Publications
Sovereign Wealth Funds and Public Financing for Climate Action
The 2018 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on limiting global warming to 1.5 °C highlights the importance of access to capital for reaching this target. As directly or indirectly government-owned and -controlled investment vehicles with a an intrinsically long-term perspective, sovereign wealth funds have an self-interest in preventing climate change and its long-term impacts on the world economy and their broader portfolios. Other investors may choose to look upon climate change as an externality as long as they are not forced to take it into account. By contrast, sovereign wealth funds are perhaps the investor class for whom it makes most sense to internalize the consequences of climate change, as their long-term investment horizon makes them directly vulnerable to its consequences. Nonetheless, the number of sovereign wealth funds that engage in such investments and the proportion of their capital that is directed towards green financing remains small. This chapter discusses the operational aspects that make sovereign wealth funds good candidates of public green financing and the limitations that they face in this process. The discussion concludes with useful policy and governance considerations.
The new oil? The geopolitics and international governance of hydrogen
While most hydrogen research focuses on the technical and cost hurdles to a full-scale hydrogen economy, little consideration has been given to the geopolitical drivers and consequences of hydrogen developments. The technologies and infrastructures underpinning a hydrogen economy can take markedly different forms, and the choice over which pathway to take is the object of competition between different stakeholders and countries. Over time, cross-border maritime trade in hydrogen has the potential to fundamentally redraw the geography of global energy trade, create a new class of energy exporters, and reshape geopolitical relations and alliances between countries. International governance and investments to scale up hydrogen value chains could reduce the risk of market fragmentation, carbon lock-in, and intensified geo-economic rivalry.
Russian Renewable Energy: Regulations and outcomes
This chapter reviews the development of the legal framework for renewable energy in Russia and discusses the current state of renewable energy in the country. The Russian support scheme for renewable energy is elaborated in detail for both the wholesale and retail energy markets, and the outcomes of the policy are assessed based on the current state of renewable energy in Russia.
Gender and Labour Market Adjustment to Trade: The Case of India
Standing at 24% in 2018, India’s female labour force articipation is only half of the global average (48%). At the same time, India has one of the widest gender wage gaps in the world and women are less likely to be employed in the formal sector compared to men. This study focuses on the role of international trade as a source of increased competitive pressure in domestic markets, and how it affects relative wages and formal employment between men and women. Using the Revealed Symmetrical Comparative Advantage index, sectors of comparative advantage and disadvantage are identified and matched on Indian labour force surveys that contain information on sectoral employment and earnings. We find that sectors of comparative advantage in services have the lowest gender wage gap, with women earning 24% less than their male counterpart, while women in manufacturing earned on average 40% less than male workers. The Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition shows that the total gender wage gap in sectors of comparative advantage in services are minor while it is quite substantial in manufacturing, regardless of the comparative advantage. The study concludes that trade goes hand in hand with a smaller gender wage gap in the services sectors as it allows women to leverage their skills better than in manufacturing.
The geopolitics of renewables: New board, new game
This policy perspective sums up the main input of four members of the Research Panel for IRENA's Global Commission on the Geopolitics of the Energy Transformation. The geographic and technical characteristics of renewable energy systems are fundamentally different from those of coal, oil, and natural gas. This has implications for interstate energy relations and will require early attention if states are to exploit opportunities and address challenges. We point to six clusters of renewables' geopolitical implications that will manifest themselves over different time horizons. Overall, a generally positive disruption is foreseen, but also one that raises new energy security challenges. Moreover, while renewables will eventually render energy relations more horizontal and polycentric, achieving a smooth transition will not be easy. Renewables alter arenas of energy interaction, transforming markets and shifting trade partners, and reshape patterns of cooperation and conflict among countries. One possible outcome is a world of continental-sized grid communities made up of prosumer countries that continuously strategize between secure domestic production and cheap imports. Political action is required to manage, inter alia, industrial competition, stranded assets, availability of electricity and storage capacity, critical materials, and rivalry over ownership of key infrastructure assets.
The missallocation of climate research funding
The window of opportunity for mitigating climate change is narrow. Limiting global warming to 1.5 °C will require rapid and deep alteration of attitudes, norms, incentives, and politics. Some of the key climate-change and energy transition puzzles are therefore in the realm of the social sciences. However, these are precisely the fields that receive least funding for climate-related research. This article analyzes a new dataset of research grants from 333 donors around the world spanning 4.3 million awards with a cumulative value of USD 1.3 trillion from 1950 to 2021. Between 1990 and 2018, the natural and technical sciences received 770% more funding than the social sciences for research on issues related to climate change. Only 0.12% of all research funding was spent on the social science of climate mitigation.
China and South Asia Crisis Management in the Era of Great Power Competition
Until very recently, China had been seen as an important and constructive force in the crisis management in South Asia in the event of an India-Pakistan military crisis. Part of the perception originated from historical evidence, such as China’s shuttle diplomacy between India and Pakistan after 1998, and such as after the 2008 Mumbai attack. But more importantly, the perception is based on the belief that China, with its vast stake in the region’s peace and stability, will be objective in its assessment and management of the crisis, even if it may not be completely neutral between India and Pakistan. Following that logic, the increasing risk to which China is exposed due to its Belt and Road investments and infrastructure development in the region will draw China even more into third-party crisis management in South Asia. This belief has become increasingly challenged due to the shifting power balance in the region and, more broadly, among China, the United States (U.S.), and India in their trilateral interactions. Although China is interested in preventing a nuclear war, under that threshold, its interest in crisis management is constantly subject to its definition of its national interest in the changing regional power balance and great power dynamics. With the deepening U.S.-China great power rivalry, the growing signs of alignment between the U.S. and India, as well as a weakening Pakistan, the foundation of China’s policy towards South Asia—a perceived balance of power between India and Pakistan and China’s advantage as a superior third party—is disappearing rapidly. With the deteriorating U.S.-China relations and great power competition, China’s instinct is to preserve its strategic leverage. In addition, with the border skirmishes between China and India continuing to flare up, China itself might become a party to the regional conflict.
The Fight Over Freedom in 20th- and 21st-Century International Discourse Moments of ‘self-determination’
This book shows how international discourse citing ‘self-determination’ over the last hundred years has functioned as a battleground between two ideas of freedom: a ‘radical’ idea of freedom, and a ‘liberal-conservative’ idea of freedom. The book offers new insights into the historical times in which ‘self-determination’ was prominently cited internationally since the early 20th century; it also offers a recasting and renewal of international debates on freedom in international discourse.
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.