Adaptive peacebuilding
International peacebuilding is experiencing a pragmatic turn. The era of liberal idealism is waning, and in its place new approaches to peacebuilding are emerging. This article identifies one such emerging approach, gives it a name—adaptive peacebuilding—and explores what it may be able to offer peacebuilding once it is more fully developed. It builds on the knowledge generated in the fields of complexity, resilience and local ownership, and may help inform the implementation of the emerging UN concept of sustaining peace. It is an alternative to the determined-design neo-liberal approach that has dominated peacebuilding over the past three decades. It represents an approach where peacebuilders, working closely together with the communities and people affected by conflict, actively engage in structured processes to sustain peace by using an inductive methodology of iterative learning and adaptation. The adaptive peacebuilding approach embraces uncertainty, focuses on processes rather than end-states, and invests in the resilience of local and national institutions to promote change.
Working paper on implementation of EU crisis response in Mali
This paper offers a critical review of the EUTM and EUCAP in Mali, arguing that this is another example of international interventions that may be well-intended, but that end up producing very mixed results on the ground. One reason for this is the gaps between intentions and implementation and between implementation and local reception/perceptions. Whereas the first gap points to mismatches between EU policy intentions and what effect the implementation of these policies actually have (see for example Hill 1993), the latter gap reveals the inability of an international actor to both understand how key concepts such as ‘security sector reform’ and ‘border management’ are understood on the ground as well as translating its own policies and Brussels’ developed mandate into policies that makes sense for people on the ground (Cissé, Bøås, Kvamme and Dakouo 2017).
Frykten for populismen
Det snakkes mye og negativt om populistenes fremmarsj i Europa. Men det er ofte uklart hva som menes med populisme.
World of the Right: Alternative visions of global order (WoR)
Prosjektet ser nærmere på det konservative "nye høyre" i Russland, USA og Europa, og studerer hva slags alternative tanker og visjoner de har for global politikk. ...
An Asian Pivot Starts at Home: The Russian Far East in Russian Regional Policy
To realize its ambitious goals of turning the Far East into Russia’s gateway to the Asia-Pacific, the Kremlin in 2012 established the Ministry for the Development of the Far East. Structurally, this ministry is a hybrid, with offices at the federal and the regional levels, reflecting both Moscow’s centralized take on policy formulation and the difficulties of micro-managing politics in a region distant in time and space. Analysing whether the new ministry has been a success, the author concludes that, while Moscow’s primary goal has been to open a Far Eastern gateway, a side-effect might be that the Far East will become better integrated with the rest of the country, providing for more balanced development throughout the Federation.
Framtida til europeisk integrasjon: ei ny regjering for Tyskland – og for Europa
Michael Kaeding besøkjer NUPI for å snakke om Tysklands noverande rolle i det europeiske integrasjonsprosjektet og rolla til den nye regjeringa.
Øyvind Svendsen
Øyvind Svendsen er seniorforsker og leder for Forskningsgruppen for global orden og diplomati ved NUPI. Hovedtema i forskningen hans er utenrikspo...
Are UN Peacekeeping Missions Moving Toward "Chapter Seven and a Half Operations"?
The combined effect of the inclusion of regional ad hoc coalitions with a strong orientation towards counter-insurgency and counterterrorism is the creation of a new type of “Chapter Seven and a Half” operations. Enforcement action is delegated to regional ad hoc coalitions that have a stronger interest in the conflict and who are more willing to put troops in the line of fire. However, such a development risks undermining the legitimacy of the UN, increasing attacks against peacekeeping operations as well as other parts of the UN, and eroding its role in the mediation and humanitarian domains.
Implementation of the EU’s crisis response in Ukraine
The objective of this paper is to reflect on the received and perceived EU crisis response in Ukraine, paying specific attention to the security and humanitarian sectors, among the key areas for the EU since the beginning of the crisis/conflict. This research focus is in line with EUNPACK Task 2, aimed at analysing how the EU and its member states are implementing its crisis response on the ground throughout the conflict cycle. Three core assumptions underpin our research focus in this paper.
Trump, Putin and rejected greatness
Why do Putin and Trump undermine the international consensus knowledge that their national academic and governmental milieus have been so central to building?