Overview
Oumar Ba is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Government. His primary areas of research focus on international law, historical and critical International Relations, violence, race, empire, humanity, and world order(s). He is the author of States of Justice: The Politics of the International Criminal Court (Cambridge, 2020). His second book project, currently in progress, is titled Against Humanity: Race, Empire, and the Liberal International Order. His writings have appeared or are forthcoming in International Studies Quarterly, International Studies Review, Global Studies Quarterly, Millennium, Journal of International Criminal Justice, Human Rights Quarterly, Journal of Human Rights, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, PS: Political Science & Politics, Journal of Narrative Politics, African Studies Review, Africa Today, Foreign Affairs, The New York Review of Books, and The Washington Post, among others. His analysis and opinions have been featured in many media outlets including Foreign Policy, the New York Times, Al Jazeera, Bloomberg, NPR, and BBC.
Research Focus
- International law
- Historical IR
- Critical IR
- Race
- Empire
- Humanity
- World Order(s)
Publications
Ba, Oumar (forthcoming). “Reconciliation and the Aporia of Transitional Justice.” International Studies Quarterly
Ba, Oumar. 2025. “International Criminal Justice: The Future Is the Past.” Journal of International Criminal Justice 23 (1), DOI: 10.1093/jicj/mqae053
Ba, Oumar. 2025. “Race and IR” in Cameron Thies (Ed.), Handbook of International Relations, Edward Elgar Publishing.
Ba, Oumar. 2025. “Justice” in Felix Brenskoetter (Ed.), Concepts in International Relations: A New Introduction, Sage Publishing
Ba, Oumar. 2024. “‘Better than Objectivity’: Critique as Method without The Fetishization of Measurement.” International Studies Review 26 (3): viae034_3
Ba, Oumar. 2023. “Exit from Nuremberg to The Hague: The Malabo Protocol and the Pan-African Road to Arusha.” Global Studies Quarterly 3 (3): 1-11
Ba, Oumar, K.Jo Bluen, and Owiso Owiso. 2023. “The Geopolitics of Race, Empire, and Expertise at the ICC.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of International Studies DOI: 10.1093/acrefore/9780190846626.013.717
Ba, Oumar. 2023. “Constructing an International Legal Order under The Shadow of Colonial Domination.” Journal of Human Rights, 22(1): 4-15
Ba, Oumar. 2022. “‘The Europeans and Americans Don’t Know Africa’: of Translation, Interpretation, and Extraction” Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 50(2): 548-560
Ba, Oumar. 2022. “Governing the Souls and Community: Why Do Islamists Destroy World Heritage Sites?” Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 35(1): 73-90
Ba, Oumar. 2021. “Race and Global Justice.” International Politics Reviews, 9: 375-389
Ba, Oumar. 2020. “Contested Meanings: Timbuktu and the Prosecution of Destruction of Cultural Heritage as War Crimes.” African Studies Review, 63(4): 743-762
Ba, Oumar. 2020. States of Justice: The Politics of the International Criminal Court. Cambridge University Press
In the news
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- Student spotlight: Danielle Obisie-Orlu
- Cornell Center for Social Sciences names spring grantees
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- Einaudi awards fund global research and activities
- U.S. can accuse Russia of war crimes, but prosecution will be elusive
- Calling Ukrainian refugees more ‘civilized’ than Syrians requires willful amnesia
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- Putin unlikely to face ICC for war crimes in Ukraine
- Einaudi Center announces new Global Public Voices fellows
- Mass atrocities in Ethiopia could get worse as federal state loses ground
