Academic Staff: Owen Parker

Dr Owen Parker, BSc (Bath), MSc (LSE), MA, PhD (Warwick)

Lecturer in European Politics

Telephone: +44 (0)114 2221695
Fax: +44 (0)114 222 1717
Room: 2.02 Elmfield

Profile

Owen Parker joined the Department in April 2012 from the University of Warwick, where he was a Research Fellow in the Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation and the Department of Politics and International Studies. Owen was awarded a PhD in Politics and International Studies from Warwick in September 2010 (ESRC funded) and holds Masters degrees from Warwick (Politics, International Political Economy track, 2007) and the London School of Economics and Political Science (International Relations, 2002).

Dr Parker’s research sits at the intersection of international theory (IR and IPE) and European studies and he has published in academic journals in both sub-disciplines. In particular his work examines via a range of historical and contemporary cases the relationship between Europe as a security/peace project and Europe as a market project, as it pertains to both internal and external EU policies.

Dr Parker’s academic interests dovetail with his prior professional experience. From 2003-2006 he was 'International Relations Officer' at the European Commission (Directorate General for Enlargement, Turkey Unit) working on the assessment of Turkey's fulfillment of the EU's Copenhagen political criteria (relating to human rights, democracy, rule of law, minority rights).

Teaching

I will teach modules on European studies. Such modules relate directly to my research interests and prior professional experience. My overriding aim in developing modules in this area is to render the EU an interesting, relevant and even exciting (!), object of study for students. Thus, while the EU itself is often regarded and portrayed as a highly technocratic and bureaucratic entity, I seek to emphasise the political and normative importance of the EU – its significance for the lives of European citizens and those beyond Europe’s borders. In so doing I draw on a mainstream European studies, but also materials from beyond these literatures and, indeed, beyond academic scholarship.

My teaching philosophy is geared towards, to use the current jargon, the activation of independent learners and thinkers. This essentially means trying to nurture an intellectual curiosity and enthusiasm in students; a desire and ability to explore linkages between different domains of scholarship and between theory and practice. I believe that such curiosity and enthusiasm will stand students in good stead whatever their chosen direction after University. Practically, this approach means treating students as well-informed participants in a collective discussion and creating a friendly learning environment in which all feel free to participate.

Recent Invited Papers and Keynote Lectures

EU citizenship and mobile Roma: Free Movement for whom, where, when?, Jean Monnet Centre Seminar series, University of Manchester, April 2013.
If the European Social Model didn’t exist would we have to invent it?, presented at roundtable (with Dan Wincott), ‘Social Europe: Scorched Earth or Fertile Ground?’, Cardiff University, March 2012.
Europeanising Citizenship? French Republicanism, the Roma and the EU, presented on panel at conference ‘Opening the Boundaries of Citizenship’, Open University, February 2012.
The Ethics of an Ambiguous Cosmopolitics: Citizens and Entrepreneurs in the European Project. Invited to present at Lund University, global political theory seminar, November 2011.

Key Projects/Grants

Awarding Body: Leverhulme Trust (Early Career Fellowship)
Title of Research: Roma Resistance in the EU: Beyond Cosmopolitan Government?
Duration: October 2011-2013
Total Award: approx. £55 000

Current Research

The politics of citizenship, mobility and identity in the EU
Governance and democracy in ‘cosmopolitan’ EU
The ‘eurozone crisis’ and ‘social Europe’
Policies and politics towards the Roma in Europe.

Key Publications

Books

Cosmopolitan Government in Europe: Citizens and Entrepreneurs in Post-national Politics (Routledge, ‘Interventions’, forthcoming, August 2012).

Selected Journal Articles

’Normative Power Europe’ meets economic liberalism: Complicating cosmopolitanism inside/outside the EU’ Co-operation and Conflict, 48,2, 2013: 229-246, with Ben Rosamond
‘Towards an Ambiguous ‘Cosmopolitics’: Citizens & Entrepreneurs in the European Project’, International Theory 4, 2, 2012: 198-232.
‘Roma and the Politics of EU Citizenship in France: Everyday Security and Resistance’, in Journal of Common Market Studies 50, 2, 2012: 475-491.
'Cosmopolitan Europe and the EU-Turkey question: The Politics of a Common Destiny', in Journal of European Public Policy 16, 7, 2009: 1085-1101.
'Why EU, Which EU? Habermas and the Ethics of Postnational Politics in Europe', in Constellations: An International Journal of Democratic and Critical Theory 16, 3, 2009: 392-409.

Book Chapters

'A Foucauldian Perspective on the Ethics of EU(rope): Genealogies of Liberal Government' in Globalisation and European Integration: Critical Approaches to Regional Order and International Relations in, H. Overbeek, A. Tsolakis, P. Nousios (eds.) (Routledge Studies in Globalisation, 2012)

View Dr Parker's full list of publications.

PhD Supervision

I would be interested in supervising students working on any aspect of European politics. I am particularly keen to supervise students interested in deploying critical social and political theory/ theorists (post-structural, post-Marxist, cosmopolitan, constructivist, Critical Theory etc.).