Maria Adele Carrai

Maria Adele Carrai is Associate Professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations and the Oxford School of Global and Area Studies (OSGA) at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of St Cross College. She was previously Assistant Professor of Global China Studies at NYU Shanghai and has taught at NYU School of Law. She is an Associate of the Harvard University Asia Center and an Adjunct Associate Research Scholar at Columbia University’s Weatherhead East Asian Institute.

Her work explores the history and theory of international law in East Asia and examines how China’s global rise is reshaping norms, institutions, and the international order. Her research focuses in particular on sovereignty, extraterritoriality, and digital governance.

She is the author of Sovereignty in China: A Genealogy of a Concept since 1840 (Cambridge University Press, 2019) and China’s Normative Power in Cyberspace (Routledge, forthcoming 2026). She co-edited The China Questions 2: Critical Insights into US–China Relations (Harvard University Press, 2022) and The Cambridge History of International Law in Asia (Cambridge University Press, 2026). Her work has been published in leading journals in international law and international relations.

She received her PhD from the University of Hong Kong and has held fellowships at KU Leuven (Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow), the Italian Academy at Columbia University, the Princeton–Harvard China and the World Program, the European University Institute, and NYU School of Law.