Publikasjoner
Women and the Katiba Macina in Central Mali
This policy brief examines the local rule of the Katiba Macina from a gender perspective and addresses the question of women’s participation in the insurgency. The key findings can be summarised as follows. First,controlling gender relations is an important element of the Katiba Macina’s rule, allowing the insurgency to demonstrate its authority over the community. Second, its rule has also had a gendered impact, which has restricted livelihoods in ways that threaten not only women’s socio-economic security, but also their way of life and identity. Third, women, like in most other jihadist insurgencies, are not recruited as combatants, but have multi-faceted supporting roles as wives of ‘men of the bush’ and as informants in informal surveillance mechanisms that pass on information and contribute to maintaining law and order. Moreover, women are more likely to actively participate when they are bonded to the insurgency through familial ties.
Internet use, intermediaries and international trade
This study of the relationship between internet use and international trade finds that firms in many developing countries are more likely to engage in export and/or import if they use the internet as a communication tool. An ordered probit regression indicates that internet use is positively associated with direct participation in trade, as well as with indirect participation via trade intermediaries. Data on countries’ aggregate trade do not give support for the micro-findings, however: no significant association emerges between the share of internet users in a given country and that country's openness to trade.
Assessing the Effectiveness of the United Nations Mission in Mali (MINUSMA)
Fram til 2016 klarte MINUSMA å styrke stabiliteten i det nordlige Mali, reduserte antall sivile drept i konflikten, og tillot et stort antall fordrevne å vende hjem. MINUSMA bistod også fredsprosessen som kulminerte i Alger-avtalen fra 2015. Mange av disse prestasjonene står fortsatt. Siden 2016 har imidlertid MINUSMAs effektivitet når det gjelder stabilisering og beskyttelse av sivile redusert. I nord har de undertegnende partene gjort sakte fremskritt i implementeringen av Alger-avtalen og 2018-pakten for fred. I tillegg har det sentrale Mali destabilisert betydelig, ettersom jihadistiske aktiviteter har skapt en ond sirkel av interkommunal vold som har nådd enestående nivåer. MINUSMA har bare fått mandat til å hjelpe den maliske regjeringen med å håndtere situasjonen siden juni 2018. Som en av de største flerdimensjonale fredsbevarende operasjonene – for tiden inkludert nesten 13 000 soldater og 1 800 politifolk fra 57 bidragende land, og nesten 750 sivile – har MINUSMA fått betydelige ressurser og et usedvanlig ambisiøst mandat. Imidlertid befinner misjonen seg ved et veiskille. Det trenger tid for å lykkes, men dette er verdifull tid Mali ikke har. Sivile har blitt utsatt for økende angrep, og spesielt USA mister interessen for å støtte en kostbar FN-fredsoperasjon som ikke er i stand til å levere raske resultater. Denne rapporten vurderer i hvilken grad det er samsvar mellom misjonens ressurser og dets mandat. Den foretar også en vurdering av de tilgjengelige alternativene for misjonen for å øke effektiviteten i møte med ekstremt utfordrende omstendigheter.
Norsk utenrikspolitikk i en varmere verden
Til tross for at klima omtales som vår tids største utfordring, har konsekvensene av klimakrisen fortsatt en marginal betydning i norsk utenrikspolitikk. Vi analyserer hvordan overgangen til et fornybart energisystem, økt klimamigrasjon, press på oljenasjonen Norges omdømme, og store utfordringer for FN, EU og NATO, vil endre betingelsene for norsk utenrikspolitikk. Vi beskriver hvordan utenrikspolitikken påvirkes i tre fremtidsbilder med henholdsvis rask omstilling (A), sen omstilling (B) og ingen omstilling (C). Det utenrikspolitiske handlingsrommet blir mindre i alle fremtidsbildene. Den viktigste prioriteringen i norsk utenrikspolitikk bør være å hindre dramatiske klimaendringer fordi det vil undergrave norsk velstand, sikkerhet og internasjonal stabilitet. I siste del av artikkelen drøfter vi hvilke konsekvenser klimakrisen bør få for prioriteringer i utenrikspolitikken og for våre viktigste allianser. Vi argumenterer for at klimakrisen gir tunge argumenter for å knytte Norge enda nærmere til EU, og for å samarbeide tettere med Kina.
Introduction: Making Liberal Internationalism Great Again
At a time when liberal internationalism and institutions of multilateral cooperation arebeing dealt almost daily blows, this special issue revisits the notion and practice ofmiddle power liberal internationalism. The introduction suggests that while liberal inter-nationalism is far from dead, the challenges are serious and multiple. Reflecting on theseven essays contained in the volume, it argues that the biggest challenge for a futureliberal internationalism is not to double-down on its normative virtues, but critically toreflect on how it can be retooled to respond to new challenges.
"Contracting development: managerialism and consultants in intergovernmental organizations"
Intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) are now managed with an eye to managerial trends associated with transnational professionals, a view that has ramifications for how IGOs govern their policies and processes. Drawing on interviews and focus groups with staff in IGOs, we trace how managerialism in IGOs is changing how staff perceive work practices. We find that IGOs increasingly rely on consultants to enact policy scripts and to evaluate program success. This signals a subtle yet significant shift from expertise and bureaucratic impartiality, grounded in particular types of knowledge, to skills and flexibility to meet client demands and advance best practice norms according to prevailing world cultural frames. This managerial trend in IGOs is partly driven by stakeholder dynamics but is primarily a normative change in who is seen as having the authority to make claims over professional best practices. Such managerialism is contracting the development policy space. This contraction is partly driven by consultants, who defer to their peers and to donors rather than IGO staff and concerned member states. This work also depletes institutional memory for IGO operations. We trace how IGO staff perceive managerial trends and changes in work practices.
Liberale verdifellesskap og selvbilder i praksis: Hvordan Norge gikk til krig og hva vi kan lære
Hvilke lærdommer kan vi trekke av bombingen av Libya i 2011? Var krigføringen i tråd med krigens folkerett? Brøt norske myndigheter grunnloven i forbindelse med krigsdeltagelsen? Levde media opp til sitt samfunnsoppdrag så lenge krigføringen i Libya pågikk? Ble det norske folk holdt for narr om de egentlige årsakene til krigen? Og hva ble konsekvensene av Libya-krigen for nasjonen Libya, regionen og verdenssamfunnet? Libya: Krigens uutholdelige letthet setter et kritisk søkelys på Norges deltagelse i den Nato-ledete operasjonen i Libya. Blant forfatterne finner vi folkerettsjurister, historikere, militære, statsvitere og professorer i journalistikk og fredsforskning. Et felles utgangspunkt for alle bidragsyterne er spørsmålet om hva norske politikere, militære og det norske folk kan og bør lære av Norges første krig i Afrika.
The Politics of Diasporas and the Duty of Care: Legitimizing interventions through the protection of kin
The duty of care (DoC) is largely portrayed as being of a benevolent and liberal character, with welfare states aiding its citizens abroad. In this chapter Holm examines a more complex phenomenon involving the DoC: that of a state and its diaspora. Seeing Duty of Care in relation to diasporas poses a conceptual shift: often multinational in identification, with a perceived or real ‘homeland’, and at times with dual (legal) citizenship, diasporas may be sought protected under an extended, non-territorialized notion of belonging to a state’s citizenry. Looking at Russian rhetoric in the Georgia war in 2008 and the Crimean annexation and Ukraine crisis in 2014, Holm explores how the Duty of Care can be evoked rhetorically to defend diaspora groups by kin-states. In relation to a domestic audience, this prism proves highly effective, as the state portrays its actions as defending ‘their’ people abroad out of a moral necessity and responsibility for their kin. It also functions to dismiss international stigma and critique at home based on a perceived higher moral purpose. As in the case of diasporas in inter-state conflicts with Georgia and Ukraine, this turns the Duty of Care into a complicated, and potentially highly politicized, international matter. It also provides a communitarian alternative to the cosmopolitan R2P: in theory, any group can be defined as worth defending as one’s own, across and despite opposing claims to sovereignty. The chapter concludes with discussing the wider ramifications of diaspora group protection by kin-states for challenges to the liberal international order.
Ethnic Diversity in the Recruitment of Diplomats: Why MFAs Take the Issue Seriously
Diversity and its management have become an issue in all organisations. Ministries of foreign affairs (MFAs) do not escape the issue. In the 2000s, states decided to consider more ethnic diversity in the recruitment of their diplomats. In some countries, this new goal requires affirmative action programs. This article is based on three case studies. The first case study analyses two Western countries — France and Norway — where MFAs have to reflect the diversity of immigration in their societies. The second case study analyses the case of Brazil, a country where the legacy of slavery still causes discrimination in the recruitment of diplomats. The third case study analyses ethnic diversity in the MFAs of India and Singapore, which recognise multiculturalism or multiracialism. The study draws five comparative conclusions to generalise on why MFAs in the world cannot escape the challenge of ethnic diversity in their recruitment policy.
Algorithm for Producing Rankings Based on Expert Surveys
This paper develops an automated algorithm to process input data for segmented string relative rankings (SSRRs). The purpose of the SSRR methodology is to create rankings of countries, companies, or any other units based on surveys of expert opinion. This is done without the use of grading systems, which can distort the results due to varying degrees of strictness among experts. However, the original SSRR approach relies on manual application, which is highly laborious and also carries a risk of human error. This paper seeks to solve this problem by further developing the SSRR approach by employing link analysis, which is based on network theory and is similar to the PageRank algorithm used by the Google search engine. The ranking data are treated as part of a linear, hierarchical network and each unit receives a score according to how many units are positioned below it in the network. This approach makes it possible to efficiently resolve contradictions among experts providing input for a ranking. A hypertext preprocessor (PHP) script for the algorithm is included in the article’s appendix. The proposed methodology is suitable for use across a range of social science disciplines, especially economics, sociology, and political science.