Justine Taylor Robinson

Justine Robinson is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Political Science at Duke University, specializing in civil-military relations and security, peace, and conflict. Their research interests include military culture and professionalism, conflict resolution, humanitarian intervention, and U.S. foreign policy and grand strategy. Their dissertation, “Breaking the Rules of Engagement: Social Norms Violations in the U.S. Military,” examines how U.S. military members and veterans evaluate and judge social norms violations by fellow servicemembers and what those judgments reveal about the tension between military professionalism and tribalism. Their first paper uses a pre-registered survey experiment with military members and veterans and finds that respondents consistently separate their moral judgment of misconduct from their personal feelings toward the perpetrator, a person-act dissociation that suggests military professionalism produces deeply internalized ethical frameworks. Justine grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and has also lived in Pennsylvania and Maryland. They earned a B.A. in Political Science from Bryn Mawr College in 2017, worked in the Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion department at the National Audubon Society’s Washington, D.C., office, and earned an M.A. in Conflict Resolution from Georgetown University in 2020. At Duke, they have served as a graduate fellow with the Program in American Grand Strategy, participating in international staff rides to Italy, Japan, and France. In their free time, they enjoy birding, watching “Oscar bait” films, and cheering for their Michigan sports teams.