Joshua Freedman

Biography

Joshua Freedman is an assistant professor of politics at Oberlin College, where he teaches courses on global politics, international law, international security, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He also teaches an advanced seminar on genocide and international criminal law.

Freedman’s research interests center around the politics of recognition, identity, and status in international conflict and diplomacy.

Political leaders often engage in open fights for recognition, announcing that some crucial element of their state’s identity, or status, has not been properly acknowledged and respected in the conduct of diplomacy. Recognition campaigns of this sort have captured peace-negotiations, they have made reconciliation between adversaries more difficult and conflicts more entrenched, and they have been used to frame, defend, and oppose cooperation between states and international organizations.

Freedman’s book project, The Recognition Dilemma in World Politics, explores the agency that so often lurks behind these struggles, motivating the question of why recognition, and its perceived absence, is so often made to matter. Substantively, his research draws on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Armenian-Turkish genocide dispute, Brexit, and China’s rise.

Elements of this research have been published in the European Journal of International Relations. Public commentary stemming from this research has been featured in the Monkey Cage @ the Washington Post, the Globe and Mail, the National Post, and Al Jazeera English.