SCGA Team: Rebecca Sutton

Rebecca Sutton

Senior Lecturer in International Law at the University of Glasgow

Rebecca Sutton is a Senior Lecturer in International Law at the University of Glasgow, based in the School of Law. She holds a PhD in Law from the London School of Economics, a JD from the University of Toronto, and an MSc in Violence, Conflict and Development from SOAS, University of London. Before joining the University of Glasgow, Sutton held a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship at the University of Edinburgh, and post-doctoral fellowships at the University of Oxford/EUI and McGill University.

Her first book, The Humanitarian Civilian: How the Idea of Distinction Circulates Within and Beyond International Humanitarian Law, was published by Oxford University Press in 2021. Her scholarship, which focuses on ‘everyday’ international humanitarian law (IHL), law and emotions, IHL pedagogy, and civilian agency appears in peer-reviewed journals such as the Leiden Journal of International Law, African Affairs, Citizenship Studies, Criminal Law Quarterly, and Refuge. Sutton’s research has been supported by the Leverhulme Trust, the Pierre Elliot Trudeau Foundation, the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, amongst other funding bodies.  

Sutton’s scholarship is informed by her previous career in the humanitarian, human rights and community development sectors. She has previously worked in Darfur, Sudan; South Sudan; South Africa; Central African Republic; Ghana; and Northern India. She continues to interact with humanitarian and peacebuilding practitioners as a Trainer and Facilitator, and routinely engages in policy-oriented work. She is currently the Principal Investigator of an FCDO-funded Scoping Study on the relationship between IHL and humanitarian need in war.  

Building on her professional experience with War Child Canada and as a youth worker in Indigenous communities in Canada, Sutton also maintains an active interest in youth leadership and peacebuilding. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic she has worked closely with Rohingya youth living in Cox’s Bazar camps to support community-led research projects on peace, security, citizenship, and human rights. This engagement informs her ongoing scholarship on emotions, embodiment, and participatory action research with displaced youth.

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Publications

Sutton, R. (2021) The Humanitarian Civilian: How the Idea of Distinction Circulates Within and Beyond International Humanitarian Law. OUP: Oxford. ISBN: 9780198863816