Dr. Edward Stoddard is an Associate Professor in International Security at the University of Portsmouth, specialising in regional security, armed conflict, and non-state actors.

Room: The Lens Studio, 10:40

Keynote

“The Coming (actually already here) Challenge of AI”

This talk explores the transformative but challenging potential of new generative AI tools like ChatGPT, emphasising their potential impact on productivity, creativity, and skill development. Dr. Stoddard will discuss the current “AI moment” and how these technologies are reshaping the (academic) workplace, urging both caution and proactive engagement. The talk discusses different strategies for integrating AI into workflows—and offers practical advice on how to think about leveraging these tools, ethically, for academic tasks.

Dr. Edward Stoddard holds a PhD in International Relations from Portsmouth, funded by the ESRC, and was a Postdoc Fellow at the Freie Universitat in Berlin and a Marie Curie Fellow at Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, where he researched the evolving character of warfare. He is a Visiting Professor at the College of Europe (Warsaw), a Fellow of the Society for Peace Studies and Practice, Nigeria, a member of the University of Lancaster’s Centre for War and Diplomacy and an Affiliated Member of the Emerging Research in International Security Group at Sant’Anna. His interdisciplinary work has explored security challenges across West Africa, the Levant, the Gulf, and the former Soviet Union, including most recently a comparative British Academy-funded project on armed conflicts in the Sahel and Lake Chad regions. Dr. Stoddard is currently exploring research looking to integrate machine learning and geospatial data science with qualitative conflict analysis to understand conflict expansion dynamics in order to mitigate humanitarian challenges in West African armed conflicts.

Room: The Lens Studio, 16:00

Summary

Prof. Athina Vlachantoni

As the Director of the SCDTP, Professor of Gerontology and Social Policy in the Department of Gerontology at the University of Southampton, Athina is also a member of the Centre for Research on Ageing and the ESRC Centre for Population Change. Her research interests are at the interface of ageing over the life-course and social policy. Her recent research projects have focused on informal care provision across the life-course in the UK, Europe and China; pension protection among minority ethnic groups in the UK; and long-term care provision in India, China, the UK and sub-Saharan Africa.

“The SCDTP Final Year conference is here! We are excited to hear about all finalists’ research,
make new friendships and solidify existing ones. Thank you to the fantastic organising committee
and the SCDTP office for all your hard work, and to all colleagues across the four Universities for supervising our students. Have an inspiring day!” – Athina