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Tegan Harrison BSc, MA

Tegan Harrison

(she/her)

BSc, MA

PhD Candidate

School of Law and Politics

Email
HarrisonT8@cardiff.ac.uk

Overview

Tegan Watt Harrison is a PhD candidate in Politics and International Relations at Cardiff University's School of Law and Politics. Her thesis is situated in Critical War Studies looking specifically at the affective power of the threat of space war in the context of United Nations agenda 'prevention of an arms race in outer space'. Focusing on (space) war's ontology as threat-making she draws on political philosophy and international political sociology in particular, to develop and apply a "martial assemblages" approach in this context.

Undertaking a longitudinal documentary analysis covering the period 1981-2022, she identifies three main ontic practices that form her empirical chapters: strategic defence, counterspace, and sustainability. The project hopes to contribute to the study of war beyond, solely, war-as-fighting and to the political organization of space warfare, its preparation, affectations, and movement at the empirical site of arms control. 

Tegan is a PGR tutor at Cardiff University and is completing an Associate Fellowship. 

She sits on the committee of the Defence Research Nework (DRN) and holds the DRN Newsletter Editor position.  

 

Research

Tegan Watt Harrison is a PhD candidate at Cardiff University in the department of Politics and International Relations (POLIR). Tegan has a background in security and military studies. Her PhD thesis focuses on outer space security in the United Nations agenda the 'prevention of an arms race in outer space' (PAROS) covering the period 1981-2023. The project develops a Global Space Security research framework to conceptualise PAROS as an (in)security assemblage to address how space weapons and space warfare is problematised in the PAROS agenda. It analyses four thematic areas: (1) space weapons and the spectacle: kinetic and non-kinetic lethality; (2) the limits of force: peaceful imaginaries and collapsing civil-military spaces; (3) seeing and knowing threat: verification, monitoring and situational awareness; (4) (re)framing PAROS: emerging environmental and human security narratives.

Her other research area covers space as a critical infrastructure and UK satellite communications (SATCOM) resilience for defence and crisis management.

Teaching

PGR tutor for two modules at Cardiff University:

  • International Politics in the Nuclear Age - third-year module.
  • Introduction to Globalisation - first-year module
  • Introduction to International Realtions - first-year module 
  • International Security: Concepts and Issues - second-year module 

Associate Fellowship Candidate - expected completion spring 2024. 

Teaching Assistant for POLIR.  

Biography

Academic Background:

BSc Sociology (2017-2020) Loughborough University.

MA Security (2020-2021) Loughborough University.

Professional memberships

British International Studies Association (BISA)

Committees and reviewing

Defence Research Network - committee member, 'newletter editor'. 

Research themes

Specialisms

  • Security studies
  • critical military studies
  • war studies