Early Career Small Research Grants

If you’re a UK-based member in your early career, this research funding might be for you. We launched the Early Career Small Research Grants (ECSRG) in 2015 in celebration of our 40th anniversary, and provide up to £3,000 per grant. In any one year we give a maximum of three grants.

For the ECSRG, early career means five years maximum between the date showing on your PhD certificate and the application deadline. Your proposed research must be in International Studies or a related sub-field. In addition we expect your research to be complete in a maximum time span of one year.

Please note the following rules on eligible costs. The funds can be used for travel and fieldwork expenses, access to archives, research training, transcription, short-term research assistance, and translation. The funds CANNOT be used to buy out individual staff time or to cover any overheads.

Applications are open! The deadline is Friday 25 November at 5pm (UK time).

Please download and complete the application form below. Send your completed application to office@bisa.ac.uk by 5pm (UK time) on Friday 25 November. Your application will be considered by our Executive Committee at its meeting in mid-December. Notification of outcomes will be sent out in January.

Following the conclusion of your award we ask you to submit a report to us, as well as to write an article for our website. More details will be provided with your grant notification. 

If you have any questions please contact our office: office@bisa.ac.uk

Past recipients

2022

• Dr Tarela Juliet Ike (Teeside University) Trauma-informed Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (TiCBT) to aid reintegration of repentant terrorists and their families in Nigeria: A pilot study
• Dr Anna Meier (University of Nottingham) The Idea of Terror: White Supremacist Violence and the Making of Counterterrorism

2021

• No awards due to COVID-19

2020

• Dr Joshua Baker (University of Leicester) Empathic diplomacy in the making of the Iran nuclear deal
• Dr Gemma Bird (University of Liverpool) Failures of the international order: experiences of displacement and their challenge to the nation state
• Dr Hannah Partis-Jennings (Loughborough University) Ireland’s ‘Repeal’ Campaign: Feminist Imaginaries, Solidarities and Change

2019

• Dr Nicholas Bernards (University of Warwick) The Colonial Origins of Policy Failures in Global Development Governance
• Dr Laura Mills (Currently on maternity leave) The Art of War
• Dr Aisling O'Loghlen (Northumbria University) Integration and instability: the displaced refugees of Mwanza

2018

• Dr Gillian McFadyen (Aberystwyth University) This research project focuses on Refugees in Britain: Practices of Hospitality and Labelling.
• Dr Katharine Wright (Newcastle University) This research project explores Civil society perceptions of NATO: What place for Women, Peace and Security?

2017

• Dr Julia Schmidt (University of Exeter) This research project explores Regional Organisations and the Responsibility to Protect: The Case of the European Union
• Dr Hannes Hansen-Magnusson (Cardiff University) This research project focuses on Discovering Common Ground in International Forums (DISCOINFORM)
• Dr Holly Eva Ryan (Manchester Metropolitan University) This research project examines The Art of International Friendship

2016

• Dr Richard Johnson (University of Strathclyde) This research seeks to investigate arms transfer policies of the United Kingdom and, in turn, compare policy versus practice in arms transfers occurring since the end of World War II.
• Dr Edward Wastnidge (Open University) For the purposes of this pilot study, the question will be how are instruments managed by the Iranian state used to channel its influence among the global Shi’i community?