John Morrissey

Biography

I am Professor of Human Geography at the University of Galway in Ireland. I have published widely in the areas of geopolitics, imperialism, security and development. My work draws upon the writings of Michel Foucault, Edward Said, Judith Butler and others in critiquing how dominant and violent forms of contemporary Western interventionism are underpinned by imperial and neoliberal discourses of security. More recently, I have begun work on the challenge of enacting more holistic and transformative practices of 'human security' and of envisioning a 'more-than-human' sense of planetary precarity in the wake of Covid-19 and wider global human-environmental crises. My books include: Haven: The Mediterranean Crisis and Human Security (Edward Elgar 2020); The Long War: CENTCOM, Grand Strategy, and Global Security (University of Georgia Press 2017); Spatial Justice and the Irish Crisis (Royal Irish Academy 2014; Co-edited); and Negotiating Colonialism (Royal Geographical Society 2003). I was a Government of Ireland Fellow at the Center for Place, Culture and Politics at CUNY Graduate Center in New York, and am a former Quatercentenary Fellow at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. I have held additional research fellowships at Virginia Tech, the University of Oxford, and Australian National University. In 2021, I was appointed International Consultant on Human Security in the Human Development Report Office of the United Nations. For over 10 years, I have been Programme Director of NUI Galway's award-winning MA in Environment, Society and Development, which addresses key challenges of international relations, global governance and sustainable development, and involves students working on the ground with the United Nations Development Programme in Bosnia. I have won the President's Award for Teaching Excellence at NUI Galway on two occasions, and am a past recipient of the Irish National Academy Award for Research and Teaching Excellence.