Philipp Lottholz
Biographic Data
| ID | 3688046 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Philipp Lottholz |
| GIVEN NAMES | Philipp |
| FAMILY NAME | Lottholz |
| SIGNATURE | LOTTHOLZ P |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Birmingham |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6616-269X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 16 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 46 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 16 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2015 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Building a new world? East-West disputes on United Nations trusteeship and self-determination
International governance is contested. Whether in the form of direct interventions, externally supported peacebuilding, or international administrations, these modes of governance within international organizations are shaped and overlaid by the ideas and practices of international politics as exercised by powerful states. Great powers’ attempts at worldmaking, emerging in competition, but also cooperation with their adversaries within internatio…
Still Engaging, Not Avoiding, Contradictions: Conceptualizing Cooperative Research in Practical, Structural and Epistemic Terms
Critical methodologies in International Political Sociology (IPS) and its intersecting fields and research traditions have increasingly coalesced around the idea that research should be done in dialogue, and possibly cooperation, with people rather than only about them. Drawing together research under this theme and wider debates on participatory, activist, and action research, alongside our own research experience, this article proposes the noti…
Author reply: Engaging with non-political lifeworlds, dialogical research and decolonial horizons through Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia
This article is part of a series including:Introducing the symposium on Philipp Lottholz’s Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia: Imaginaries, Discourses and Practices of Social Ordering
Topologies of security: Inquiring in/Security Across Postcolonial and Postsocialist Scenes
Postcolonial and postsocialist thought has critiqued Critical Security Studies (CSS) on its Eurocentric orientation in terms of its concepts, categories, and concerns of security. In this introductory text, we discuss a concept in tension – topology/scene – to deepen a dialogue between postcolonial and postsocialist scholarship alongside insights from Science and Technology Studies (STS). Drawing on various contributions, we demonstrate how topol…
Understanding the Post-Imperial Politics of Security, Stability and Ordering in Central Asia: An Introduction
The Post-Imperial Politics of Security and Depoliticisation: Comparing Discourses and Practices of Ordering Across Central Asia
In this essay, we build on earlier discussions on the insufficiency of labels such as ‘post-Soviet’ and ‘postcolonial’ for Central Asian regimes and propose a consideration of their particular post-imperial character. We illustrate the usefulness of this lens through an analysis of security and violent conflicts in Central Asia and how governments interpret and present these conflicts. Our discussion draws systematically on existing research on r…
Recognizing the never quite absent: De facto usage, ethical issues, and applications of covert research in difficult research contexts
This article scrutinizes and reconceptualizes covert research in social science. Surveying recent literature about this research method, we reflect on the ethical and safety implications stemming from the widespread, even if well-intended, lack of transparency characterizing many research projects, especially ones conducted in difficult research contexts. While the standard definition of covert research holds that researchers deliberately do not …
The Roles and Practices of Civil Society Actors in Police Reform in Kyrgyzstan: Activism, Expertise, Knowledge Production
The increasingly complex and differentiated field of security sector and police reform has given rise to extensive research into such processes, but also the stalemate and contradictions they are facing. Recent analyses have shown how civil society actors can successfully influence reform and hold authorities accountable, but are also facing limits in terms of their own expertise, capacity and representativeness. This article presents new evidenc…
Governance and order-making in Central Asia: From illiberalism to post-liberalism
This forum brings together five different angles on the question as to whether and how political regimes and forms of order-making can and should be researched through the concept of ‘illiberalism’. The discussion engages critically with this and associated concepts, such as ‘illiberal peace’ and ‘authoritarian conflict management’, which have been developed out of the Central Asian / Eurasian context and discussed in their wider global ramificat…
Blood ties and the native son: Poetics of patronage in Kyrgyzstan
With Blood Ties and the Native Son: Poetics of Patronage in Kyrgyzstan, Aksana Ismailbekova, one of the most widely published among the Central Asian studies scholars who originate from the region
Old Slogans Ringing Hollow? The Legacy of Social Engineering, Statebuilding and the ‘Dilemma of Difference’ in (Post-) Soviet Kyrgyzstan
This article illustrates the ‘dilemma of difference’ of post-conflict peacebuilding in the Kyrgyz Republic in Central Asia. Following inter-communal clashes in 2010, the country has received significant support in the form of peacebuilding and conflict prevention programmes and aid. Still, national policy makers retained their sovereignty and carried out peacebuilding in line with the country’s historical legacy and cultural specificities. I illu…
Navigating the safety implications of doing research and being researched in Kyrgyzstan: Cooperation, networks and framing
Much security-related research conducted in Central Asia appears to disregard the nexus between the data gathered and participants’ and researchers’ experiences of safety during the research. This article explores the interconnectedness of these factors and their effects on the knowledge produced on security. It investigates the legal and institutional context researchers encounter when conducting research in Kyrgyzstan; namely, a state monopoly …
Critical peace research and the limits of language and practicability: New approaches, old problems
Critical peace research has evolved as a dynamic field in the past years and seen a series of debates and ‘turns’ offering new insights and future avenues but also, sometimes, confusion. Especially
Critiquing Anthropological Imagination in Peace and Conflict Studies: From Empiricist Positivism to a Dialogical Approach in Ethnographic Peace Research
This article seeks to show how the ethnographic peace research agenda can benefit from long-standing discussions in the anthropological literature. It sets out by arguing that the ‘anthropological imagination’ apparent in recent debates in peace and conflict studies is informed by an empiricist positivism that conceives of ethnography as a data-gathering tool. By drawing insights from the ‘writing culture’ and ‘Third World feminism’ debates, I wi…
Re-reading Weber, re-conceptualizing state-building: From neo-Weberian to post-Weberian approaches to state, legitimacy and state-building
This article analyzes how different interpretations of Max Weber’s work on the state and legitimacy have materialized in contemporary research on—and practice of—international state-building. We argue that the currently prevailing neo-Weberian institutionalism in state-building theory and practice is based on a selective interpretation of the passionate and polemicist ‘politician’ Max Weber, whilst omitting almost entirely the wealth of thought o…
Exploring the Boundaries of Knowledge via Hybridity
The special section on hybridity in a previous issue of this journal (Lemay-Hebert and Kuhn 2015) has provided more evidence that hybridity is a good departure point for research on processes of in
Re-reading Weber, re-conceptualizing state-building: From neo-Weberian to post-Weberian approaches to state, legitimacy and state-building
This article analyzes how different interpretations of Max Weber’s work on the state and legitimacy have materialized in contemporary research on—and practice of—international state-building. We argue that the currently prevailing neo-Weberian institutionalism in state-building theory and practice is based on a selective interpretation of the passionate and polemicist ‘politician’ Max Weber, whilst omitting almost entirely the wealth of thought o…
Navigating the safety implications of doing research and being researched in Kyrgyzstan: Cooperation, networks and framing
Much security-related research conducted in Central Asia appears to disregard the nexus between the data gathered and participants’ and researchers’ experiences of safety during the research. This article explores the interconnectedness of these factors and their effects on the knowledge produced on security. It investigates the legal and institutional context researchers encounter when conducting research in Kyrgyzstan; namely, a state monopoly …
Critiquing Anthropological Imagination in Peace and Conflict Studies: From Empiricist Positivism to a Dialogical Approach in Ethnographic Peace Research
This article seeks to show how the ethnographic peace research agenda can benefit from long-standing discussions in the anthropological literature. It sets out by arguing that the ‘anthropological imagination’ apparent in recent debates in peace and conflict studies is informed by an empiricist positivism that conceives of ethnography as a data-gathering tool. By drawing insights from the ‘writing culture’ and ‘Third World feminism’ debates, I wi…
Recognizing the never quite absent: De facto usage, ethical issues, and applications of covert research in difficult research contexts
This article scrutinizes and reconceptualizes covert research in social science. Surveying recent literature about this research method, we reflect on the ethical and safety implications stemming from the widespread, even if well-intended, lack of transparency characterizing many research projects, especially ones conducted in difficult research contexts. While the standard definition of covert research holds that researchers deliberately do not …
Still Engaging, Not Avoiding, Contradictions: Conceptualizing Cooperative Research in Practical, Structural and Epistemic Terms
Critical methodologies in International Political Sociology (IPS) and its intersecting fields and research traditions have increasingly coalesced around the idea that research should be done in dialogue, and possibly cooperation, with people rather than only about them. Drawing together research under this theme and wider debates on participatory, activist, and action research, alongside our own research experience, this article proposes the noti…
Author reply: Engaging with non-political lifeworlds, dialogical research and decolonial horizons through Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia
This article is part of a series including:Introducing the symposium on Philipp Lottholz’s Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia: Imaginaries, Discourses and Practices of Social Ordering
The Post-Imperial Politics of Security and Depoliticisation: Comparing Discourses and Practices of Ordering Across Central Asia
In this essay, we build on earlier discussions on the insufficiency of labels such as ‘post-Soviet’ and ‘postcolonial’ for Central Asian regimes and propose a consideration of their particular post-imperial character. We illustrate the usefulness of this lens through an analysis of security and violent conflicts in Central Asia and how governments interpret and present these conflicts. Our discussion draws systematically on existing research on r…
The Roles and Practices of Civil Society Actors in Police Reform in Kyrgyzstan: Activism, Expertise, Knowledge Production
The increasingly complex and differentiated field of security sector and police reform has given rise to extensive research into such processes, but also the stalemate and contradictions they are facing. Recent analyses have shown how civil society actors can successfully influence reform and hold authorities accountable, but are also facing limits in terms of their own expertise, capacity and representativeness. This article presents new evidenc…
Governance and order-making in Central Asia: From illiberalism to post-liberalism
This forum brings together five different angles on the question as to whether and how political regimes and forms of order-making can and should be researched through the concept of ‘illiberalism’. The discussion engages critically with this and associated concepts, such as ‘illiberal peace’ and ‘authoritarian conflict management’, which have been developed out of the Central Asian / Eurasian context and discussed in their wider global ramificat…
Old Slogans Ringing Hollow? The Legacy of Social Engineering, Statebuilding and the ‘Dilemma of Difference’ in (Post-) Soviet Kyrgyzstan
This article illustrates the ‘dilemma of difference’ of post-conflict peacebuilding in the Kyrgyz Republic in Central Asia. Following inter-communal clashes in 2010, the country has received significant support in the form of peacebuilding and conflict prevention programmes and aid. Still, national policy makers retained their sovereignty and carried out peacebuilding in line with the country’s historical legacy and cultural specificities. I illu…
Exploring the Boundaries of Knowledge via Hybridity
The special section on hybridity in a previous issue of this journal (Lemay-Hebert and Kuhn 2015) has provided more evidence that hybridity is a good departure point for research on processes of in
Re-reading Weber, re-conceptualizing state-building: From neo-Weberian to post-Weberian approaches to state, legitimacy and state-building
This article analyzes how different interpretations of Max Weber’s work on the state and legitimacy have materialized in contemporary research on—and practice of—international state-building. We argue that the currently prevailing neo-Weberian institutionalism in state-building theory and practice is based on a selective interpretation of the passionate and polemicist ‘politician’ Max Weber, whilst omitting almost entirely the wealth of thought o…
Critical peace research and the limits of language and practicability: New approaches, old problems
Critical peace research has evolved as a dynamic field in the past years and seen a series of debates and ‘turns’ offering new insights and future avenues but also, sometimes, confusion. Especially
Critiquing Anthropological Imagination in Peace and Conflict Studies: From Empiricist Positivism to a Dialogical Approach in Ethnographic Peace Research
This article seeks to show how the ethnographic peace research agenda can benefit from long-standing discussions in the anthropological literature. It sets out by arguing that the ‘anthropological imagination’ apparent in recent debates in peace and conflict studies is informed by an empiricist positivism that conceives of ethnography as a data-gathering tool. By drawing insights from the ‘writing culture’ and ‘Third World feminism’ debates, I wi…
Old Slogans Ringing Hollow? The Legacy of Social Engineering, Statebuilding and the ‘Dilemma of Difference’ in (Post-) Soviet Kyrgyzstan
This article illustrates the ‘dilemma of difference’ of post-conflict peacebuilding in the Kyrgyz Republic in Central Asia. Following inter-communal clashes in 2010, the country has received significant support in the form of peacebuilding and conflict prevention programmes and aid. Still, national policy makers retained their sovereignty and carried out peacebuilding in line with the country’s historical legacy and cultural specificities. I illu…
Navigating the safety implications of doing research and being researched in Kyrgyzstan: Cooperation, networks and framing
Much security-related research conducted in Central Asia appears to disregard the nexus between the data gathered and participants’ and researchers’ experiences of safety during the research. This article explores the interconnectedness of these factors and their effects on the knowledge produced on security. It investigates the legal and institutional context researchers encounter when conducting research in Kyrgyzstan; namely, a state monopoly …
Blood ties and the native son: Poetics of patronage in Kyrgyzstan
With Blood Ties and the Native Son: Poetics of Patronage in Kyrgyzstan, Aksana Ismailbekova, one of the most widely published among the Central Asian studies scholars who originate from the region
The Roles and Practices of Civil Society Actors in Police Reform in Kyrgyzstan: Activism, Expertise, Knowledge Production
The increasingly complex and differentiated field of security sector and police reform has given rise to extensive research into such processes, but also the stalemate and contradictions they are facing. Recent analyses have shown how civil society actors can successfully influence reform and hold authorities accountable, but are also facing limits in terms of their own expertise, capacity and representativeness. This article presents new evidenc…
Governance and order-making in Central Asia: From illiberalism to post-liberalism
This forum brings together five different angles on the question as to whether and how political regimes and forms of order-making can and should be researched through the concept of ‘illiberalism’. The discussion engages critically with this and associated concepts, such as ‘illiberal peace’ and ‘authoritarian conflict management’, which have been developed out of the Central Asian / Eurasian context and discussed in their wider global ramificat…
Recognizing the never quite absent: De facto usage, ethical issues, and applications of covert research in difficult research contexts
This article scrutinizes and reconceptualizes covert research in social science. Surveying recent literature about this research method, we reflect on the ethical and safety implications stemming from the widespread, even if well-intended, lack of transparency characterizing many research projects, especially ones conducted in difficult research contexts. While the standard definition of covert research holds that researchers deliberately do not …
Understanding the Post-Imperial Politics of Security, Stability and Ordering in Central Asia: An Introduction
The Post-Imperial Politics of Security and Depoliticisation: Comparing Discourses and Practices of Ordering Across Central Asia
In this essay, we build on earlier discussions on the insufficiency of labels such as ‘post-Soviet’ and ‘postcolonial’ for Central Asian regimes and propose a consideration of their particular post-imperial character. We illustrate the usefulness of this lens through an analysis of security and violent conflicts in Central Asia and how governments interpret and present these conflicts. Our discussion draws systematically on existing research on r…
Author reply: Engaging with non-political lifeworlds, dialogical research and decolonial horizons through Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia
This article is part of a series including:Introducing the symposium on Philipp Lottholz’s Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia: Imaginaries, Discourses and Practices of Social Ordering
Topologies of security: Inquiring in/Security Across Postcolonial and Postsocialist Scenes
Postcolonial and postsocialist thought has critiqued Critical Security Studies (CSS) on its Eurocentric orientation in terms of its concepts, categories, and concerns of security. In this introductory text, we discuss a concept in tension – topology/scene – to deepen a dialogue between postcolonial and postsocialist scholarship alongside insights from Science and Technology Studies (STS). Drawing on various contributions, we demonstrate how topol…
Still Engaging, Not Avoiding, Contradictions: Conceptualizing Cooperative Research in Practical, Structural and Epistemic Terms
Critical methodologies in International Political Sociology (IPS) and its intersecting fields and research traditions have increasingly coalesced around the idea that research should be done in dialogue, and possibly cooperation, with people rather than only about them. Drawing together research under this theme and wider debates on participatory, activist, and action research, alongside our own research experience, this article proposes the noti…
Building a new world? East-West disputes on United Nations trusteeship and self-determination
International governance is contested. Whether in the form of direct interventions, externally supported peacebuilding, or international administrations, these modes of governance within international organizations are shaped and overlaid by the ideas and practices of international politics as exercised by powerful states. Great powers’ attempts at worldmaking, emerging in competition, but also cooperation with their adversaries within internatio…
Sociology (15 works) · Political science (13 works) · Political Conflict and Governance (11 works) · Law (10 works) · Peacebuilding and International Security (10 works) · Epistemology (9 works) · Law (9 works) · Politics (7 works) · Political economy (6 works) · Philosophy (5 works)