Debora Valentina Malito is an Associate Professor of International Relations and Undergraduate Director of Studies in the School of Humanities and Social Science at Xi’an Jiaotong–Liverpool University.

She earned her PhD in Political Studies from the University of Milan and subsequently held research positions at the European University Institute and the University of Cape Town, before joining XJTLU in 2018.

Her research sits at the intersection of critical International Relations, global governance, peace and conflict studies.

She is the author of Destabilising Interventions in Somalia (Routledge, 2019) and co-editor of several volumes, including Decentring Global Challenges in International Relations (Routledge, 2025) and the Palgrave Handbook of Indicators in Global Governance (2018). Her current research focuses on global knowledge production, politics of intervention and infrastructures in world ordering.

She welcome PhD applications in the following areas:

• Peace and Conflict Studies, with a special focus on international interventions, sovereignty and recognition
• Africa-China relations, with a special focus on politics of infrastructures, China-US competition and Global South-South relations
• Global Governance and World Order Transformation and measurements

2025-ongoing, Undergraduate Director of Studies, HSS

2024-ongoing, Associate Professor, Dept of International Studies, XJTLU

2021-23, Programme Director, BA in International Relations

2021-22, Maternity leave

2018-23 Assistant Professor, Dept of International Studies, XJTLU

2015-2016, A.W. Mellon Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Humanities, University of Cape Town

2013-2016, Research Associate, Global Governance Programme, Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute

2009-11, Adjunct Lecturer, Dept of Economics, University of Brescia

World Order Transformations

Sovereignty and Intervention

International Relations Theory

International Interventions, Humanitarism, Responsibility to Protect

Global Governance

Critical security studies

Critical theory

Global South and China-Africa relations

Infrastructural geopolitics 

INS101  Contemporary International Relations

INS405 Critical Security Studies

INS402 Conflict and International Intervention

INR201 Managing the World: the role of International Institutions

INR107 International Politics of Development in Africa

Economic Theories of Globalisation