GEO-Security: Governance, Geopolitics & Security

About the research group

Mission:

The GEO-Security research group advances comprehensive and critical approaches to vulnerability and resilience, positioning them at the core of governance, geopolitics, and security across local, national and international scales. Integrating perspectives from international relations, geography, and the broader social sciences, the group fosters inquiry that generates meaningful insights to inform decision-making and policy outcomes

Objectives:

1. Advance research on the intersections of territoriality, governance structures, and security risks, with a focus on critical infrastructure, lifeline vulnerabilities
   
2. Develop conceptual frameworks that explain the changing dimensions of geopolitics and security to enhance state and societal resilience to the challenges of our time.
   
3. Produce knowledge about threats to state and societal security as it relates to geopolitical developments, and how these impact formulations of foreign and security policy and diplomatic relations.
   
4. Strengthen partnerships with actors across all sectors and scales of society from local communities to policymakers to facilitate real-world solutions.

• MembersCopy linkCopied

  Members

  • Corine Wood-Donnelly
  • Beate Steinveg
  • Annelin Seppola
  • Torbjørn Pedersen
  • Elisabeth Pettersen
  • Håkan Sandersen
  • Martin Kossa
  • Bjørn Olav Knutsen (FFI/Nord)
  • Tanja Ellingsen
  • Ivar Svar Holand
  • Astrid Marie Holand
  • Zala Terlep Rogelj
  • Irene Barbon

  Associated PhD students

  • Eskil Jacobsen
  • Jason Bunderson
  • Tizian David Ziegler

  Associate members

  • Øystein Solvang (UiT)
  • Ingrid Agnete Medby (Newcastle University)
  • Amy Hill (Newcastle University)
  • Virga Popovaite (University of Lapland)
  • Marco Krüger (Tübingen University)
  • Emilie Wold (HHN)
  • Rune Elvegård (HHN)
  • Natalia Andreassen (HHN)
  • Eivind Junker
  • Charlotte Gehrke
• Research Focus and ThemesCopy linkCopied
  • Normative evolution of the international system: examining how rules, norms and institutions shape governance and security.
  • Explore how geopolitical change and international developments impact the formulation of foreign and security policy, as well as interstate and diplomatic relations.
  • Conceptual and geographic configurations of security, risk and vulnerability: investigating how these concepts are defined, spatialised and operationalised in different contexts.
  • Framings of disaster, crisis and preparedness: analysing how different actors construct, respond and recalibrate to the state of exception.

  Go to research projects
• Group activitiesCopy linkCopied
  • Research projects
  • Guest seminar series
  • Reading seminars
  • Papers in progress seminars
  • Edited volume: Crisis in our Times
• Media contactsCopy linkCopied

  Name of employee	Area of expertise	Language
  Beate Steinveg, associate professor	The High North/Arctic, international cooperation, Norwegian foreign and security policy, geopolitics, diplomacy	English, Norwegian
  Corine Wood-Donnelly, professor	The High North/Arctic, sovereignty, Arctic governance and policy, ocean politics, political legitimacy, resource politics	English, Swedish
  Bjørn Olav Haram Knutsen, associate professor	International cooperation, military strategy, security policy, NATO, EU, US and European security interests	English, Norwegian
  Tanja Ellingsen, førsteamanuensis	Hybrid threats, terrorism, extremism, conspiration theories, populism, authoritarian regimes, democratic decline, political violence, clash of civilizations, war and armed conflict.	English, Norwegian