Researcher
Halvard Leira
Contactinfo and files
Summary
Halvard Leira’s main areas of research is foreign policy and diplomacy, with a special emphasis on the Norwegian varieties. He also has a long-standing research interest in historical international relations, and international thought. Leira completed his PhD thesis in May 2011, titled «The Emergence of Foreign Policy: Knowledge, Discourse, History».
Expertise
Education
2011 PhD, Political Science, University of Oslo
2002 Cand. Polit., Political Science, Department of political Science, University of Oslo
Work Experience
2003- Research Fellow/Phd-candidate/Senior Research Fellow/Research Professor, NUPI
Aktivitet
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Clear all filtersResearch group for Global Order and Diplomacy
Afterword: Gendering the Brand
One potentially productive way of framing the debates about nation-branding and public diplomacy is to consider them both subsumed under the broader motivations of status, prestige and reputation. On the one hand, it emphasizes how domestic politics can shape status-seeking and how the domestic resonance of status-seeking matters to its likelihood of success. On the other hand, it leads our attention to the external recognition of status, how it can be associated with circles of recognition, club membership and relative ranking, and also how there is a marked difference between formally equal-status relationships and relationships more in the teacher-pupil mould. As small states, the Nordics wanted to be recognized; gender equality was just not one of the fields that they considered to offer such recognition. While gender equality is certainly part of the self-image of the Nordic states, it is expressed in different ways and also 'usable' for diplomats in different ways.
Inter-governmentality: A framework for analysis
This chapter explores the analytical purchase of the governmentality-framework when applied to interactions between polities before the early modern period, what I refer to as inter-governmentality. Starting from the assumptions that: (1) governmentality (historically understood) was always entangled with globality and (2) that governmentality (heuristically understood) can be studied in polities other than the modern state, the chapter establishes a heuristic analytical apparatus for the study of the relation between non-state governmental apparatuses. By being explicitly analytical, the conceptual vocabulary of governmentality allows us to make sense of logics and practices of government across time and space, without assuming sameness. The conceptual apparatus of inter-governmentality (or the analytics of government) provides three clear and interrelated benefits. First, and most importantly, it provides an explicitly analytical framework to the academic subfield of Historical International Relations where the distinction between analytical and practical concepts is central, but often hard to get around. Second, it can direct attention at overlooked issues, such as gift-giving and marriage practices, and help bring meaning to practices which do not make sense to the modern eye. Third, it offers potential coherence to already ongoing research, by suggesting an overarching and integrative analytical framework.
Hva er Internasjonal Politikk
The term international politics is used both for events and processes in the world around us - and for the study of these. The subject covers obvious topics such as war, trade and diplomacy, but it also deals with more everyday phenomena such as tourism, immigration and how individuals are affected by globalization. This book presents the most important perspectives, theories and debates within the subject. It aims to make the reader more curious and better equipped to reflect on both contemporary and historical international political events.
Utenrikspolitikkens opprinnelse
In this book, Halvard Leira deals with how Norwegian foreign policy originated. He shows that foreign policy is a relatively new phenomenon and that its origins must be sought in the field of tension between royal power and popular power in the second half of the 19th century. The way this happened in Norway at the end of the 19th century had a lasting effect on how people thought about foreign policy in Norway after independence in 1905, and thus on the long lines of Norwegian foreign policy. Leira takes the reader from Norse times to the Danish-led whole state's rule in the 18th century and on to the 19th century, where boundaries were drawn between the affairs of society and the the Storting on one hand, and matters that were the prerogative of the monarchy on the other. Between 1850 and 1880, questions of war and peace became central. From 1880 until the dissolution of the union, it was about how foreign policy should be controlled by the people, and that it should ideally be abolished. Leira draws lines from history up to today's foreign policy discourse, where popular participation is still in a state of tension with the primacy of the executive branch and an extensive secrecy.
Consequences of Investments for National Security (COINS)
How can liberal open societies reap the benefits of open economies, but at the same time protect their legitimate security interests? In the project “Consequences of Investments for National Security”...
Making foreign policy foreign
Building on earlier work, I delve into the translations of “foreign policy” and the potential challenges following from these translations. I start with a section on how something conceptualizable as “foreign policy” first emerged. Then I discuss at an overarching level how this something was translated. I pay particular attention to English, French and the Scandinavian languages. A final section returns to one of the many implications of this for International Relations theorising, before I conclude.
How do revolutions begin, unfold and end?
To mark the establishment of the Centre of Historical International Politics (CHIP) at NUPI, we have the pleasure of inviting you to a talk with Dr George Lawson on ‘Anatomies of revolution’.
A Conceptual History of International Relations
In this lecture, I discussed why we need a conceptual history of international relations, and how we can go about writing it.