Valerie Morkevičius

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vmorkevicius

Valerie Morkevičius

Associate Professor of Political Science; Chair, Department of Political Science

Department/Office Information

Political Science, International Relations
140 Persson Hall
  • W 9:00am - 11:00am (140 Persson Hall)
  • R 10:00am - 11:00am (140 Persson Hall)
  • R 1:30pm - 2:30pm (140 Persson Hall)

Valerie Morkevičius is the author of Realist Ethics: Just War Traditions as Power Politics, which uses an exploration of the history of the Christian, Islamic, and Hindu traditions to reveal that just war thinking is no stranger to pragmatic politics. Her other work focuses on the intersection between power and ethics, and the applicability of traditional just war thinking to contemporary challenges, including cyberwarfare and information warfare.

Follow her on Twitter at @vmorkevicius.

  • PhD, University of Chicago, Political Science, 2008
  • MA, University of Chicago, Committee on International Relations, 2000
  • BA, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, East Asian Languages and Cultures/French, 1999

Book

Realist Ethics: Just War Traditions as Power Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2018)

Articles

"Introduction: The Roles of International Law and Just War Theory," Ethics and International Affairs, 31(4), 2017, 431-432.

"Looking Inward Together: Just War Thinking and Our Shared Moral Emotions," Ethics and International Affairs, 31(4), 2017, 441-451.

"Response to Michael Gross: Between Reality and Restraint," Journal of Military Ethics, 14(3-4), 2015, 260-265.

“Power and Order: The Shared Logics of Realism and Just War Theory,” International Studies Quarterly, 59(1), 2015, 11-22.

“Tin Men: Ethics, Cybernetics and the Importance of Soul,” Journal of Military Ethics, 13(1), 2014, 3-19.

“Why We Need a Just Rebellion Theory,” in Ethics and International Affairs, 27(4), 2013, 401-411.

“Changing the Rules of the Game: A Just Peace Critique of Just War Thought,” Nova et Vetera, 10(4), 2011, 1115-1140.

Book Chapters

"Military Necessity and Realism: Comparing Permission and Limitation in Christian, Islamic, and Hindu Thought," in Military Necessity and Just War Statecraft: The Principle of National Security Stewardship, Eric Patterson and Marc LiVecche, eds., Routledge, 2023.

  "Just War Thinking and Wars of Information: War, Not-War, and the Places Between," in Routledge Handbook of the future of Warfare, Artur Gruszczak and Sebastian Kaempf, eds., Routledge, 2023, 251-261.

  "Just War as Tradition in a Civil International Order," in The Civil  Condition in World Politics: Beyond Tragedy and Utopianism, Vassilios Papas, ed., Bristol University Press, 2002, 188-208.

“Sovereignty and Authority in the Work of James Turner Johnson,” in Responsibility and Restraint: James Turner Johnson and the Just War Tradition, Eric D. Patterson and Marc LiVecche, eds., Stone Tower Press, 2020, 97-124.

"The Fog of War: Violence, Coercion and Jus ad vim," co-authored with Danielle Lupton, in Jai Galliott, ed., Force Short of War in Modern Conflict: Jus Ad Vim (Edinburgh University Press, forthcoming 2019).

“Coercion, Manipulation and Harm: Civilian Immunity and Soft War,” in Michael Gross and Tami Meisels, eds., Soft War: The Ethics of Unarmed Conflict (Cambridge University Press, 2017), 33-48.

"Just Revolution: Protestant Precedents for Resistance and Rebellion," co-authored with Glenn A. Moots, in Glenn A. Moots and Phillip Hamilton, eds., Justifying Revolution: Law, Virtue, and Violence in the American War of Independence (University of Oklahoma Press, 2018), 35-63.

“Protestant Christianity,” in Gregory M. Reichberg and Henrik Syse, eds., Religion, War and Ethics: A Sourcebook of Textual Traditions (Cambridge University Press, 2014), 235-299.

"Hindu Perspectives on Just War" in Howard Hensel, ed., The Prism of Just War: Asian and Western Perspectives on the Legitimate Use of Military Force (Ashgate Press, 2010), 169-194. 

"Shi'i Perspectives on Just War,"  in Howard Hensel, ed., The Prism of Just War: Asian and Western Perspectives on the Legitimate Use of Military Force (Ashgate Press, 2010), 145-168.

"Ethics of War in Protestant Christianity," in Greg Reichberg and Vesselin Popovski, eds., World Religions and Norms of War (United Nations University Press, 2009), 220-254.

"Just War: an ethic of restraint or the defense of order?" in Allan Eickelmann, Eric Nelson and Tom Lansford, eds., Justice and Violence: Political Violence, Pacifism and Cultural Transformation (Ashgate Press, 2005), 3-20.

Book Reviews

"Pursuing Moral Warfare: Ethics in American, British, and Israeli Counterinsurgency by Marcus Schulzke. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2019. (Review)," in Perspectives on Politics, 17(4), 1261-1262.

"Outsourcing War: The Just War Tradition in the Age of Military Privatization by Amy E. Eckert. Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2015. (Review)," Political Science Quarterly, 132(2), 2017, 272-275.

"Re-Thinking Legitimate Authority: Incorporating Non-State Actors into the Just War Framework,” Review of Ethics, Authority and War: Non-State Actors and the Just War Tradition, Eric A. Heinze and Brent J. Steele, eds., (New York, NY: Palgrave MacMillan, 2009), International Studies Review, 16(1), 2014, 158-160.

  • Research Fellow, Stockdale Center for Ethics and Leadership, United States Naval Academy 2010-2011
  • Visiting Assistant Professor, DePaul University, 2008-2010
  • Lecturer, Saint Xavier University, 2006-2008
  • International relations theory
  • Just War 
  • Ethics of Security, Cybersecurity, and Information Warfare
  • Religion and International Conflict
  • International Humanitarian Law