What we do
The centre offers New Zealand's only specialist education in defence and security studies. Its qualifications and courses give you real-world knowledge and experience that will make you highly employable. You can study at an undergraduate, graduate or postgraduate level.
Research
Our multidisciplinary research offers a critical analysis of the nexus of power, law, human rights, and political resistance. It also looks at the impact of violence, securitisation and coercion on individuals, groups and nations.
Projects
Inter-island rivalry
Inter-island rivalry
Many Pacific islands have been tied together as unitary territories by colonialism. Inter-island rivalry underpins peaceful attempts to secede. A collaborative research project with the University of Hawaiʻi explores the driving forces of inter-island rivalry and its potential to redraw the Pacific’s geo-political map in six Pacific countries and territories.
Law, Politics and the Limits of Prosecuting Mass Atrocity
Law, Politics and the Limits of Prosecuting Mass Atrocity
Damien Rogers offers a unique and powerful critique of the quest for international criminal justice. It explores the efforts of three successive generations of international prosecutors, recognising the vital roles they play in the enforcement of international criminal law.
Post-internationalism and Small Arms Control: Theory, Politics, Security
Post-internationalism and Small Arms Control: Theory, Politics, Security
Damien Rogers examines how the international community has responded to the challenge of controlling small arms and light weapons since the early 1990s. Using a post internationalist analytic framework, he specifically focuses on the maturing relationships between particular actors of world affairs and the nascent interconnectivity between their strategies for, and approaches toward, controlling these weapons.
Study with us
The Centre for Defence and Security Studies is a department of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Massey.
Study security & defence
Unique qualifications to protect people, borders and information. Graduates explore careers in diplomacy, intelligence, government or the armed forces.
College of Humanities & Social Sciences
Creative thinking for a changing world. It's at the heart of everything we do at the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.
Security short courses
Learn about what’s happening and likely to happen in Asia-Pacific security and development with our 4-day Pacific Security Dynamics course, or enhance your military career with our postgraduate certificate in International Security.
Our people
Our team specialises in research areas such as global security and intelligence, counter-terrorism, cybersecurity and geopolitics.
Dr Dee McDonald
Dee's main research focus is biosecuring agricultural and human assemblages. She's broadly interested in biosecurity and conservation values, biodiversity and climate change issues, and environmental law. She has written articles and book chapters on the topic of Aotearoa New Zealand's biosecurity and on environmental security more broadly.
Dr Rhys Ball
Rhys Ball spend a number of years as an intelligence officer. His teaching work examines current New Zealand and global security risks, the gathering and analysis of intelligence, the history of military and security intelligence and critical analysis of intelligence in investigations and detection. His research areas include intelligence studies, history, strategic studies and military history.
Dr John Battersby
Dr John Battersby is a Senior Fellow in the Centre for Defence and Security Studies. He teaches and researches in intelligence and counter-terrorism and is Managing Editor of the National Security Journal.
Nicola Macaulay
Nicola is an and experienced academic who is also a postgraduate supervisor and undergraduate course coordinator. Coming to Massey with previous security practitioner experience in UK intelligence, Nicola’s key interests lie in international relations, intelligence surveillance technologies and urban security, and the implications of those from domestic, regional and global perspectives.
Nick Nelson
Nick is a Senior Lecturer at Massey University with extensive experience in both the security sector and academia. He teaches in a diverse range of subject areas, including security and warfare, cybersecurity and the psychology of security. His main research interest is in understanding how the online environment impacts on security.
Associate Professor Anna Powles
Associate Professor Anna Powles worked in complex humanitarian emergencies and security sector reform with the United Nations, INGOs and the International Crisis Group before joining academia. Her research focus is geopolitical dynamics in the Pacific, Pacific security architecture, security cooperation in the Pacific, and New Zealand's foreign and defence policy.
Marcel Zentveld-Wale
Marcel is a Massey alumnus working in the Centre for Defence and Security Studies. His doctoral research was on virtue politics, which he completed at the University of Auckland. His research interests include political and security theory, international norms and the ethics of armed conflict.
Publications
National Security Journal
The National Security Journal is focused broadly on national security. It invites academics and practitioners across the expanded national security working space to contribute their research, knowledge and experience. It is available to subscribers across the Government, NGO, business and academic sectors and on request.
The Conversation
Is NZ defence and intelligence policy aligning with AUKUS in all but name?, 4 February 2026
Disaster, defence and security research news
Opinion: A cultural double standard in the Defence Force
By Professor Bethan Greener
Opinion: 4 lessons NZ should take from another summer of weather disasters
Co-authored by Professor of Disaster and Emergency Management Julia Becker
Opinion: Is it time for regime change…..in the United States?
By Dr John Battersby
Opinion: The US just increased global insecurity, again
By Dr John Battersby
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