Dr. Erika Simpson, Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada specializes in International Relations/International Security and Canadian foreign/defence policy.
She has written extensively on nuclear issues—mainly nuclear proliferation and disarmament—and contemporary Canadian defence and foreign policy issues. Her first book, NATO and the Bomb was published by McGill-Queen’s University Press in 2001 and reissued in paperback. Her current book project is entitled Nuclear Insecurity and focuses on the problems with nuclear proliferation and nuclear deterrence.
Her PhD was earned in 1995 from the University of Toronto and her post-doc and first teaching position was at Carleton University in Ottawa. She has been a visiting ‘Fellow’ at the Liu Institute for the Study of Global Issues at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver; an Alton Jones ‘Fellow’ in New York City; a Canadian Institute for International Peace and Security (CIIPS) Senior Barton ‘Fellow’; a Canadian Department of National Defence (DND) Security and Defence Forum (SDF) scholar; and a NATO ‘Fellow’.
A frequent commentator on television and radio, she has published many editorials in European and Canadian newspapers, such as Metro Europe, Embassy, The Hill Times, the Globe and Mail, and the London Free Press. Her consulting company, Common Security Consultants, has produced a variety of commissioned reports and analyses, including the original proposals to establish Canada’s Lester B. Pearson Canadian International Peacekeeping Training Centre at CFB Cornwallis in Nova Scotia.
Dr. Simpson is the Vice Chair of the Canadian Pugwash Group—the national affiliate of the Pugwash International Conferences—and has served on its board of directors for many years.