Dr David Bicknell

Dr David Bicknell is a Visiting Research Fellow at the School of Security Studies. He completed a PhD in the War Studies Department at King’s College, London in January 2021. Prior to that his professional background was as a partner at a leading City law firm in London specialising in international finance and he also served in the British Army. His first degree is a B.Sc (Econ) in International Relations from the London School of Economics. After his Army service he completed post-graduate legal training at Nottingham Law School and he returned to full-time education to complete an MA in War Studies at King’s in 2016.

Research Interests

• International law and war
• The law of armed conflict
• War crimes
• Human rights
• The character of war
• Legal history
• The practice of law.

Thesis

A penumbra of war: The use of lethal force in British military operations in internal armed conflicts.

Dr Bicknell's thesis used a multi-disciplinary approach encompassing international law, history and strategy to investigate the legal basis adopted by the British Army for the use of lethal force in internal armed conflicts from the Jamaica Rebellion in 1865 to the Iraq War, 2004-09.

Teaching

He has taught on the second-year BA module 5SSW2063 ‘International Law, Human Rights and Intervention’ for five years as well as the first year module 4SSW1001 ‘The Causes of War’. He also taught on the MA War Studies modules 7SSWN031 ‘International Peace and Security’ and 7SSWN086 ‘Dirty Wars’ as well as the War Studies Online MA module 7SSWN186 ‘International Law and the Use of Force’.

Selected Publications

• ‘Francis Lieber and the development of the Principle of Military Necessity (King’s College, London/BISA, January 2020)
• ‘Breathing life into international law: The European Court of Human Rights and the development of international human rights law’ (BISA/St Andrews, November 2019)
• ‘Rules of Engagement: The Hidden Link Between Modern Conflicts’ (BISA Annual Conference, Bath, June 2018)
• Book review: ‘Christine Chinkin & Mary Kaldor, International Law and New Wars (Cambridge University Press, 2017)’, Strife Journal, Issue 8 (February/ March 2018), pp. 77-80
• Strife blog articles: ‘Challenges to the Rule of Law in Times of Crisis: “Introduction” and “Prosecuting war crimes: Some thoughts for the new Prosecutor of the ICC”’, Strife blog (24 and 27 May 2021)