Kyle Reed is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science at the University of Amsterdam and an Affiliated Lecturer at Amsterdam University College. He is affiliated with the Transnational Configurations, Conflict and Governance group of the Amsterdam Institute for Social Science Research. He holds a PhD (2022) and MA (2019) in Political Science and International Relations from the University of Southern California (USA) and an MSc (2016) in Human Rights from University College Dublin (Ireland). Previously, he was a Research Fellow at the Berlin-Potsdam Research Group “The International Rule of Law - Rise or Decline?” He has also taught at Arizona State University and Pepperdine University.

His research and teaching focuses on:

1. The strategic uses of law and legal rhetoric in international politics, including in international organizations and foreign policy;
2. Processes of norm contestation, in relation to legal and non-legal norms, and the connection to ontological security
3. The choreographies and visual politics of international organizations and international order
4. Multimethod approaches to studying international law and organizations

Research methods

• Archival analysis
• Interviews and field observation
• Quantitative Analysis
• Computational Text Analysis

Current research projects

• “By Word, Not Deed: Rhetoric and the Construction of Compliance in International Law” – exploring how state and non-state actors construct the meaning of compliance in international law through the acceptance, rejection, and contestation of rhetorical claims
• “Choreographing Global Politics: Practices, Performances and Staging in International Organizations” – theorizing and examining the role and effect of choreographed practices in the politics of international organizations
• “Domestic and International Support for the International Criminal Court (with M.P. Broache, University of North Carolina – Greensboro)” – examining domestic US political support for policies hostile to the International Criminal Court and factors shaping international support for the ICC in return
• “Memory Politics in International Organizations (with Cornelia Baciu,  Saarland University) – examining international organizations as sites of memory-making and contestation and the effects of these processes on shared identities and norms

Research grants & honours

AISSR Impulse Grant (2026-2028):  Choreographing International Organizations

BA:

• Law and Politics
• Beyond the Headlines (US Politics)
• International Organizations and Global Politics
• The Strategic Uses of International Law (BA Researhc Project)
• The International (dis)Order: Past and Present (Amsterdam University College)

MA:

• Politics and Practices of International Law
• The Politics of International Law (MA Research Project)