Rachel Blackman-Rogers was born in a small market town in Hampshire, where her mother’s family have lived for generations. She studied geography at Oxford University and then embarked on a varied career in academia, publishing and media including roles as a researcher at INSEAD business school and as a senior strategist for BBC News. She returned to academic studies in 2013 and completed an MA in History of War at King’s College London, before becoming a PhD candidate in the Department of War Studies. Her supervisor is the Laughton Chair of Naval History, Professor Andrew Lambert, and her thesis examines Britain’s strategic and cultural transformation during the French Revolutionary Wars of the 1790s. Contrary to the traditional historical narrative of strategic paralysis and financial chaos, her research has taken an holistic approach to political, economic, naval, and cultural, histories. Consequently, her thesis has revealed that Britain was being insulated from the threat of invasion by an evolution in naval culture and strategy and a fiscal transformation. Simultaneously, the government pushed the institutions of British defence, the Bank of England, and His Majesty’s Navy, closer to parliament to improve national confidence, and used the naval victories to build consensus for the war around a British maritime identity. Her academic interests include strategy, maritime history and identity, strategic and military culture, the role of media in warfare and contemporary maritime issues. She is also currently teaching at the Joint Services Command and Staff College in Shrivenham where she is involved in military education.

Rachel will lead a conversation about strategy and its relationship with culture. She will also touch on the role of media in wartime.

We will have a seated dinner at Cabotte and taste 6 wines.