Experts

Emerging Scholar

Nicolas-François Perron

Emerging Scholar
Nicolas-François Perron is a doctoral student at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM). He is interested in decision-making in the context of foreign and security policies. His research focuses on issues related to norms, beliefs, and practices in international security. His thesis project examines the constraints on the emergence of strategic counter-cultures through an analysis of cases in Canada, Italy, and Germany. He holds a master's degree in international relations from Université Laval and an additional dual-degree master's in international law and transatlantic relations from the University of Bordeaux. His professional experiences have led him to work on nuclear…

Frédéric Pesme

Collaborator
Brigadier General Pesme (Rted) is a French combat engineer officer, who specialized during the first part of his career in underwater reconnaissance and river-crossing operations (1987-1995). He then developed an expertise in European defense issues and the transatlantic relationship through various assignments: in France, at the Joint Staff (2003-2006 and 2015-2018) and the Delegation for Strategic Affairs, where he was head of the North America desk (2008-2011); at NATO, first at Allied Command Transformation in Norfolk as Executive Assistant to the Supreme Allied Commander Transformation (2013-2015) and then at the NATO’s International Military Staff in Brussels, where he was Deputy…

Falk Petegou

Emerging Scholar
Falk Petegou is a post-doctoral fellow at the Chair in International Francophonie Research on Political Aspirations and Movements in Francophone Africa at the University of Ottawa. He was a lecturer at the Université Protestante d'Afrique Centrale, where he taught the following courses, among others: Conflict theory and typology, Peace building approaches, Identities and conflicts in Africa, Conflict resolution practice. He has also provided consultancy services to a number of institutions, including UNICEF, the Service Civil pour la Paix and was a visiting researcher at the Frankfurt Institute for Peace Research in Germany (HSFK) between 2014 and 2015. His work focuses…
Maxime Philaire

Maxime Philaire

Emerging Scholar
Maxime Philaire is a PhD student in International Studies at Laval University's École supérieure d'études internationales under the supervision of Prof. Anessa Kimball, after completing a master's degree in political science at Laval University with a thesis on strengthening the legitimacy of the Russian Federation regime through the construction of national identity. Prior to this, he obtained a Bachelor's degree in International Relations at ILERI Paris, with a semester at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO). Parallel to his studies, he is an administrative assistant at ESEI's Centre for International Security and has been President of the NATO…

Pauline Pic

Emerging Scholar
Pauline Pic graduated from her PhD in Geography in the spring of 2022. In October 2022, she started a postdoctoral fellowship at the Graduate School of International Studies, Université Laval. She is collaborating with Jean-Frédéric Morin’s research chair and is interested in the political processes at work in the global commons. More specifically, her project aims to examine the power dynamics at work in the governance of shared spaces, particularly the central Arctic Ocean and outer space. Her doctoral research, directed by Frédéric Lasserre and Stéphane Roussel, focused on the scales of security in the Arctic. It was rewarded by…

Joël Plouffe

Collaborator
Joël Plouffe is advisor for the Arctic Council Secretariat. He is also a researcher at CIRRICQ (Center for Interuniversity Research on the International Relations of Canada and Québec) at the École nationale d’administration publique (ENAP) in Montréal, managing editor of the Arctic Yearbook. His research interests include security and defense, geopolitics of the Arctic, regions of the circumpolar North, Northern Québec, and U.S.-Canada relations and foreign policy. Mr Plouffe has conducted research in the Arctic regions of Russia, the US (Alaska), Norway (Svalbard and mainland), Finland, Sweden and Canada (Nunavik, Northwest Territories). He is a Fellow of The Canadian Global…

Maria Popova

Researcher
Maria Popova is an Associate Professor of Political Science at McGill University, the Scientific Co-Director of the Jean Monnet Center Montreal and Editor of the Cambridge Elements Series on Politics and Society from Central Europe to Central Asia. She held the Jean Monnet Chair “Europe and the Rule of Law” in 2017-2021. Her work focuses on rule of law and democracy in Europe. Her award-winning book Politicized Justice in Emerging Democracies (Cambridge UP, 2012) examines the weaponization of law to manipulate elections and control the media and the obstacles to judicial independence in Russia and Ukraine in the late-1990s-early 2000s.…

Mark Purdon

Researcher
Mark Purdon is an expert in the emerging field of comparative climate change politics, which combines elements of comparative politics, comparative public policy and international relations. He is particularly interested in the relationship between decarbonization and political economy, and has extensive research experience in both developing and developed countries in areas of climate finance, renewable energy, transportation, forestry and land-use. His goal is to develop a bottom-up understanding of global climate change politics through rich and contextualized comparative research, as well as to rethink international relations theory in order to better inform domestic politics and public policy. Mark earned a…

Maud Quessard

Collaborator
Maud Quessard is a senior lecturer on North American civilization, a graduate from Sciences Po, and an American foreign policy specialist. She is currently teaching at Université Paris 2-Panthéon Assas and taught until 2017 at the University of Poitiers and at the Institute for Political Studies (IEP) of Bordeaux. Maud is Senior Research Fellow and Director of the Euratlantic Area at the Institute for Strategic Research at the Military School. Her research focuses on public diplomacy, American soft power, information warfare and influence strategies. She was a beneficiary of the research support program of the IHEDN, and a visiting fellow…
Matthew Rainsford

Matthew Rainsford

Student Collaborators
Matthew Rainsford is a fifth year undergraduate student at Bishop’s University, pursuing an honours in Political Studies and a major in International Relations. Matthew was a part of the 2020 Model United Nations Delegation and represented Bishop’s University at the Political Science Games for the first through third years of his studies. Matthew runs the Bishop’s University Debate society, while also being the director of human resources at Bishop’s university’s entrepreneurship club; Enactus. In the fourth year of his studies, Matthew was hired to be a coordinator for the fourth edition of the Quebec Undergraduate Security Conference under the supervision…