Dr. Philipp Lottholz

Currently only by appointment via email.

Since 02/2022
Post-Doctoral Fellow, DFG Collaborative Research Centre (SFB/TRR 138) "Dynamics of Security", Subproject B05 — Securitization and Desecuritization in International Trusteeship Administrations

Since 04/2019- 12/2021
Post-Doctoral Fellow, DFG Collaborative Research Centre (SFB/TRR 138) "Dynamics of Security", Subproject C05 — Political Security and Economized Infrastructures

10/2018-03/2019
Visiting Fellowship, DFG Collaborative Research Centre (SFB/TRR 138) "Dynamics of Security"

01-09/2018
Post-Doctoral Research Assistant, UN and Global Order Programme, University of Reading

05-07/2016
Research Associate, International Development Department, University of Birmingham

10/2014-04/2016
Graduate Teaching Assistant, Department of Political Science and International Studies (POLSIS), University of Birmingham
Research Assistant, International Development Department, University of Birmingham

10/2013-05/2018
Doctoral Studies, International Development Department, University of Birmingham

06-12/2015
Visitig Fellow, Central Asian Studies Institute, American University of Central Asia, Bishkek (Kyrgyz Republic)

2010 - 2013
Intern, Speaker and Consultant, NGO ‘Citizens of Europe’ (Bürger Europas e.V.), Berlin

2011 - 2012
Master of Science in International Development (International Political Economy Pathway), International Development Department, University of Birmingham

2007 - 2011
Bachelor of Science in International Economics (Major in East European Studies), School of Business and Economics, University of Tübingen

Peace, conflict and security studies 

Statebuilding and intervention

Central Asian studies

Post-Soviet and post-Socialist studies

Cooperative, practice-based and ethnographic methodology

Researcher and research participant safety

Post- and decolonial international studies 

Edited Works

Dwyer, A., Langenohl, A., Lottholz, P. (eds.) (2023) Special Issue: Topologies of Security: Inquiring (In-)Security Across Postcolonial and Postsocialist Scenes, Critical Studies on Security, 11(1), https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rcss20/11/1

Lottholz, P., Bonacker, T. (2022) The Politics of Security, Stability and Ordering in (Post-) Imperial Central Asia, Europe-Asia Studies, 74(2). https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/ceas20/74/2

Manolova, P., Kušić, K., Lottholz, P. (eds.) (2019) Decolonial Theory & Practice in Southeast Europe, edited with Polina Manolova and Katarina Kušić, dVERSIA, 3.19: 1-124, https://dversia.net/4644/dversia-decolonial-theory-practice-southeast-europe/

Ismailbekova, A., Lottholz, P. (trans. & eds.) (2020) Collective Discussion: The Conflict in South Kyrgyzstan Ten Years On/Конфликт на юге Кыргызстана десять лет спустя, Central Asia Program Paper Series, Washington, DC: George Washington University, https://www.centralasiaprogram.org/archives/16380

Peer-reviewed articles

Lottholz, P. (2023) Author Reply: Engaging with Non-Political Lifeworlds, Dialogical Research and Decolonial Horizons through Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia, in Devereux, L. (ed.) Symposium on Philipp Lottholz’s Post-Liberal Statebuilding in Central Asia: Imaginaries, Discourses and Practices of Social Ordering, Central Asian Survey, 42(4): 736-739. https://doi.org/10.1080/02634937.2023.2271947 

Dwyer, A., Langenohl, A., Lottholz, P. (2023) Special Issue Introduction: Thinking Security further through Topologies and Scenes, Critical Studies on Security, 11(1): 1-13, doi.org/10.1080/21624887.2023.2208942 

Lottholz, P., Manolova, P. (2022) The Politics of Urban Under-Development in Kyrgyzstan and Bulgaria: Community-Level Self-Organisation in the Absence of Infrastructures and Services, Connections. A Journal for Historians and Area Specialists, https://www.connections.clio-online.net/article/id/fda-133276

Bonacker, T., Lottholz, P. (2022) ‘The Post-Imperial Politics of Security and Depoliticisation: Comparing Discourses and Practices of Ordering across Central Asia’, Europe-Asia Studies, https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2021.2020217

Bonacker, T., Lottholz, P (2022) Understanding Post-Imperial Politics of Security, Stability and Ordering in Central Asia: An Introduction, Europe-Asia Studies, 74(2): 179-193, https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2021.2020492 

Kluczewska, K., Lottholz, P. (2021) Recognizing the Never Quite Absent: De-Facto Usage, Ethics and Applications of Covert Research, Qualitative Research, 23 (2): 417-433, https://doi.org/10.1177/14687941211033084 

Manolova, P., Lottholz, P.  (2021) Security above the Law? Germany’s Bordering Practices and Freedom of Movement in Times of Covid-19, Movements: Journal of Critical Migration and Border Regime Studies, 6(1): 137-150, https://movements-journal.org/issues/09.open-call/08.manolova,lottholz--security-above-the-law.html

Lottholz, P., Sheranova, A. (2021) Governing, but not Producing Security? Internationalised Community Security Practices in Kyrgyzstan, International Quarterly of Asian Studies, 52 (1-2): 55-77, https://doi.org/10.11588/iqas.2021.1-2.14476

Lottholz, P. (2021) The Roles and Practices of Civil Society Actors in Police Reform in Kyrgyzstan: Activism, Expertise, Knowledge Production, International Peacekeeping, 28(1): 52-83, https://doi.org/10.1080/13533312.2020.1792296

Lottholz, P., Heathershaw, J., Ismailbekova, A., Moldalieva, J., McGlinchey, E., Owen, C. (2020) Round-Table Discussion: Governance and Order-Making in Central Asia: From Illiberalism to Post-Liberalism?, Central Asian Survey, 49(3): 420-437, https://doi.org/10.1080/02634937.2020.1803794  

Lottholz, P. (2018) Old Slogans Ringing Hollow? The Legacy of Social Engineering, Statebuilding and the ‘Dilemma of Difference’ in (Post-) Soviet Kyrgyzstan, Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding, 12(3): 405-424, https://doi.org/10.1080/17502977.2018.1507869

Bekmurzaev, N., Lottholz, P., Meyer, J.  (2018) Navigating the Safety Implications of Doing Research and Being Researched in Kyrgyzstan: Cooperation, Networks and Framing, Central Asian Survey, 37(1): 100-118, https://doi.org/10.1080/02634937.2017.1419165

Lottholz, P. (2018) Critiquing anthropological imagination in peace and conflict studies: From empiricist positivism to a dialogical approach in ethnographic peace research, International Peacekeeping, 25(5): 695-720,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13533312.2017.1350576

Lottholz, P. (2017) Negotiating Unfreedom: An (Auto-) Ethnography of Life at the Forefront of Academic Knowledge Production, Inter-disciplinary Political Studies, 3(1): 77-101, http://dx.doi.org/10.1285/i20398573v3n1p77

Lottholz, P., Lemay-Hébert, N. (2016) Re-reading Weber, Reconceptualising Statebuilding: From Neo-Weberian to Post-Weberian Approaches to State, Legitimacy and Statebuilding, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 29(4): 1467-1485, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09557571.2016.1230588

Chapters in edited volumes

Lottholz, P., Manolova, M. (2023) No Escape from Coloniality? A Comparison of Political and Moral Orientations in the Former Soviet Periphery, in Petkovska, Sanja (ed.): Decolonial Politics in European Peripheries: Redefining Progressiveness, Coloniality and Transition Efforts, London: Routledge, 257-276.

Lottholz, P. (2021) Towards a Post-Liberal Approach to Political Ordering, in Uitz, Renata, Holmes, Stephen and Andras Sajo (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Illiberalism, London: Routledge, 582-595.

Lottholz, P. (2020) More than a Matter of Proportion: A Critical Consideration of Anthropology’s Role in Peace and Conflict Studies’, in Heffernan, Emma, Fiona Murphy and Jonathan Skinner (eds.) Collaborations: Anthropology in a Neoliberal Age, London: Routledge, 231-250.

Lottholz, P. (2019) Decolonial “Interventions”? Potentials and Challenges of Decolonial Perspectives, in Nicolas Lemay-Hébert (ed.) Handbook on Intervention and Statebuilding, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 82-92.

Bliesemann de Guevara, B., Lottholz, P. (2019) The Oxford Bibliography of State Formation, 2nd edition, Oxford Bibliographies

Lottholz, P. (2018) A Negative Post-Liberal Peace? Inquiring the Embeddedness of Everyday Forms of Peace in Central Asia, in Owen, Catherine, Shairbek Juraev, David Lewis, Nick Megoran and John Heathershaw (eds.) Interrogating Illiberal Peace in Eurasia – Critical Perspectives on Peace and Conflict, New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 97-119

Lottholz, P. (2017) Nothing More than a Conceptual Lens? Situating Hybridity in Social Inquiry’, in Lemay-Hébert, Nicolas and Rosa Freedman (eds.) Hybridity: Law, Culture and Development, London: Routledge, 17-36

Freedman, R., Lottholz, P. (2017) Peace as a Hybrid Human Right: A New Way to Realise Human Rights, or Entrenching their Systematic Failure? in Lemay-Hébert, Nicolas and Rosa Freedman (eds.) Hybridity: Law, Culture and Development, London: Routledge, 37-57.

Book reviews

Lottholz, P., Manolova, P. (2020) Informal Nationalism after Communism: The Everyday Construction of Post-Socialist Identities, Anthropology of East Europe Review, 37(1): 75-78.

Lottholz, P. (2018) Blood Ties and the Native Son: Poetics of Patronage in Kyrgyzstan. Central Asian Survey, 38(2): 300-302, https://doi.org/10.1080/02634937.2018.1519344

Lottholz, P. (2017) Review Essay: Critical Peace Research and the Limits of Language and Practicability: New Approaches, Old Problems?, Peacebuilding, 6(1): 80-85, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21647259.2017.1368160

Lottholz, P. (2016) Review Essay: Exploring the Boundaries of Knowledge via Hybridity, Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding, 10(1): 136-142, https://doi.org/10.1080/17502977.2015.1095204

Reports, working papers and consultancy outputs

Alimzhanov, S., Lottholz, P., Ryskulbekova, Ch., Turdubaeva, E. (2021) Good Practices and Lessons Learnt in Building Resilient Communities in Kyrgyzstan/Лучшие практики и извлеченные уроки по повышению устойчивости сообществж, UNFPA Kyrgyzstan, https://kyrgyzstan.un.org/en/110959-good-practices-and-lessons-learnt-building-resilient-communities-kyrgyzstan  

Lottholz, P. (2020) Активисты, эксперты, производители знаний: Роли и практики деятелей гражданского общества в реформировании милиции в Кыргызстане [Activists, Experts, Knowledge Producers: Role and Practices of Civil Society Actors in Police Reform in Kyrgyzstan], Central Asia Program Paper No 230, Washington, DC: George Washington University.  

Papieva, S., Lottholz, P. (2019) Engaging Women Religious Leaders in PVE Work in Kyrgyzstan. Reflections and Good Practices, UNFPA Eastern Europe & Central Asia

Lottholz, P., von Billerbeck, S. (2019) Senior Leadership Performance Management in International Organizations, Final Report, UN and Global Order Programme, University of Reading, https://research.reading.ac.uk/ungop/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2019/04/UNGOP-IO-Senior-Leadership-Performance-Management-Final-Report.pdf

Event reports

Lottholz, P. (2020) Workshop Summary: “Topologies of security: Critical security studies in postcolonial and postsocialist scenes”, https://www.sfb138.de/images/sfb138/Dateien/Veranstaltungen/TopoSummary.pdf

Lottholz, P. (2019) Workshop Summary: “Peace, order and securitisation in post-imperial Central Asia”, SFB/Transregio 138 “Dynamics of Security” https://www.sfb138.de/en/home-en/news/wrap-up-from-the-workshop-b05

Kušić, K., Lottholz, P., Manolova, P. ,Karkov, N. (2017) Workshop Report: Dialoguing ‘Between the Posts’, Developing Critiques of Coloniality, Modernity and Neoliberal Capitalism in (and beyond) South-Eastern Europe, Dialoguing Between the Posts Website

Lottholz, P. (2017) Workshop Summary: Peace Research and (De)Coloniality, Vienna, December 2016, Peace Studies Journal, 10(3): 105-108.

Krohn, J., Lottholz, P. (2023) Friedensforschung: Wie weiter in Zeiten der Konfrontation und Neuaufrüstung? [Peace Research: How to Move on in Times of Confrontation and Renewed Proliferation?], CPD Policy Blog, Conflict, Peace and Democracy Cluster (CPDC), University of Graz, https://policyblog.empowermentforpeace.org/2023/06/friedensforschung-wie-weiter-in-zeiten-der-konfrontation-und-neuaufrustung/

Lottholz, P. (2022) Agora Interview: ‘Philipp Lottholz on Post-Liberalism in Central Asia’, Illiberalism Studies Program (George Washington Universität, Washington D.C.), https://www.illiberalism.org/philipp-lottholz-on-post-liberalism-in-central-asia/

Lottholz, P. (2022) Podcast Interview: ‘Dr. Philipp Lottholz - Postliberale Staatenbildung [Postliberal Statebuilding]’, Varna Institute for Peace Research, https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=FL2VnGR_Lj8

Lottholz, P. (2021) Social Mobilisation in the Absence of Infrastructures and Services in Urban Margins: Toward “Societal Infrastructures”, Voices on Central Asia, available in Russian as: ‘Общественные инфраструктуры» как новый феномен в маргинальных кварталах. Опыт и сравнение двух городов’, Central Asia Analytical Network

Lottholz, P. (2020) Reclaiming Security: Civil Society Activism, Expertise, and Knowledge Production in Police Reform, Security Praxis;  available in Russian as: Какую роль играет гражданское общество в реформе милиции в Кыргызстане: Активисты, эксперты, производители знаний, Central Asia Analytical Network

Lottholz, P. (2019) Towards a Post-Liberal Research Agenda in Eurasia, openDemocracy Russia

Lottholz, P. (2019) Safer and Fairer: The Value of Cooperative Approaches to Fieldwork, The CESS Blog

Lottholz, P. (2018) Building secure communities in a post-liberal age: A view from Kyrgyzstan, Voices on Central Asia

Manolova, P., Lottholz, P.  (2018) Solidarity Undone: The Left-Green Protest that didn't Happen in Bulgaria, LeftEast

Lottholz, P. (2018) Researcher Safety in Peace, Conflict and Security Studies in Central Asia and Beyond: Making Sense and Findings New Ways Forward, Security Praxis

Lottholz, P., Kluczewska, K. (2017) Ever Wondered Why Practitioners Treat Researchers like a Nuisance? The Challenges of Accessing Expert Knowledge, from Two Perspectives, LSE Field Research Method Lab and LSE Impact Blog

Lottholz, P., Marschall, T. (2017) Knowledge Transfer, Inspiration, (Over-) Reflection: A Discussion of Potentials and Limits of Cooperative Research, The CESS Blog

Lottholz, P. (2017) Cultural Undercurrents in the Post-Soviet Space: Oral Histories as a Way beyond the Facade of High Politics, Public Discourse and Popular Protests, Wilson Center, 
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/cultural-undercurrents-the-post-soviet-space,
available in Russian as ‘Понять постсоветского человека’, День Київ, https://day.kyiv.ua/ru/article/top-net/ponyat-postsovetskogo-cheloveka

Lottholz, P., Meyer, J. (2016) ‘Friend’ or ‘Foreign Agent’? On the Limits of Field Research in Post-Soviet Kyrgyzstan, Exeter Central Asian Studies Network,
https://www.academia.edu/33980022/Friend_or_foreign_agent_On_the_limits_of_field_research_in_post_Soviet_Kyrgyzstan

Lottholz, P. (2016) Polizeireform in Kirgistan: Mechanismen der Gemeindesicherheit als Schritt zum fundamentalen Wandel?, Zentralasien-Analysen, No. 99, reprinted as ‘Police Reform in Kyrgyzstan: Introducing Community Security Mechanisms to Deliver Fundamental Change?’, Central Asia Policy Review, 2(3): 21-27