Researcher
Minda Holm
Contactinfo and files
Summary
Dr. Minda Holm is a Senior Research Fellow at NUPI. Her research spans three main areas: the theory of international ideology and ideological resistance in world politics; global liberalisms and liberal internationalism, liberal exceptionalism and ideological and conceptual changes in global order, international norms, state ideals, sovereignty and international law; and the international ideology and networks of far-right and reactionary movements. She also works on diplomacy and foreign and security policy, particularly Norwegian, US and Russian. Her work is both theoretical and empirical, and situated in interdisciplinary dialogue with International Relations, global historical sociology, social theory, critical international law and political philosophy.
She has researched liberal internationalism and liberal exceptionalism, including in Norwegian foreign policy, and changing notions of sovereignty and state ideals in international law and politics. Since 2017, she has also researched far-right, national-conservative and reactionary movements and their global ideas. Between 2018 and 2023, she led a research project at NUPI for the Norwegian Ministry of Defence on the international ideology and networks of the ‘New Right’ in Europe, Russia and the US, and she was part of the research project World of the Right at the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS).
She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Copenhagen (2023). Her doctoral thesis, a monograph, is titled Towards a Social Theory of International Ideology, Ideological Scripts, and Counter-Ideology: Rethinking “Liberal International Order” and the Far Right’s Critique. It develops a theory of how ideologies structure the international through the state as a legal and political subject, and of the distinct forms of resistance this generates. She is currently developing it into a book proposal, and its core empirical arguments are summarized in the NUPI report A Postliberal Global Order? Challenge(r)s to the Liberal West (2025).
Holm has published in journals such as Review of International Studies, International Studies Review, Cooperation and Conflict, The Hague Journal of Diplomacy and New Perspectives, on topics including sovereignty, (mis)recognition, securitization theory, the transatlantic community of values and international diaspora politics.
For eight years, she wrote a monthly column on global politics in Dagsavisen and Klassekampen, and she was Editor-in-Chief of the journal Internasjonal Politikk between 2018 and 2024. Holm holds a double master’s degree in International Relations from LSE and George Washington University, where she was a Fulbright scholar.
See her personal website for more, including publications.
Expertise
Education
2018 – 2023 PhD, Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen. Submitted November 2022, defended after maternity leave September 2023.
2015 – 2016 MA George Washington University, USA (Fulbright scholar)
2013 – 2014 MSc London School of Economics and Political Science, England
2008 – 2013 BA (2, in parallel), Political Science and Russia studies, University of Oslo and American University in Cairo, Oslo/Egypt
Work Experience
2025– Board Member, Norwegian Polytechnic Society’s Geopolitics Network
2023– Senior Research Fellow, NUPI
2020–2025 Columnist (global politics), Klassekampen
2018–2024 Editor-in-Chief, Internasjonal Politikk – Scandinavian Journal of International Studies
2018– Board Member, Human Rights House Foundation
2018–2023 PhD Fellow/Researcher and Project Leader (Norwegian Ministry of Defence), NUPI
2018–2023 PhD Fellow, University of Copenhagen (supervisors Ole Wæver and Ole Jacob Sending; submitted November 2022, defended September 2023 following parental leave)
2018–2023 PhD Fellow, World of the Right research project, Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS; based in both Oslo and Copenhagen)
2018–2021 Board Member, European International Studies Association (EISA) Early Career Development Group
2017–2020 Columnist (global politics), Dagsavisen (“Internasjonalen”)
2017–2018 Research Fellow, NUPI
2015–2019 Board Member, Fulbright Alumni Association of Norway
2012–2017 Research Assistant, NUPI (full-time from January 2016)
2012 Intern, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Tajikistan
2010–2011 Trainee, Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Kazakhstan (covering Central Asia)
2009–2010 Journalist, Radio Nova
Aktivitet
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Clear all filtersTransformative securitization: Rethinking the Copenhagen School in light of COVID-19, climate change, and the war in Ukraine
This article advances securitization theory by introducing the concept of transformative securitization, in which crises are not only framed as existential threats but also as catalysts for reconstituting political orders. Drawing on the Copenhagen School and Hannah Arendt’s notion of natality, the article distinguishes transformative securitization from conservative forms that aim to preserve the status quo. It conceptualizes transformative securitization through three dimensions: agency (bottom-up and participatory), procedure (disruptive yet potentially democratizing), and outcome (yielding durable institutional or normative change). Through empirical illustrations from Denmark and Norway’s responses to COVID-19, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and climate change, the article shows how securitization can both constrain and enable democratic transformation. It finds that while some responses reinforce executive power and narrow deliberative space, others—especially in climate politics—reflect participatory and future-oriented securitizing moves that can reconfigure societal sectors or entire polities. Climate change emerges as a paradigmatic case of transformative securitization, where intergenerational justice and systemic change are driven by civic agency. By bridging crisis and political founding, the concept refines securitization theory’s understanding of extraordinary politics and offers new tools to analyze the democratic potential and pitfalls of security responses in an era of overlapping, urgent predicaments.
Towards a Postliberal Global Order? The Crises of the Liberal West
This article is in Norwegian. The article discusses the weakened position of the liberal West in global governance, and the significance of Trump’s USA in this landscape. The first part of the article outlines three central ideological and geopolitical developments related to global order that run counter to the dominant dichotomies between the West and the non-West, democracies and autocracies. Although the world is changing, and the post-1989 form of liberal hegemony is in significant reverse, global politics will not become post-liberal any time soon. The second part discusses how the Western self-image as a unified liberal «us» has unraveled throughout the 2000s. First, Western states have systematically undermined some of the values and institutions they have claimed to represent. The gap between self-image and reality, in parallel with extensive outward moralization, has created a significant legitimacy crisis for the West. Second, the far right has become a central part of the Western political landscape. The new transatlantic community of values under Trump is not liberal, but radical right-wing. The tensions within the community of shared values will be there regardless of who’s in power in the USA. The conclusion is that it is no longer possible to talk about a unified Western liberal «us». Continuing to insist on it will only further strengthen the West’s internal and external tensions.
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A Postliberal Global Order? Challenge(r)s to the Liberal West
In a new report, NUPI’s senior researcher Minda Holm looks closer at which international order it is that is under pressure. What is the issue with seeing the world through the lens of a post-1945 Liberal International or Rules-Based Order? What do actors like Russia and China have in common with the populist radical right in their perspectives on global politics? And what does Donald Trump’s second term entail for the liberal West?
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This op-ed is in Norwegian.