Biography
Before coming to the EUI, Max Lesch was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF). He obtained his PhD in Political Science from Goethe University Frankfurt in 2020. Before joining PRIF in 2022, he held positions at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law and at the Zeppelin University Friedrichshafen. During his PhD, he was a visiting researcher in the International Relations Group at the University of Copenhagen.
Max’s research interests include international norm dynamics, the politics of international law, and international practice theories, with a focus on contestation, enforcement, and lawmaking in the fields of human rights and peace and security law. His research has been published in International Studies Quarterly, International Studies Review, International Relations, Global Constitutionalism, Heidelberg Journal of International Law, and Global Studies Quarterly, among others. He is a co-author of the monograph International Norm Disputes: The Link Between Contestation and Norm Robustness, published with Oxford University Press in 2023. He teaches international relations theory, peace and conflict studies, international organisations, human rights, and international law.
At the European University Institute, Max will work on his book manuscript entitled ‘Norms and Deviance in World Politics: International Institutions and the Prohibition of Torture’ and continue his research projects on legal struggles over the right to self-defence against non-state actors, and the politics and practice of international fact-finding missions.