Memo to the Arctic Security Roundtable: The geopolitics of Arctic economic activities
This brief memo supported discussions at the MSC Arctic Security Roundtable 2025 of the Munich Security Council, which has a particular focus on economic drivers and how they impact security and governance in the region. The memo directs attention to key vectors, both long-term and more recent, that are at the intersection of economy, security and environment across national borders in the Arctic.
Managing Climate, Peace and Security Risks from the Borderlands of the Lake Chad (CPS-Lake Chad)
How can local efforts in the Lake Chad Region teach us how to manage the effects of climate change on peace and security? ...
Ole Mathias Rustad
Ole worked as a master student at NUPI. In his MA thesis, Ole wrote about the Russian oppositional diaspora in Georgia and Norway, analysing how t...
Edel Mari Buhr Ødegård
Edel worked as a master's student in the Defence and Security research group in 2025. She wrote her thesis about the use of artifical intelligence...
Vilde Friis Ruud
Vilde was a master's student at NUPI in 2025, where she was affiliated with the research group for Russia, Asia, and international trade. She wrot...
A warmer Arctic in colder geopolitical climate: What role for the private sector?
• The Arctic is experiencing considerable physical and geopolitical change affecting states, Indigenous peoples and various stakeholders. • Private sector actors are also affected by climate change, geopolitical developments and economic trends in the Arctic, although the impacts on and potential governance role of the private sector in securing safety and stability in the Arctic are often neglected in policy analyses. • This policy note outlines key stressors in the region and gives recommendations as to how the private sector can contribute to a safe and stable Arctic by supporting governance and sharing knowledge.
Breakfast seminar: When expertise becomes power politics – US perspectives on Russia and China
What can we learn from US engagement towards China and Russia after the Cold War? And what role should experts play in the shaping of foreign policy?
Breakfast seminar: When expertise becomes power politics – US perspectives on Russia and China
What can we learn from US engagement towards China and Russia after the Cold War? And what role should experts play in the shaping of foreign policy?
Topos of threat and metapolitics in Russia’s securitisation of NATO post-Crimea
This article makes a twofold contribution on the relationship between self/other securitisation, ambiguous threat constructions, and anxiety at the intersection of Securitisation Theory (ST) and Ontological Security Studies (OSS). First, we develop the concept topos of threat (TT) as a potent linguistic anchor in securitisation processes. TTs depict an entire self/other threat situation that warrants escape, serving identity needs while staying flexible and ambiguous. However, their frequent rhetorical deployment can blur the threat construction and increase anxiety: this challenges the classical scholarly assumption that antagonism necessarily alleviates anxiety. Second, we theorise metapolitics as an anxiety mediation strategy. Metapolitics is a mode of interpretation – a relentless analysis of surface clues to expose a deceptive, powerful adversary – which in the final event fails to alleviate anxiety. The dual practice of nurturing topoi of threat and metapolitics drives conflict because it sets in motion a vicious securitisation spiral that entrenches rigid patterns of self/other representation and fosters a bias of anticipating hostility. We employ abductive theorising: working with established theory alongside empirical discovery through a discourse analysis of Russia’s official rhetoric on NATO and the use of the TT ‘colour revolution’ since the conflict in Ukraine began in 2014.