Alex Waterman

Nice to see that my India Review article with Ben Holt analysing variation in the character of state-rebel conflict across Northeast India's "Highland," "Heartland" and "Hinterland" conflicts is the journal’s 3rd most-read article in the last year!

Read it Open Access here: lnkd.in/e-6XjJEw

Indian Army Carries Out Major Drone Strikes on ULFA-I, NSCN(K) Camps in Myanmar Tinsukia | Assam | Top Stories | The Indian Army reportedly launched a series of drone strikes on insurgent camps belonging to the United Liberation Front of Asom-Independent

Reports of large-scale drone strikes against northeast Indian insurgent camps in Myanmar. As with most other conflict zones, the Northeast/Sagaing border area has gradually seen the arrival of drone warfare over the last couple of years www.pratidintime.com/latest-assam...

Next Wednesday (11 June) our very own Professor Christoph Bluth is presenting the Freedom Speakers International at the Light Church in Bradford. The three speakers, Yuna Jung, Riha Kim, and Sujin Kim, will share their stories about escaping from North Korea and their journey since.

Pleased to see the second article from our Gerda Henkel Stiftung funded research project on counterinsurgency doctrine published online, plenty more to come. I’ll let @alexwaterman.bsky.social explain this one in his detailed thread!

Many thanks to Gerda Henkel Stiftung for supporting this project + to our interlocutors and participants who were so generous in their time. Thanks also to members of the COIN Forum down at Warminster, the JSS editorial team and reviewers for such a constructive and supportive process!

This picture of compromise and negotiation reflected the epistemic influences, positionality, and power brought to the table by various authors and stakeholders, shaped by path dependencies brought about by deadlines and critical negotiations to break deadlocks

We show a picture of epistemic negotiation and complexity often overlooked in critiques of the manual's 'classical' representation of insurgencies. FM 3-24 blended neoclassical approaches, attempts to widen typologies, 'mosaic' and GWOT(Iraq)-specific models of insurgency

We illustrate the fluid, negotiated nature of these knowledge processes through analysis of documentary and interview evidence of the drafting process of FM 3-24

We theorise 4 steps through which knowledge is integrated into doctrine: Knowledge Generation, In-Team Knowledge Negotiation, Org. Knowledge Negotiation and Critical Stakeholder Knowledge Negotiation. These processes are not linear, nor do they occur only once during drafting

In this open-access article with @jamesworrall.bsky.social in the Journal of Strategic Studies, we theorise how specific elements of knowledge - in this case knowledge of insurgencies - are integrated, negotiated and codified into doctrine doi.org/10.1080/0140...

Interested in joining us for a discussion? DM us or contact @alexwaterman.bsky.social. We're particularly keen to pull in a broad church of civil wars scholars reflecting the field's methodological diversity, so please do circulate widely!

We are keen to build on our excellent roundtable at #ISA2025 in Chicago this year (keep an eye out for a write-up in our next issue!) by reflecting specifically on epistemology and the diverse research approaches that make up our field of study

Interested in attending @isanet.bsky.social #ISA2026? Interested in discussing how we create and produce knowledge about civil wars, and how this informs our research approaches? We are looking for participants to join a roundtable proposal for our "Reimagining a Field of Study" roundtable series!

India and Pakistan have agreed a precarious peace – but will it last? The ceasefire between these two nuclear powers appears to be holding, but deeper resolution appears unlikely.

India and Pakistan have agreed a precarious peace – but will it last? My short piece with @sudhirselvaraj.bsky.social theconversation.com/india-and-pa...

Dr Rashmi Arora gave a talk this week at Manchester Metropolitan University for the Women in Economics Mentoring Scheme, exemplifying PSID's bridge between research and practice!

Yesterday, the department's Global Security Research Group held an informal workshop to discuss a number of fascinating research projects spanning rich archival work, deep ethnographies and quantitative modelling. Particularly great to see our PhD students showcasing the evolution of their projects!

This article examines the War on Terror’s shift to ‘over-the-horizon counterterrorism’ after the 2021 American withdrawal from Afghanistan. I argue that the concept of the ‘horizon’ provides temporal and spatial structures which both obscure and reveal the political dimensions of counterterrorism. Drawing on German historian Reinhart Koselleck’s concept of the ‘horizon of expectation’, I demonstrate how the horizon shows the tensions between present uses of force and future security endeavours through a discourse analysis of speeches and communications on counterterrorism by the Biden Administration, inescapably inscribing counterterror violence at the heart of American security futures.

Abstract here 👇

Thank you to @hannahrwest.bsky.social and @alexwaterman.bsky.social for editing this special issue; stay tuned for the full line-up of papers imminently!

What lies over the horizon? Remoteness and the evolution of American global counterterrorism This article examines the War on Terror’s shift to ‘over-the-horizon counterterrorism’ after the 2021 American withdrawal from Afghanistan. I argue that the concept of the ‘horizon’ provides tempor...

New publication in the Journal of Strategic Studies (part of a special issue on "Reimagining COIN after Afghanistan): What lies over the Horizon?
In this, I question the meaning of "over-the-horizon" counterterrorism, and what kinds of futures it points towards.

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Excited to share new research from one of our colleagues! Dr Clara Voyvodic @cvoyvodic.bsky.social has two papers out on armed groups and rebel authority in Colombia. Clara’s work explores the intersections of conflict, development, and non-state governance. www.bradford.ac.uk/staff/cvoyvo...

Highland, Heartland and Hinterland Conflicts: Introducing a Typology of State-rebel Conflict in Northeast India The many “forgotten conflicts” of Northeast India remain poorly understood. Important works have highlighted deep nuances and historical variation in patterns of state-society relations across the ...

***New Open Access Publication!*** In this India Review article co-authored with Ben Holt, we develop a new typology capturing variation in state-rebel conflict across Northeast India
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Thank you @davidbrenner.bsky.social - same very much goes for your work!

Day one of 'free movement' in Manipur: One killed, 25 injured as clashes erupt between Kukis and security forces— top developments | India News - The Times of India India News: NEW DELHI: One protestor was killed and 25 injured after clashes erupted between Kuki demonstrators and security forces in Manipur on the first day of.

We conclude by reflecting on the typology's implications for comparative approaches to studying and shaping peacebuilding in Northeast India, as well as violence in Manipur since 2023, which continues to rage well into President's Rule: timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/day-on...

The article is about showing when, where and how the Indian state, through its responses to rebellion, draws its “red lines” on acceptable and unacceptable forms of armed mobilisation within the region, and when and where bargaining or the use of force has been possible or undesirable.

These clusters of state-rebel conflict are shaped by historical state-society relations, rebel group ideological compatibility and political and strategic interests to produce distinct spatial and temporal patterns in state-rebel conflict across the region

Drawing on data from Paul Staniland's Armed Orders in South Asia dataset project, plus archival, newswire and secondary data, we illustrate the existence of 3 distinct spatially and temporally varied clusters of state-rebel conflict in the region ("Highland," "Heartland" and "Hinterland" conflicts)

Highland, Heartland and Hinterland Conflicts: Introducing a Typology of State-rebel Conflict in Northeast India The many “forgotten conflicts” of Northeast India remain poorly understood. Important works have highlighted deep nuances and historical variation in patterns of state-society relations across the ...

***New Open Access Publication!*** In this India Review article co-authored with Ben Holt, we develop a new typology capturing variation in state-rebel conflict across Northeast India
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Great end to a productive @isanet.bsky.social in Chicago! Presented preliminary research with Ryan O'Connor on the relationship between Naga rebel narratives and conflict events during a fascinating panel on rebel governance. Fascinating papers and super helpful discussion - thank you all! #IA2025

The calm before last night’s @civilwarsjournal.bsky.social reception @jamesworrall.bsky.social @hyyppati.bsky.social Great to see so many contributors to and friends of the journal, to meet many new faces and to learn about lots of exciting new projects!

An excellent start to #ISA2025 with @alexwaterman.bsky.social and the @civilwarsjournal.bsky.social organising a well-attended workshop on Rebel Financing and Rebels’ Use of Economic Instruments for Rebel Governance in Chicago!

Thanks to @ilyssa.bsky.social, Tanya Irwin, @jamesworrall.bsky.social, & @alexwaterman.bsky.social for their effort on the @civilwarsjournal.bsky.social Rebel Financing workshop @isanet.bsky.social. Feedback from @sanjidaamin.bsky.social & others on my paper w/ Kasia Houghton was incredibly valuable