SNORW-tag

The Polish Presidential Election 2020: which role does far-right politics (not) play?

In less than two weeks, and amid much turbulence, Poland will choose its next President. Far-right politics plays a complex role in the election.

Why Black Pete matters: Institutional racism and police violence in the Netherlands

Black Lives Matter has shaken up political discussions about racism across the globe. In the Netherlands, it has led to yet another escalation around the ‘Black Pete’ controversy, Iris Beau Segers argues that the empty rhetoric, inaction and opportunism of (radical) right politicians indicates their continued reluctance to tackle institutional racism at its roots.

How Right-Wing Violence in Western Europe Changed in 2019

While the year 2019 in Western Europe was neither very violent in terms of fatal attacks, nor particularly deadly in terms of fatalities, we witnessed a worrying emerging global trend of right-wing lone-actor terrorists carrying out, or trying to carry out, mass-casualty attacks.

The EU’s global response to Covid-19: The challenge of promoting ownership

An effective external response to Covid-19 by the EU must be rooted in the requirements and priorities of southern partners, argue Niels Keijzer and David Black.

Another brick in the wall: Covid-19 and the crisis of the liberal order

Covid-19 risks being another hit to the liberal world order, argues GLOBUS researcher Sonia Lucarelli.

Translating economic growth into sustainable development in Africa during Covid-19

EU aid policies in Africa must continue to address the broader challenge of African socio-economic development while dealing with the specific challenges of Covid-19, writes GLOBUS researcher Pundy Pillay.

Do you think we know whom we share this planet with? Then you are mistaken.

Learning from corona: Climate change, security and justice

Just as the coronavirus, climate change is an existential threat that requires urgent measures. So why are we not treating it with the same kind of urgency, asks GLOBUS researcher Thomas Diez.

The EU and Covid-19: Overcoming the lockdown mindset on migration

While the EU seems even less inclined to change its restrictive approach to migration during the coronavirus, the pandemic offers a window of opportunity to advance measures that would fit with the EU’s purported stance as a liberal vanguard in the international landscape, argues GLOBUS researcher Michela Ceccorulli.

Food fraud: Do you really know what fish species you are eating?

When you buy fish from a store, or when you are served a fish dish in a restaurant, you expect to get what the label says or to eat what you ordered. Unfortunately, the reality is sometimes far from expectations.

CasaPound Italia: Contemporary Extreme Right Politics

How does a relatively small far right group, with little electoral support, attract international media attention and influence national politics? A recently published book by C-REX researchers Pietro Castelli Gattinara and Caterina Froio uses the example of CasaPound Italia to illustrate the new and often surprising forms that right-wing extremism is taking across the globe.

Quarantining Hungarian Democracy

The Covid-19 crisis is exploited by Viktor Orbán to consolidate power and undermine democracy. The increasingly authoritarian Prime Minister has used the pandemic to further authoritarian ends. Democratic backsliding in Hungary has for long been a cause of concern for the European Union.

Ensuring meaningful stakeholder involvement in the EU's external policies

While engagement with stakeholders is an increasingly popular approach to national and international decision-making, the EU needs to exercise greater caution when exporting multistakeholder arrangements to other countries, argues Diana Potjomkina.

Who cares about pellet saithe?

There’s one thing we can say about men from Northern Norway that are over 60: They sure care about pellet saithe. And not just a little – they care about it in a way that is statistically more significant than everyone else in Norway.

What is going on in Delhi and how is this connected to right-wing extremism?

Over this past week, the Indian capital of Delhi has been home to violence between Hindus and Muslims with a rising death toll each day. Eviane Leidig shows not only how this is the most recent manifestation of a legacy of right-wing extremist activity in India, but also that the response of global far right actors suggest a more disturbing connection between the extreme right in India and the West.

Matured cheese and ham - yes please, but what about matured clipfish?

A Norwegian google search for "matured food" displays results for balsamic vinegar, cured meat, fermented trout and many types of cheese. Why isn’t clipfish on the list?

Blackface in the name of tradition: the controversy around the Dutch ‘Sinterklaas’ festivities

In the aftermath of the festive month, Dutch PhD candidate Iris Beau Segers looks back on the annually recurring issue of Black Pete in the Netherlands, whose blackfaced appearance has been at the heart of a controversial public debate for almost a decade.

Development of right-wing violence in Western Europe

The RTV trend report recently published by C-REX shows that, since the 1990s, severe forms of right-wing terrorism and violence in Western Europe have decreased, particularly gang-related and unorganized forms of violence. Today, so-called ‘lone actors’ carry out most of the violence, a trend that has been reinforced by the emergence of various online platforms.

Norwegian salmon is a huge success story – but could it get even bigger?

The salmon industry creates thousands of jobs along the coast. Its export value is twice that of all other Norwegian fish combined. Could more unique products add even more value?

Is private finance a panacea for sustainable development?

The EU has pushed for a strong role of the private sector to finance the sustainable development goals. However, an increased role of the private sector might be at odds with the EUs fundamental rights commitments, argues Sunniva Hustad.

Do organisms find food when the sea ice retreats?

In times of climate change and retreating sea ice, important research questions are for example: How important are sea ice algae as a food source for organisms such as copepods, krill and fish? Are they affected by the sea ice retreat and if so, how will that affect the functioning of the Arctic ecosystem?

Far Right Politics Has Changed. So Should We!

As far right politics is becoming an ever bigger part of mainstream politics, opponents and scholars of the far right have to leave their 20th century thinking behind and critically review their received wisdom. What might have been true in the 1990s, might no longer be true today. Taboos have been broken, preferences have shifted, and the broader political context has become much more accepting to far right politics and politicians.

What do crabs and fruit have in common?

Picking frost flowers in the Polar night

A couple of days ago when we were sailing between two of our process stations, we came across a beautiful icy garden covered with frost flowers. So we decided to go picking them.

Hot topics from the cold

More than 75% of the Earth’s surface is occupied by cold environments. Cold environments are hot spots for the organisms living there.

Care for you core!

We have recently drilled 34 ice cores from the sea ice. We expected to find very little life inside the ice, but we were proven wrong.

Do the animals at the bottom of the ocean know it’s dark season?

Do the animals at the bottom of the ocean, that might never have been exposed to sunlight, notice the dark season as we do? It seems logical to assume that the polar night should go by completely unnoticed by them. But it doesn’t.

In the Arctic Ocean and on the shoulders of giants

Blowing in the Arctic wind

Imaging driving with an open cabriolet car at 90km/h inside a gigantic freezer box at -25 degrees C with all windows opens. This does not sound comfortable and most people would not be part of such a situation voluntarily. But this has been the conditions we had been facing for the first days of our Q4 expedition.

How to make your own luxury caviar

If you are lucky enough to catch a salmon that is full of roe, you must never throw the roe away!

Unique Challenges at the start of an Arctic winter Expedition

Here's what happened when I served my friends chocolate with seaweed

An impromptu session of new product testing with a group of friends in northern Norway ensued after I returned from a seaweed trade fair with new product samples of chocolate infused with seaweed or chocolate seaweed.

Hard disks full of data despite ice, darkness and freezing temperatures

Where are we?

The heat

Night watch

There is something magical about working night shifts on a boat. And magically tiring.

Tales from the deep

What IS this mooring business?

Searching in the dark

From tornadoes in Oklahoma to Arctic survival training

Heritage conservation and Climate Change: Introducing the Future of our past in the Norwegian context.

Transitions are changes in the way of do things, and to stimulate them it is necessary to expand our understanding of the world and its realities, so we can create new ways to relate to them. Although such proposals seem rather theoretical and abstract, this article will discuss how such transition is happening in the cultural heritage field.

A critical look at the EU's approach to peacekeeping

The EU has been commended for its engagement with women and the local indigenous population in its mission in Chad. However, from a postcolonial perspective, it can be argued that the EU's personnel displayed specific Western assumptions in their operation, explains Lea Augenstein.

Who is responsible for sustainable development?

Should past emissions matter when allocating responsibility for sustainable development? Former GLOBUS MA student Sigrid Jerpstad has analysed the EU's view on responsibility when negotiating the global sustainable development agenda.

Trafficking in human beings: A threat to European state security?

After the so-called ‘migrant-crisis’, the EU has described trafficking in human beings as a threat to EU states, societies and economies. What implications does this shift have for the victims of trafficking? GLOBUS MA Vera Skjetne discusses the recent turn in EU’s trafficking policies.

Into the Subglacial Tunnel

A POST FROM THE SUB-GLACIAL BLOG: After a steep walk up the mountain, we arrived in front of the tunnel entrance. There we stood, in shorts and t-shirts, suddenly realising that the heat and sunshine we were used to until now were about to become only a distant memory. With our winter coats, hats and gloves on, we followed Miriam as she opened the door leading into the mountain.

Arrival at Svartisen

A POST FROM THE SUB GLACIAL BLOG: On the 17th of July, our advisor Miriam Jackson and the three of us (French students Perrine, Sophia and Juliette) made an excursion from their internship in glaciology at the NVE in Oslo to the Svartisen Subglacial Laboratory.

Does the consumer take food for granted?

In my career as a researcher and head of food research I have been met with quizzical looks many times. Is it possible to research food? Most people see the need to understand more about nutrition and the body’s need for nutrients. But what else could there be to research?

Would you like salt fish or klippfisk for dinner today?

That’s really something you should have thought of yesterday or even the day before.

How the EU combines normative and consequentialist motivations in its climate policy

The EU is often viewed as a key global actor in efforts to tackle climate change, but are the EU’s actions motivated by altruistic concerns for the environment or rather by pragmatic political and economic reasons, asks GLOBUS researcher Franziskus von Lucke.

Bring the boys into the kitchen!

Boys are less involved in the preparation of food than girls are, according to a survey Nofima carried out among preschool children. If boys are encouraged to cook or prepare food more often, it can help improve equality and public health in a dietary perspective in the future.

World Heritage in Danger… What Danger?

Beyond a state-centric right to protect human rights: Operation Mediterranea by land and sea

Who will protect the human rights of migrants at sea when the state fails to do so? GLOBUS researcher Michela Ceccorulli (University of Bologna) discusses the role of the non-governmental project Mediterranea Saving Humans in light of the recent criminalisation of humanitarian efforts in Italy.

On the hunt for flying fish

“If you get sick and need to throw up, that’s fine, but if you don’t then that’s fine too,” says the skipper, laughing through his big smile, before setting off on the voyage taking nine excited business professionals and R&D representatives out on his boat towards the open sea. The location is Macau in northern Brazil. The goal: to harvest flying fish roe.

Charles-Joseph Minard’s map of Napoleon’s flawed Russian campaign: An ever-current classic

Brazil’s declining climate ambitions: A severe blow to global climate governance

The new Brazilian government’s seeming neglect of the climate issue causes instability in international climate negotiations, and puts pressure on other large economies like India and China to help fulfil the goals of the Paris Agreement, argues GLOBUS Researcher Solveig Aamodt. But are these countries up to the task?