Joseph Christian Agbagala

Joseph Christian Agbagala is a PhD candidate at the Center for Security Studies (CSS) at ETH Zurich. Joseph holds a Master’s degree in International Relations from the University of Amsterdam. His thesis examined how the decentralization process during China’s economic reforms in the 1980s enabled its provinces to operate within China’s foreign policymaking system. He received his Bachelor’s Degree in International Affairs with honors from the University of California, Riverside. During his undergraduate studies, he was a Communications Intern for the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington D.C. He also spent time as an undergraduate associate at the Queen Mary University of London.

Before joining the CSS PhD program, Joseph also worked at the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMFUS) as a Research Intern for the Asia Program.

His research focuses on military interoperability, military organization, international institutions, and alliance politics. Specifically, his main research interest is to examine the linkages between technical/hardware interoperability and alliance design and management.