Featured Scholar: Sara Daub

Could you introduce yourself?

I’m Sara Daub and since September I am a DAAD [German Academic Exchange Service] Postdoctoral Fellow at Johns Hopkins SAIS where I’m affiliated with the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs. I am also a Research Fellow at the Hertie School’s Centre for International Security in Berlin, Germany. I work mainly on international security, with a particular focus on conflict studies. Earlier this year, I obtained my PhD in Political Science with a dissertation on the causes and consequences of diaspora sponsorship to rebel organizations. My main research expertise centers around external sponsorship and non-state actors’ behavior.

Could you describe your current research focus in a bit more depth?

While my current research is situated within international relations and combines conflict and migration scholarship, I focus on civilian-insurgent relations in the context of internationalized civil wars, diaspora politics, foreign aid, civilian victimization and foreign policy preferences. My main research project during my postdoctoral fellowship investigates the phenomenon of political support for militant groups. Specifically, I examine why diaspora groups provide political support for warring parties in intrastate conflicts and how this support affects foreign policy making in the United States.

On a more abstract level, I am interested in the broader question of whether non-state actors and non-state armed actors present an opportunity or a threat to the current world order. Consider, for example: ongoing conflicts around the globe where external actors play an important role; ungoverned spaces where rebel governance can serve as an alternative provider of public goods, thus providing legitimacy; and non-state actors impacting the grand behavior of Western democracies and their strategic planning, indirectly shaping world order.

In addition to my single-authored research, I am collaborating with scholars from Europe and the United States. For instance, we are currently finalizing an article that takes an intersectional approach to gender, migration, and foreign policy preferences. Based on a survey we conducted in Germany, we examine various dimensions of German foreign policy, including military aid to Ukraine, increased defense spending, and the perception of Germany’s feminist foreign policy. Similarly, we investigate whether those preferences are affected by experiences of identity-based discrimination. In another project with co-authors I met during my Fulbright research stay, we have developed a dataset on jihadist leaders. Lastly, I have recently started a new research project with a co-author from the University of Maryland, College Park, in which we investigate specific types of foreign aid and the role of foreign-born individuals in the Unites States.

How did you get into conflict research?

That’s an excellent question. I started off with my BA in Economics and Political Science from the University of Goettingen where I firstly got into contact with development economics and critical approaches to international development during my Erasmus semester at Roskilde University in Denmark. I quickly realized that I have a big interest in development economics from an interdisciplinary perspective. This led me to my master’s degree at the University of Passau where I wrote my thesis on the impact of development aid on conflict dynamics in Iraq. From there I realized I was getting increasingly fascinated by external actors and how they shape conflict dynamics, particularly violence against civilians. However, I also wanted to gain experience of development agencies’ work. So I moved from Passau to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, for an internship with Germany’s development agency, GIZ. Gaining an insight into the daily work of the agency in a program which supports the African Union (AU) in the area of peace and security and more precisely, in a project supporting the AU in applied research and policy dialogue in the field of peace and security, showed me my data-oriented interest and the analytical work compared to more project management, monitoring, and evaluation-related activities. Therefore I applied for conflict and security focused PhD programs in Europe and decided to go for an interdisciplinary-oriented PhD program with a fulltime PhD stipend in Berlin to make the switch from development assistance to academia.

In the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, I started my PhD in Political Science at the Hertie School in Berlin. As a PhD researcher at the Center for International Security, I could not have wished for a more suitable and supportive environment to academically grow, be inspired by scholarly excellence and surrounded by fantastic officemates and colleagues. Following my interest in external actors’ involvement in intrastate conflicts, I wrote my dissertation on non-state actor support to non-state armed actors in the context of intrastate conflicts. My dissertation examines the causes and consequences of diaspora sponsorship (as non-state actors) to rebel organizations (as non-state armed actors). My empirical curiosity sparked during my master’s drove me to collect original data during my PhD, finalizing in a diaspora support dataset. I received my first DAAD scholarship in 2022, enabling me to do a research stay at the Department of Peace and Conflict at Uppsala University and the Uppsala Conflict Data Program in Sweden. Joining regular coders’ meetings and learning from researchers at the world’s most well-known conflict data collection projects further shaped my research.

And after Sweden?

I returned to Berlin to continue my dissertation research and prepare for my next research stay. I had the good fortune to win a Fulbright Award to conduct a six-month research stay at the University of Maryland’s (UMD) Department of Government and Politics and the Center for International Development and Conflict Management. Hosted by my second advisor, whom I met in person for the first time, I got integrated into one of the biggest hubs for quantitative conflict scholars. While my research stay in the US had a very significant impact on my dissertation development, it was also fostered by transatlantic research and community interests. Last but not least, it was my first time being in the US.

I then returned to Berlin to finish up my dissertation, and graduated in May 2024, in time to come to the United States again—this time to DC to join Johns Hopkins SAIS as a postdoctoral fellow with generous support from DAAD.

What were your first impressions of the US in 2022?

I was fascinated and inspired by the large academic community and vibrant options. After Covid, I had the chance to meet so many scholars—whose work I have been citing for years—in person in the DMV area and via international conferences held in the US. Embedded in a crowd of quantitative-oriented conflict scholars and like-minded graduate students influenced by perspectives and widened my horizon. But also more on the cultural side, I got to experience Thanksgiving for the first time at a UMD Professor’s open house and visited the Baltimore Christmas market. 

On a more serious note, being in the US first for the 2022 midterm Congressional elections, and then for the 2024 presidential election, has been exciting to see. I am particularly interested to observe the debates and discussions in the US and compare it to German politics.

Any other aspects of DC you're looking forward to?

Yes, there are plenty. On the academic side, I am excited to pursue my research projects. My main postdoctoral research project involves data collection, specifically expert interviews here in Washington D.C. And I think there is no better place to be housed, at SAIS, and the Kissinger Center, and literally working walking distance from the Capitol. Additionally, for my research here, I want to make use of the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995, so being based in the capital of the US is amazing.

I am also excited to rejoin the international relations workshops and seminars in the DMV area, besides meeting scholars with similar research interests. Furthermore, getting an insight into the think tank and policy community in DC is something I am very excited for, too. On a more personal note, I am glad to be back in a city that offers free exhibits and my favorite Smithsonian Museum, the National Gallery of Art across from our office building. Catching up with friends and meeting new ones and learning more about my colleagues’ research is also among the things I am looking forward to.

Fantastic! Any other goals for this year?

I am planning to submit two more articles to top-field journals before the end of the year after constructive feedback from colleagues at SAIS. I just returned from two conference participations, the ISSS-IS in Pittsburgh and the annual International Studies Association Northeast conference where I presented several of my research projects and interacted with fantastic scholars. After conference season also kickstarts upcoming conference season, so I am preparing for more conference presentations in January and March next year.

I’ve also got several co-authored projects; we are pursuing turning them into journal manuscripts. And then of course I have several articles in different review stages, and I hope to get them accepted in the next months.

I’m also very excited to deepen transatlantic research collaborations and get engaged again in the Fulbright community in the area. Overall, I’m very interested in getting insights into the policy world in the US and a sense for how policies are shaped, and how the discourse works in another capital. Being at the Kissinger Center and SAIS is an ideal institutional setting because it goes beyond purely academic work and broadens my horizon in that regard.