PRIO Blogs
The Hype, Delusions and Risks of the Arctic Geopolitics
The surge of political attention to the Arctic may appear counter-intuitive to the experts overtaxed with assessing the consequences of the global trade war, perplexed by the deadlock of the Ukraine War, and frustrated by the deepening indifferenc...
PRIO Blogs
Global Trade Wars: All Against All — But Where is Africa?
The trade war, unilaterally launched by Donald Trump on April 1, 2025, will go down in global history as a hostile act against globalization and international rules — rules that were once defended by the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Unit...
PRIO Blogs
Decision Point for Putin is Set Too Close for His Comfort
Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Steven Witkoff, U.S. President Donald Trump’s key negotiator, last Friday, in St. Petersburg, likely to buy himself more time before making any concessions. On Sunday, Russian missiles struck the Ukrainian...
PRIO Blogs
Putin’s Warpath Goes Through Arctic
Russia’s war against Ukraine is stuck in a rigid deadlock. The prospect of agreeing on a ceasefire, which had appeared within reach a couple of weeks ago, has, however, become distant and blurred.
PRIO Blogs
What Now for Humanitarian Studies?
Humanitarianism has long been in crisis, but since early 2025 the sector has been experiencing an unprecedented organizational, institutional, normative, and political collapse. As scholars active in the broad, inter-, and multidisciplinary field ...
PRIO Blogs
Triumphalism in Moscow About Setback in Peace-Making for Ukraine Could be Short-Lived
Moscow’s mouthpieces competed to celebrate and ridicule the individuals involved in the February 28 talks in Washington, D.C. between Ukraine and the United States. To the surprise of many, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy left the White Ho...
PRIO Blogs
Russia Refuses to Make Meaningful Step on Road to Peace
U.S., European, and Ukrainian peace-making policies are now aligned at a possible breakthrough point, as differences in means and methods transmute into complementarities. This fast evolution starkly contrasts with the immobility of Russia’s posit...
Monday, 24 Feb 2025
Top UN Middle East Envoy Tor Wennesland Joins PRIO
Veteran diplomat Tor Wennesland joined the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) as Practitioner in Residence in January.
PRIO Blogs
Contesting the AI-Cybersecurity Nexus: Lessons Learned from the United Kingdom
In an age where so-called artificial intelligence (AI) seems to revolutionise every corner of our lives, it’s no surprise that its intersection with cybersecurity has become a major focus for governments worldwide. Where cybersecurity and AI were ...
PRIO Blogs
How Colombia’s Disarmament Process Transformed Weapons Into Symbols of Peace
In 2016, the Colombian government and the guerrilla group FARC-EP ended their five decade-long war. As part of the peace agreement, FARC-EP’s weapons had to be collected, a process known as disarmament. By 2017, UN observers had received and remov...
Security Dialogue
Poison: The politics behind pesticides and chemical weapons
Compounds labelled as chemical weapons and pesticides share common active chemical ingredients, which function as nerve agents to humans and insects whether they are considered a form of warfare or a farming staple. Lice: Image from Pixabay Why ar...
PRIO Blogs
Trump Vol. 2 Will Impact Global Development
The United States is by far the world’s largest provider of foreign aid, but it is completely unclear whether and how this will continue. Trump speaks of quickly achieving peace but at the same time he threatens neighboring countries. One thing is...
PRIO Blogs
This Is What Norwegians Think About Emergency Alerts on Mobile Phones
The mobile phone has become an indispensable part of our daily lives. We carry it with us everywhere, and it’s a crisis when it’s lost. Now it has also taken on a new role: alerting us to emergencies. On Wednesday, January 8, emergency...
Tuesday, 10 Dec 2024
PRIO in the Republic of Korea for its Action with Women and Peace Conference
On December 10th, PRIO Research Director Louise Olsson and GPS Coordinator Stine A. Bosheim contributed to the Action with Women and Peace Conference (AWP), in Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Friday, 29 Nov 2024
Thomas Hylland Eriksen: Words of Gratitude
On 27 November, PRIO received the sad news that Professor of social anthropology Thomas Hylland Eriksen passed away.
PRIO Blogs
Authorship and Involuntary Attribution: How and Why Should We Contest AI Manipulation?
Technology is radically changing the work and role of scholars and the function of academic publishing. Fake and fabricated content (data, facts, arguments, claims, conclusions) undermines the foundations of knowledge in a democratic society. Faki...
PRIO Blogs
Putin’s ‘Three Escalations’ Affect Prospect of Peace in Ukraine
Russia’s strategy in executing its aggressive war against Ukraine, passing the 1,000-day mark last week, puts the country’s economy, society, and armed forces under enormous pressure that Moscow’s militaristic propaganda cannot quite cover. As Rus...
PRIO Blogs
Protection of Civilians in Crisis: Geneva Conventions at 75
With the devastating news from Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan among other wars, we witness a crisis of the international regime for protecting civilians in armed conflict. However, this is not a total collapse but a return to the troubling world that the...
PRIO Blogs
Making Women Combatants Visible: Steps Towards Gender-Responsive Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration
In October the Security Council met for its annual Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Open Debate under the theme of “Women Building Peace in a Changing Environment.” Despite the WPS agenda’s goals for including women in all aspects of security and ...
PRIO Blogs
Putin’s Much Ado About the BRICS Summit
The BRICS summit on October 22–24, held in Kazan, Russia, was met with great fanfare in Russian propaganda, which hailed it for its “epochal” significance. The BRICS summit, held in Kazan, was met with great fanfare in Russian propaganda. Propagan...
PRIO Blogs
Civil Society Participation in International Criminal Justice
The International Criminal Court (ICC) is in trouble. To commentators and observers of the Court, one crisis seems to lead on to the next, so that the field of international criminal justice has been described as being in ‘perpetual crisis’. Follo...
PRIO Blogs
No Shortcut to Hard Road to Peace in Ukraine
As Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine approaches its 33rd month, no drastic changes are expected on the battlefield. Ukraine has intensified its behind-the-scenes multilateral political maneuvering, as evidenced by Ukrainian President Volodym...
PRIO Blogs
Unwinnable Wars, Risks of Escalation, and the Nuclear Taboo
The announcement of the Nobel Peace Prize on October 11 coincided with a dangerous phase in two long wars — Israel’s war against Hamas and Hezbollah and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine — that are both poised for escalation. This ...
Thursday, 3 Oct 2024
Nobel Peace Prize 2024: PRIO Director’s Updated List Announced
The Director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), Henrik Urdal, announced his updated list for the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize today, with election observers topping the list.
PRIO Blogs
Putin’s Nuclear Blackmail Goes Doctrinal
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced neither surprising nor radical revisions in Russia’s nuclear doctrine on September 25 (Kremlin.ru, September 25). He committed to revising the government’s vague document back in June. In the ensuing mont...
Wednesday, 25 Sep 2024
Call for Papers: Theorizing Migration and Social Mobility in Asia and Beyond
Focusing on the Asian context, we seek to explore the interactions between multiple forms of migrations and processes of social mobility, whether upward, downward, or sideways. The Call for Papers is open till 15 October 2024.
Popular Article
Legacy of Putin's war on terror weighs heavily on modern Russia
Popular article in Eurasia Daily Monitor
PRIO Blogs
Spectre of Escalation Over the Ukraine War
The first striking sentence of the Communist Manifesto issued in 1848 – A spectre is haunting Europe – the spectre of communism – has long become a historical anecdote. Even the leftist fringe cherishes no illusions about the unity of the proletar...
Report – Other
Foxes Guarding The Henhouse? The IGAD Mediation for South Sudan, 2013-15
PRIO Blogs
Moscow Takes the Measure of Western Vacillations
Since the start of Russia’s war against Ukraine, the US-led Western coalition has demonstrated remarkable determination in supporting Kyiv. Yet, every practical step in providing military support to defiant Ukraine has involved protracted delibera...