I am a doctoral candidate in International Relations at the University of Oxford, following an early career in policymaking, research, and non-profit leadership across the US, Denmark, and Australia. I research the grounds of solidarity in international politics, with a focus on the political thought of overlooked or erased historical women and people of colour who sought to develop alliances across cleavages of race, gender, class, nation, and empire.
I hold a BA in Ethics, Politics, and Economics from Yale University and an MPhil in International Relations from the University of Oxford.
In addition to international relations, my academic and professional background and interests include strategic communications, ethical governance, economic and social policy, agricultural sustainability, and French and English literature. I am from Sydney, Australia. I speak and write fluent French and conversational Danish.
Professional Experience
Prior to my graduate studies at Oxford, I built multi-sector policy and research partnerships for public good from within academia, government, and non-profit organisations:
- As a founding member of the Sydney Policy Lab team at the University of Sydney, I led collaborative policy research projects across a range of policy domains including inequality, migration, environment, and democratic inclusion.
- I managed international non-profit ‘MAD’ – Danish for ‘food’ – and consulted to the Danish Government’s Ministry of Food and Environment.
- I held a two-year fellowship at Yale University’s Sustainable Food Program, helping to run its academic programmes and research on food and agricultural systems.
Teaching
I am currently a Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Balliol College, where I teach and assist with undergraduate admissions for the degrees in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, and History and Politics. I teach undergraduates the following papers and subjects in multiple colleges across the University of Oxford.
- International Relations
- International Relations in the Era of Two World Wars
- International Relations of the Cold War
Awards and Honours
- World Universities Ramsay Postgraduate Scholar (2022-2025)
- Beinecke Library Graduate Student Research Fellow, Yale University (2023)
- Roosevelt Institute for American Studies Research Award, Middelburg, the Netherlands (2023)
- Deidre and Paul Malone Prize in International Relations, University of Oxford (2022)
- Governor Phillip Scholar, University of Oxford (2020-2022)
- Fellow, Centre for Australian Progress (2019)
Publications
Journal Articles
- Napier, I. “Recovering racial positioning in white women’s international thought: Lady Kathleen Simon’s international abolitionist crusade, 1927–1955.” Global Studies Quarterly, 0(0), pp. 1-12. 2023.
- Boucher, A., Hooijer, G., King, D., Napier, I. and Stears, M. "COVID-19: A crisis of borders.” PS: Political Science & Politics, 54(4), pp. 617–622. 2021.
Policy Reports
- Goodwin, S., Mudaliar, S., Napier, I. and Stears, M. "Making policy together: Reflections from the NSW Refugee Policy Initiative." The University of Sydney, Sydney Policy Lab, and Multicultural New South Wales. 2022.
- Tattersall, A., Bryant, G., Hancock, R., Napier, I. and Stears, M. "A Real Deal: A research action agenda for transforming Australia in and beyond the pandemic." The University of Sydney, Sydney Policy Lab. 2020.
I also write and provide research and copy-writing assistance in a wide range of forums, from academic to journalistic. For example, I co-researched the ‘Ask a Policy Expert’ series in The Guardian with its Life on the Breadline columnists, copy-edited community-led reports on Australia’s climate transition, and was acknowledged for my contribution as research assistant to Harold Bloom in his book, The Daemon Knows: Literary Greatness and the American Sublime. I was Chief Copy Editor for Oxford’s student-run, peer-reviewed academic journal on international affairs, the St. Antony’s International Review.
