Emma Hutchison

Emma Hutchison is Associate Professor and Australian Research Council DECRA Fellow in the School of Political Science and International Studies. She is an interdisciplinary politics and international relations scholar. Her work explores the politics of emotion, trauma, humanitarianism and aid, and conflict and its recovery. She examines these topics conceptually and through a range of contexts, from humanitarian crisis and terrorist attacks to the challenge of reconciling societies divided by historical trauma.

Emma has published on these topics in a range of academic journals and books. Her key publications can be viewed below. Her first book, Affective Communities in World Politics: Collective Emotions After Trauma (Cambridge University Press, 2016), was awarded the BISA Susan Strange Book Prize, the ISA International Theory Best Book Award, and the Australian Political Studies Assocation Crisp Prize.

Emma is currently working on a range of projects, which extend her research into the roles of emotions in world politics, humanitarian change through history and in international order, and the politics and ethics of visualising humanitarian crises. Her research takes shape individually and collaboratively, and through an ARC DECRA Project (2018-2024), a UQ Foundation Research Excellence Award (2018-2021), and an ARC Linkage Project (2022-2026). The latter involves collaboration across three universities and with industry partners, the World Press Photo Foundation, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the Australian Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières.

For a recent story on some of Emma's research, see here.

Emma teaches into peace and conflict studies and international relations programs across the School of Political Science and International Studies. She is course coordinator for POLS7503 Ethics and Human Rights.

GRANTS AND AWARDS

"Visualising Humanitarian Crises: Transforming Images and Aid Policy", ARC Linkage Project 2022-2026, Lead CI Professor Roland Bleiker with Emma Deputy-Lead, LP2000200046.

"Emotions and the Future of International Humanitarianism", Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Award 2018-2024, DE180100029.

"Emotions and the History of Humanitarianism", UQ Foundation Research Excellence Award.

Academy of Social Sciences in Australia, Paul Bourke Award for 2018.

SELECT PUBLICATIONS

Books

Affective Communities in World Politics: Collective Emotions After Trauma. Cambridge Studies in International Relations, Cambridge University Press, 2016/2018.

*Awarded the British International Studies Association Susan Strange Book Prize for 2017.

*Awarded the ISA Theory Section Best Book Award for 2017-2018.

* Awarded the Australian Political Studies Association Crisp Prize, best book from early-mid career scholar for 2022.

Edited Collections

"Making War, Making Sense?" (with Asli Calkivik), in Millennium: Journal of International Studies, Vol. 48, No. 1, 2020.

"Emotions and World Politics" (with Roland Bleiker), in International Theory, Vol. 6, No. 3, 2014.

Journal Articles

"Decolonising Affect: Emotions and the Politics of Peace" (with Roland Bleiker, Josephine Bourne, and Young-ju Hoang), Cooperation and Conflict, Online First, 2024.

"Making War, Making Sense? Debating Jens Bartelson's War in International Thought" (with Asli Calkivik), Millennium: Journal of International Studies, Vol. 48, No. 1, 2020.

"Emotions, Bodies, and the Un/Making of International Relations", Millennium: Journal of International Studies, Vol. 47, No. 2, 2019.

"Emotions, Discourse and Power in World Politics" (with Roland Bleiker), International Studies Review, Vol. 19, No. 3, 2017.

"Theorizing Emotions in World Politics" (with Roland Bleiker), International Theory, Vol. 6. No. 3, 2014.

"A Global Politics of Pity? Disaster Imagery and the Emotional Construction of Solidarity after the 2004 Asian Tsunami", International Political Sociology, Vol. 8, No. 1, 2014.

"The Visual Dehumanization of Refugees" (with Roland Bleiker, David Campbell and Xzarina Nicholson), Australian Journal of Political Science, Vol. 48, No. 4, 2014.

"Affective Communities as Security Communities", Critical Studies on Security, Vol. 1, No. 1, 2013.

"Trauma and the Politics of Emotions: Constituting Identity, Security and Community after the Bali Bombing," International Relations, Vol. 24, No. 1, 2010.

"Unsettling Stories: Jeanette Winterson and the Cultivation of Political Contingency", Global Society, Vol. 24, No. 3, 2010.

"Emotional Reconciliation: Reconstituting Identity and Community After Trauma" (with Roland Bleiker), European Journal of Social Theory, Vol. 11, No. 3, 2008.

"Fear No More: Emotions and World Politics" (with Roland Bleiker), Review of International Studies, Vol. 34, 2008.

Book Chapters

"Humanitarian Emotions Through History: Imaging Suffering and Performing Aid", in Dolorès Martin Moruno and Beatriz Pichel (eds.), Emotional Bodies: Studies on the Historical Performativity of Emotions. Illinois: University of Illinois Press, forthcoming 2019/2020.

"Trauma", in Roland Bleiker (ed.), Visual Global Politics. Interventions Book Series, Routledge, 2017.

"Grief and the Transformation of Collective Emotions After War" (with Roland Bleiker), in Linda Ahall and Thomas Gregory (eds.), Emotions, Politics and War. Milton Park and New York: Routledge, 2015.

"Art, Aesthetics and Emotionality" (with Roland Bleiker), in Laura J. Shepherd (ed.), Gender Matters in World Politics: A Feminist Introduction to International Relations, 2nd edition. Milton Park and New York: Routledge, 2014.

"Imaging Catastrophe: The Politics of Representing Humanitarian Crises" (with Roland Bleiker and David Campbell), in Michele Acuto (ed.), Negotiating Relief: The Dialectics of Humanitarian Space. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

"Emotions in the War on Terror" (with Roland Bleiker), in Alex J. Bellamy, Roland Bleiker, Sara E. Davies and Richard Devetak (eds.), Security and the War on Terror. London: Routledge, 2008.

Other Publications

“As Fires Rage We Must Use Social Media for Long-Term Change, Not Just Short-Term Fundraising,” The Conversation, January 2020. Available here.

“Why Study Emotions in International Relations”, E-IR, 8 March 2018. Available here.

“Affective Communities and World Politics,” E-IR, 8 March 2018. Available here.

“Emotions and the Precarious History of International Humanitarianism,” for the ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions “Histories of Emotion” blog, hosted by the ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions, 19 August 2017. Available here.

“Emotional Cultures and the Politics of Peace,” (with Roland Bleiker) for the “Histories of Emotion” blog, hosted by the ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions "History of Emotion" Blog, 25 September 2015. Available here.

“Emotions, Conflict and Communal Recovery,” for the “Histories of Emotion” blog, hosted by the ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions, 17 July 2015. Available here.

“The Politics of Post-Trauma Emotions: Securing Community after the Bali Bombing,” Working Paper 2008/4, Department of International Relations, RSPAS, The Australian National University, 43pp.