Dr Marieke Riethof

My modules introduce students to a variety of themes in Latin American politics, development and international relations as well as offering more specialised, research-led study of democratisation processes in the region. My particular interests lie in the interaction between international and national dimensions of political change in Latin America, using case studies on human rights, environmental change, democratisation and development.

I am a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and I was awarded the 2021 Learning, Teaching and Student Experience prize.

I welcome applications for PhD research in the following areas: foreign policy and international relations, human rights, transitional justice, environmental politics, social movements and transnational solidarity. I have supervised PhD projects on topics across Latin America but particularly welcome proposals focusing on Brazil and the Southern Cone.

We offer postgraduate funding for social-science projects in Latin America: for more information on applying for postgraduate funding (1+3), please check the ESRC NWDTP website.

Current PhD students:

• Erika Drummond, Maternal mortality, reproductive risk, and obstetric violence: the medicalisation of childbirth as oppression of the ‘otherised’ woman in Guatemala (ESRC-funded).
• John McEvoy (ESRC-funded)
• Jo Morley, Renewable energy projects and the trade-offs of sustainable development: A case study of hydroelectric projects and the contested politics of neo-extractivism in Ecuador (ESRC-funded).
• Naiara Unzurrunzaga (ESRC-funded)

Completed PhDs as first or second supervisor:
• Sheneez Amara, Citizenship in Rio de Janeiro’s favelas: A comparative study (ESRC-funded).
• Richard Smith, Opposing Pinochet: the nature of protest in Santiago de Chile in the early 1980s (ESRC-funded).
• Luke Grover, Youth mobilisation and empowerment in rural and urban El Salvador: A comparative study (ESRC-funded).
• Juliette Doman, Truthtelling and seeking justice from below: Mayan women’s voices on transitional justice in Guatemala (John Lennon Memorial scholarship).
• Ji-hyun Seo (2014) Neoliberal extractivism and rural resistance: The anti-mining movement in the Peruvian Northern Highlands, Cajamarca (2011-2013).
• Claire House (2013) Between visibility and the personal as political: Sexual politics and social movements in Brazil (ESRC-funded)
• Radek Poweska (2012) Indigenous movements and building the Plurinational State in the Bolivian Highlands: Organisation and identity in the trajectory of the CSUTCB and CONAMAQ (funded by the Lucy Newton Fund)
• Adam Gill (2012) State-managed participatory democracy in Venezuela: The case of the communal councils (ESRC-funded)
• Tori Holmes (2011) Local content and embeddedness on the internet: Following the texts and practices of bloggers from a Brazilian favela.
• Helen Porter (2011) The granddaughters of Sandino: Examining gender, sport and development in Leon, Nicaragua (ESRC-funded)
• Colin Campbell (2008) A social-constructivist analysis of civil-military relations: US-Mexican bilateral military relations, 2000-2008.