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Dr Peter Stirk

BA (Birmingham Polytechnic), PhD (Exeter)


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Member of the Centre for the History of Political Thought  

Biography

Peter is Senior Lecturer and Director of the Centre for the History of Political Thought. He has held appointments at York, Teeside and Sunderland and was Leverhulme Research Fellow at Hull (1986-9).

Dr Stirk is currently working on a history of military occupations. This builds on his Politics of Military Occupation and is related to a second project on the state as a community of liability (intended for publication of a co-edited book on the The Concept of the State in International Relations). The history of military occupation will be a multivolume project which seeks to provide a comprehensive, analytically informed history of military occupation from their origins as a conceptually distinct political phenomenon in the eighteenth century through to today's occupations. The project seeks to address such questions as: how is military occupation defined?; when and why did political leaders, military officers and occupied populations come to think of military occupation as a distinctive form with its own rules and laws?; what forms of government have military occupiers developed; what has been the relationship between the armed forces of the occupying power(s) and the civilian agencies which have often formed part of the occupation administration?; do occupied populations have a duty of obedience to occupying forces?; what has happened to justice under military occupation?; does the concept of sovereignty have any meaning under military occupation?; has military occupation changed in any fundamental way?; are cases of 'international territorial administration' in fact disguised military occupations? All of these questions have troubled those involved in military occupation. The project seeks to bring together these question and the implications of the way they have been answered in a historical synthesis of a topic that has been unduly neglected by political scientists.

Research interests

  • The Politics of Military Occupation
  • Political Thought and International Relations
  • German Political Thought

Research groups

  • Political Theory

Publications

Authored book

Chapter in book

  • Stirk, Peter. (2011). 'No peace beyond the line'. In Spatiality, Sovereignty and Carl Schmitt. Legg, Stephen. Routledge. 276-283.
  • Stirk, Peter M.R. (2010). Multiculturalism and the Concept of the State. In Multiculturalism and Moral Conflict. Dimova-Cookson, Maria. & Stirk, Peter M. R. Abingdon: Routledge. 151-169.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (2006). ‘Integration and Disintegration before 1945’. In Origins and Evolution of the EU. Dinan, Desmond Oxford: Oxford University Press. 9-28.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (2000). 'Habermas on Theory and Political Practice'. In Marxism at the Millenium. Cowling, M. & Reynolds, P. London: Palgrave. 97-115.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1994). 'The Idea of Mitteleuropa'. In Mitteleuropa: History and Prospects. Stirk, P.M.R. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 1-35.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1994). 'Ideas of Economic Integration in Interwar Mitteleuropa'. In Mitteleuropa: History and Prospects. Stirk, P.M.R. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 86-111.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1991). 'The Preconditions of European Integration: Observations on the Years 1918-1945'. In Europese Eenwording in Historisch-Perspectief. Camphuis, W.A.F. & Wildboer-Schut, C.G.J. Zaltbommel: Europese Bibilotheek. 174-185.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1991). 'Authoritarian Federalists in Central Europe'. In A Constitution for Europe. King, P. & Bosco, A. London: Lothian Press. 199-212.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1991). 'Americanism and Anti-Americanism in British and German Responses to the Marsahll Plan'. In Shaping Postwar Europe: European Unity and Disunity 1945-1957. Stirk, P.M.R. & Willis, D. London: Pinter. 27-42.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1990). 'Anti-Americanism in National Socialist Propaganda during the Second World War'. In Making the New Euroope: European Unity and the Second World War. Stirk, P.M.R. Stirk & Smith, M.L. London: Pinter. 66-86.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1989). 'Authoritarian and National Socialist Conceptions of Nation, State, and Europe'. In Stirk, P.M.R. London: Pinter. 125-48.

Edited book

  • Dimova-Cookson, Maria & Stirk, P.M.R. (2009). Multiculturalism and Moral Conflict. Routledge Innovations in Political Theory. London: Routledge: Routledge.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. & Weigall, D (1999). The Origins and Development of European Integration: A Reader and Commentary. London: Pinter.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. & Weigall, D. (1995). An Introduction to Political Ideas. London: Pinter.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1994). Mitteleuropa: History and Prospects. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. & Weigall, D. (1992). The Origins and Development of the European Community. Leicester: Leicester University Press.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. & Willis, D. (1991). Shaping Postwar Europe: European Unity and Disunity, 1945-1957. London: Pinter.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. & Smith, M.L. (1990). Making the New Europe: European Unity and the Second World War. London: Pinter.
  • Stirk, P.M.R. (1989). European Unity in Context: Interwar Europe. London: Pinter.

Journal Article