Liana Minkova
BA (KCL), MPhil (Cantab), PhD (Cantab)
College roles
Postdoctoral Affiliate
Director of Studies in History & Politics and HSPS (Politics) (Lent Term 2025)
Biography
Dr Liana Minkova is a Teaching Associate at the Department of POLIS, a fellow at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law, and a former Junior Research Fellow in Law at Newnham College. She holds a PhD in Politics and International Studies from the University of Cambridge. Her PhD research project received a full funding award from the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s Doctoral Training Partnership programme. She previously completed an MPhil in International Relations at the University of Cambridge and a BA in international politics at King’s College London. Liana has worked as a research assistant at the University of Cambridge and at King’s College London and delivered lectures on international law and international relations at Sofia University ‘St. Kliment Ohridski’ and the American University in Bulgaria.
Research Interests
Liana’s research explores accountability mechanisms in global environmental governance, including state responsibility, civil liability, and the proposed criminalisation of ecocide under international criminal law. Specifically, her research looks at the exchange of ideas between legal experts in the process of constructing narratives around accountability mechanisms and the purposes they serve in preventing and compensating environmental harm. Liana has also conducted research on the concept of individual criminal responsibility in international law, the boundaries of ‘culpability’ for mass atrocities, and the practices associated with the assessment of guilt and innocence at international courts and tribunals. Her book Responsibility on Trial: Liability Standards in International Law was published with Cambridge University Press in 2023.