Researcher
Benjamin de Carvalho
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Summary
Benjamin de Carvalho is a research professor at NUPI, working in the Research group on Global Order and Diplomacy (GOaD). His research interests have, broadly speaking, been between three areas: (i) historical international relations, (ii) UN peacekeeping, and (iii) status in international relations.
Within these fields, he has published on issues of broader historical change such as the formation of the nation-state in Europe, sovereignty, and the role played by confessionalization and religion. He has also been involved in a number of projects on UN peacekeeping, and has worked on the protection of civilians and sexual and gender-based violence in Liberia, Chad, and the Sudans. He is also involved in projects addressing status as a key driver of foreign policy, focusing on Norway and Brazil. Central issues here are the role played by small states in international politics, emerging powers and great power responsibility. Other research interests include hegemony, popular culture and international relations theory.
De Carvalho is currently involved in work of more historical character. He is currently the Principal Investigator of Empires, Privateering and the Sea (EMPRISE), a project funded by the Research Council of Norway addressing the importance of privateering for the formation of overseas empires in the Atlantic (1556-1856). He is also the main collaborator in Conceptual History of International Relations (CHOIR), led by Halvard Leira.
In addition, de Carvalho has played an important role in the institutionalization of Historical International Relations as a subfield of the discipline of International Relations. Together with Leira, he was instrumental in setting up the Historical International Relations Section of the ISA, of which he has served as section program chair (2015-2017) and section chair (2017-2019). Leira and de Carvalho are also co-editors of the four-volume set Historical International Relations.
He is formerly a co-editor of the leading Scandinavian-language International Relations-journal Internasjonal Politikk.
Benjamin is Editor in Chief of the journal Cooperation and Conflict, 2023-2027.
Expertise
Education
2009 PhD in International Studies, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
2001 MA, New School for Social Research, New York, USA
Work Experience
2006- PhD student/Senior Research Fellow/Research Professor, NUPI
Aktivitet
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Brazil's Rise to the Global Stage (BRAGS)
BRAGS seeks to understand the drivers behind Brazilian humanitarian action and participation in peacekeeping and peacebuilding activities....
Undermining Hegemony. The US, China, Russia, and International Public Goods
Developments in the last fifteen years have driven renewed interest in hegemonic-stability and power-transition theory. The persistence of US-centered primacy during the 1990s produced new arguments f...
Rights up Front and the Protections of Civilians: Towards Ensuring the Core Responsibilities of the UN?
In the wake of the 2012 Internal Review Panel (IRP) findings on UN Action in Sri Lanka, which characterized the failed efforts of the UN as a “systemic failure”, the UN Secretary-General launched the Human Rights up Front (RUF) initiative in late 2013.
Undermining Hegemony? Building a Framework for Goods Substitution
The logics that we have outlined may, indeed, be applicable to a wide array of international actors and organizations that are aspiring to play public goods substitution roles. Likewise, they are applicable to a number of actors seeking alternative access to public goods. For example, supply and demand factors may help explain both the growing pains and potential power of the BRICS and recast debates about the role of alternative lenders in the developing world. Ultimately, our project is an appeal to think more precisely about the components of hegemonic order and the more hidden mechanisms that may contribute to its transformation or, in certain cases, enduring resilience.
Small States and Status Seeking : Norway's Quest for International Standing
Status-seeking is an important aspect of the foreign policies of a number of small states, but one that has been rarely studied. This book aims to contribute to our understanding not only of status-seeking, by coming at that question from a new angle, that of a small state, but also to our understanding of foreign policy, by discussing the importance of status for foreign policy overall. If status is a hierarchy, then it is important to focus not just on the highest-ranking powers, but also those at lower levels. As the distribution of power is becoming more diffuse, the role of small and medium powers becomes more significant than it was during the Cold war. The book chapters go beyond familiar explications of "soft power" or conflict resolution to highlight new aspects of Norway’s foreign policy, including contributions to national defense, global warming, and management of Arctic resources. This book will be of interest to students and scholars in areas including US Foreign Policy, International Relations and European Politics.