Skip to content
NUPI skole

Researcher

Elana Wilson Rowe

Research Professor (part time)
Elana_Wilson_Rowe_11.jpg

Contactinfo and files

ew@nupi.no
(+47) 450 04 240
Original image Download CV

Summary

Dr Elana Wilson Rowe is research professor (part time) at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. Wilson Rowe’s research and expertise areas include governance of nature and changing power relations in the Anthropocene, Arctic and ocean governance and geopolitics, and Russian climate and Arctic policymaking. Her publications explore how the interplay of diplomatic practices, security rivalries and expert/environmental knowledge shape outcomes and understandings in regional and global policy fields.

She is the author of Russian Climate Politics: When Science Meets Policy (Palgrave, 2013) and Arctic Governance: Power in cross-border relations (University of Manchester, 2018). She was a member of Norway’s committee establishing research priorities for the UN Ocean Decade. She holds a BA in Russian and Geography from Middlebury College (USA) and an MPhil and PhD in Geography/Polar Studies from the University of Cambridge (2006). More publications and links can be found on Google Scholar.

Wilson Rowe was the PI and led a 5- year major grant from the European Research Council (#80335, 2019-2024. Read more about the Lorax project here). The aim of this project was to understand the broader regional and global repercussions of governance efforts anchored in sub-global ‘ecosystems’ or ‘ecoregions’ and how the power relations enacted around ecosystems shape regional and global ordering. Wilson Rowe has also led projects funded by the Norwegian Research Council, Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Norwegian Ministry of Defence.

Expertise

  • Diplomacy
  • Foreign policy
  • Russia and Eurasia
  • The Arctic
  • Climate
  • Oceans
  • International organizations
  • United Nations

Education

2002-2006 D. Phil., human geography, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

2001-2002 M. Phil., human geography, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

1997-2001 B.A., Geography/Russian, Middlebury College, Vermont, USA

Work Experience

2023- Professor of International Relations, Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU)

2006- Senior Research Fellow/Research Professor, NUPI

2006-2022 Senior research fellow, NUPI 2010- Adjunct Professor at Nord University

2002-2006 Teaching Assistant/Supervisor, Geography Department, University of Cambridge

 

Aktivitet

Publications
Publications
Report
Karsten Friis, Elana Wilson Rowe, Ulf Sverdrup, Mike Sfraga, Pavel K. Baev, Troy J. Bouffard, Marc Lanteigne, Marisol Maddox, Jan-Gunnar Winther

Navigating Breakup: Security realities of freezing politics and thawing landscapes in the Arctic

Russia’s re-invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has had immediate and ongoing effects for Arctic security and cooperative governance at both a regional and international level. The region is impacted by the increased sanctions, the withdrawal of Western companies from Russia, the Western disconnect from energy dependencies, and has also witnessed an increase in hybrid security incidents.  In addition, climate change continues at to change the environment at a staggering pace in the north. This report is an input to the Arctic Security Roundtable (ASR) and the Munich Security Conference, February 2023. It provides insights into both established and novel drivers of change in Arctic and security governance. Chapters cover the impacts of climate change on the physical environment, human security and the Arctic region’s military operational environment, and review the regional security policies of the three major powers (USA, China and Russia). The report argues leaders must continue to address Arctic governance challenges and take concrete steps to mitigate and manage risks, regardless of the cessation of cooperation with Russia and the radical uncertainty shaping the broader political environment.

  • Security policy
  • The Arctic
  • Climate
Screenshot 2023-02-16 at 17.15.47.png
  • Security policy
  • The Arctic
  • Climate
Publications
Publications
Scientific article

Space, nature and hierarchy: the ecosystemic politics of the Caspian Sea

The Anthropocene has given rise to growing efforts to govern the world’s ecosystems. There is a hitch, however, ecosystems do not respect sovereign borders; hundreds traverse more three states and thus require complex international cooperation. This article critically examines the political and social consequences of the growing but understudied trend towards transboundary ecosystem cooperation. Matchmaking the new hierarchy scholarship in International Relations (IR) and political geography, the article theorises how ecosystem discourse embodies a latent spatially exclusive logic that can bind together and bound from outside unusual bedfellows in otherwise politically awkward spaces. The authors contend that such ‘ecosystemic politics’ can generate spatialised ‘broad hierarchies’ that cut across both Westphalian renderings of space and the latent post-colonial and/or material inequalities that have hitherto been the focus of most of the new hierarchies scholarship. Rowe and Beaumont illustrate their argument by conducting a multilevel longitudinal analysis of how Caspian Sea environmental cooperation has produced a broad hierarchy demarking and sharpening the boundaries of the region, become symbolic of Caspian in-group competence and neighbourliness, and used as a rationale for future Caspian-shaped cooperation. They reason that if ecosystemic politics can generate new renderings of space amid an otherwise heavily contested space as the Caspian, further research is warranted to explore systemic hierarchical consequences elsewhere.

  • Russia and Eurasia
  • Climate
  • Oceans
  • Governance
European Journal of International Relations - cover.jpeg
  • Russia and Eurasia
  • Climate
  • Oceans
  • Governance
Publications
Publications
Report

A Governance and Risk Inventory for a Changing Arctic

Background Paper for the Arctic Security Roundtable at the Munich Security Conference 2020

  • Security policy
  • The Arctic
Screenshot 2022-12-05 at 09.33.45.png
  • Security policy
  • The Arctic
Arktis.jpg
Roundtable
2020 - 2024 (Ongoing)

Munich Security Forum - Arctic Security Roundtable (MSF - ASR)

This roundtable is organized by the MSC in cooperation with NUPI and Wilson Centre....

  • Defence
  • Security policy
  • NATO
  • Europe
  • Russia and Eurasia
  • North America
  • The Arctic
  • The Nordic countries
  • Conflict
  • Climate
  • Energy
  • Oceans
  • Governance
  • International organizations
  • The EU
  • Defence
  • Security policy
  • NATO
  • Europe
  • Russia and Eurasia
  • North America
  • The Arctic
  • The Nordic countries
  • Conflict
  • Climate
  • Energy
  • Oceans
  • Governance
  • International organizations
  • The EU
Event
16:00 - 17:30
C.J. Hambrosplass 2 D / Livestream to Facebook and Youtube
Engelsk
270422-illegal-fishing.png
Event
16:00 - 17:30
C.J. Hambrosplass 2 D / Livestream to Facebook and Youtube
Engelsk
27. Apr 2022
Event
16:00 - 17:30
C.J. Hambrosplass 2 D / Livestream to Facebook and Youtube
Engelsk

Are we making progress on reducing Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated fishing? Challenges and Measures

This seminar seeks to take stock of the progress made by states, regional organizations, and their international partners in reducing IUU fishing, discuss the most successful measures available so far, and reflect on the main challenges of such an endeavour and what can be done differently.

Publications
Publications
Scientific article

Ecosystemic politics: Analyzing the consequences of speaking for adjacent nature on the global stage

This article introduces a conceptual framework for analysing and comparing the broader or unintended effects of cooperation anchored in border-crossing ecosystems. The importance of addressing this lacuna in our scholarship on such sub-global cooperation is underscored by research in political geography that has demonstrated how the creation of scale is an important expression of power relations and how interaction with the materiality of different kinds of spaces necessitates distinct political technologies (and thus may have distinct effects). The article introduces three key analytical angles central to policy field studies in international sociology and demonstrates their utility through a case of the Arctic/Arctic Council. These analytical angles – networks (what are the relationships shaping the field?), hierarchies (who leads and how does leadership work?), and norms for political behavior – capture key consequences and dynamics of ecosystemic politics in a concise fashion that lends itself to cross-case comparison. The Arctic case focuses on the changing network positions and roles of non-Arctic actors over time, as an initial exploration of the broader ordering effects of such forms of cooperation. The findings suggest that most non-Arctic actors have experienced a decline in their centrality in Arctic cooperation, even as the Arctic has received intensified global interest and the number of participants in Arctic Council work has increased. Further comparative work along these lines would leave us better equipped to assess whether states speaking for their own immediate environs is better – and if so, in which ways – than seeking common solutions to global challenges.

  • Global economy
  • Regional integration
  • Diplomacy and foreign policy
  • Diplomacy
  • Foreign policy
  • Regions
  • The Arctic
Political-geography_large.jpg
  • Global economy
  • Regional integration
  • Diplomacy and foreign policy
  • Diplomacy
  • Foreign policy
  • Regions
  • The Arctic
Articles
New research
Articles
New research

Transnational Ecosystems Cooperation is Taking off

Do these efforts to govern border-crossing ecosystems have unique effects that matter for global politics more generally?
  • Diplomacy
  • Foreign policy
  • Russia and Eurasia
  • South and Central America
  • The Arctic
  • Climate
  • Oceans
  • Governance
  • International organizations
Collage-Arktis-Kaspiske-Amazonas_system_toppbilde.png
Publications
Publications
Scientific article

Norge er en stormakt innen havforskning - FNs tiår for havforskning må gi et ytterligere løft

Op-ed on Norway's role in the UN Ocean Decade.

  • Diplomacy and foreign policy
  • Foreign policy
  • Regions
  • The Arctic
  • Natural resources and climate
  • Oceans
  • Global governance
  • United Nations
Norge-er-en-stormakt-innen-havforskning_large.png
  • Diplomacy and foreign policy
  • Foreign policy
  • Regions
  • The Arctic
  • Natural resources and climate
  • Oceans
  • Global governance
  • United Nations
Publications
Publications
Chapter

Livet ved Havet (Life along the Ocean)

This chapter translates the core findings of the High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy into Norwegian and relates them to Norwegian domestic and foreign policy challenges.

  • Natural resources and climate
  • Climate
  • Oceans
  • Global governance
  • Governance
Blaatt-kompass_large.png
  • Natural resources and climate
  • Climate
  • Oceans
  • Global governance
  • Governance
Articles
Articles

Research group for Russia, Asia and International Trade

What is the role of Russia, the Arctic and Asia in global politics? How are these societies developing? How do international trade, innovation and policy change interact in the global economy? And how does this interplay affect the performance of companies, industries and countries? NUPI has a strong community of scholars working on these topics, and an extensive international network in these regions.
  • International economics
  • Trade
  • Foreign policy
  • Russia and Eurasia
  • Asia
Russland-og-olje_system_toppbilde.jpeg
11 - 20 of 106 items