Marika Sosnowski is an Australian-qualified lawyer, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Melbourne Law School and a Research Associate at the German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA) in Hamburg. Her works sits at the intersection of socio-political-legal anthropology. Her primary research interests are in the fields of critical security studies (mainly ceasefires), local/rebel governance and legal systems (particularly issues around citizenship and belonging) with a geographical focus on Syria.
From June 2023 until May 2026 she is based in the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness at Melbourne Law School working on a postdoctoral project which examines the legal after-life of war and revolution. The project aims to better understand how people internalise and experience the law at an everyday level after mass violence or world-shaping events.
Marika’s academic work has been published in Citizenship Studies, International Studies Quarterly, the Leiden Journal of International Law and Civil Wars among others. Her first book Redefining Ceasefires: Wartime Order and Statebuilding in Syria came out in June 2023 with Cambridge University Press. She has also published a range of more public-facing work including for Middle East Eye, the New Humanitarian, the Lieber Institute West Point, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, The Atlantic Council and the Washington Institute.
Memberships and affiliations
Research Associate, GIGA Hamburg
International Studies Association member
Law and Society Association member
Conflict Research Society member
Australian Political Studies Association member