am currently serving as the Director of Student Tours and Teacher Training at Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust.

Profile submitted in March 2015.

Dr  Emmanuel Mourlon-Druol
MSc History of International Relations, 2005

Tutor: Piers Ludlow
Dissertation Title: The Creation of the European Council in 1974

After completing a PhD in History at the European University Institute in Florence (2006-2010), I embarked on an academic career. I was a Pinto Post-Doctoral Fellow at LSE IDEAS/International History Department (2010-2011) and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Economic and Social History Department, University of Glasgow (2011-2013). In 2013, I was appointed Lord Kelvin Adam Smith Fellow, at the Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow, a position I still hold. My publications appear in journals such as Cold War History, Diplomacy & Statecraft, West European Politics and Business History.

Profile submitted in March 2015.

Professor Hamish Stewart
MA International History, 1975

Supervisor: Donald Cameron Watt

I was employed at the Universidad de Concepcion, Concepcion, Chile from 1983-1993 and I am now employed at the Universidad de Playa Ancha, Valparaiso, Chile and the Universidad Andres Bello, Viña del Mar, Chile as an Associate Professor, specializing in British and American History and International Relations. I have written two books, La Segunda Guerra Mundial 1939-1945: Repercusiones internacionales y consecuencias en Chile and Del Mar del Norte al Mar del Sur: Navegantes Ingleses y Holandeses an el Pacifico Suroriental as well as numerous articles.

Profile submitted in March 2015.

Dr Douglas Ford
PhD International History, 2002

Supervisor: Dr Antony Best
Thesis Title: British Intelligence and Japan’s Armed Forces during the Second World War in the Asia-Pacific theatre, 1937-1945

After completing my Ph.D., I held lectureships at several UK universities, including Aberystwyth, Salford, and Birmingham. I have also held visiting positions at the University of Wolverhampton, as well as overseas institutions including the Japanese National Institute for Defense Studies and Waseda University. I have published three books, plus over a dozen journal articles which have appeared in The Journal of Military History, International History Review, War in History, and Journal of Strategic Studies. I have also presented papers at conferences in France, Japan, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. I am also a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and have served on the editorial board for the Mariner’s Mirror. I am currently based at the Baltic Defence College in Tartu, Estonia, where I lecture on military history and strategic planning for the officer education programmes.

Profile submitted in October 2015

Dr Donald Rotunda
PhD International History, 1972

Supervisor: Professor Donald Cameron Watt
Thesis Title: The Rome Embassy of Sir Eric Drummond, 16th Earl of Perth, 1933-1939

Donald T. Rotunda was the Manager of Editorial Services, later promoted to Director of Editorial Services, at four Fortune 20 corporations: United Technologies Corporation; PepsiCo; Union Carbide and Martin Marietta Corporation. He is the author of numerous articles in The Washington Post, the New Republic Magazine, The Saturday Review; The Orange County Register and other publications. He is the author of the forthcoming Ambassador to Mussolini's Italy and The View from Fleet Street. He is former board member of the National Committee on American Foreign Policy and the Director of the Center for Contemporary History. He lives in Villa Park California, USA.

Profile submitted in March 2015.

Dr Pinar Üre
PhD International History, 2014

Supervisor: Professor Dominic Lieven
Dissertation Title: Byzantine Heritage, Archaelogy, and Politics between Russia and the Ottoman Empire: Russian Archaeological Institute in Constantinople (1894-1914)

Since graduating, Dr Pinar Üre has been lecturing at the Department of Social Sciences at Istanbul Kemerburgaz University, Istanbul, Turkey. She continues to research on Russian-Ottoman relations in the eve of World War I.

Profile submitted in March 2015.