Professorkvalifiseringens affektive økonomi. Styring, følelser og motstand

The Rise and Fall of Humanitarian Citizen Initiatives: A Simulation-Based Approach

Citizen Initiatives for Global Solidarity (CIGS) are small, ad hoc, volunteer organizations that arise in certain humanitarian and development contexts. They operate outside of traditional aid structures and may or may not cooperate with traditional government and nongovernmental organizations. Using agent-based modeling, we derive narrative-based, qualitative scenarios from simulation data to extend the theoretical discussions of CIGS as a phenomenon. The scenarios allow further discussion of the role that CIGS may play as development and humanitarian response actors outside of the traditional context-specific descriptions of CIGS that permeate the development literature. We find that scen…

Beyond crisis management? The role of Citizen Initiatives for Global Solidarity in humanitarian aid: the case of Lesvos

In recent years, what has been called citizen initiatives for global solidarity (CIGS) have grown considerably in numbers across Europe and beyond. Lately, CIGS have also received attention as they...

Localizing Global Solidarity: Humanitarian Aid in Lesvos

The so-called “refugee crisis” in Lesvos, Greece provides a poignant example of situated, local suffering that has called for the coordination of global resources to provide relief. Some of the first to respond were local and international Citizen Initiatives for Global Solidarity (CIGS). While a growing role for CIGS has been interpreted as a call for more global involvement, arguments for the increased localization of relief efforts suggest the need for aid agents to maintain a reflexive awareness of the potential for an influx of outside assistance to disempower those most affected. We argue that barriers to implementing the localization of humanitarian aid can be better understood by po…

Citizens as Actors in the Development Field: The Case of an Accidental Aid-Agent’s Activities in Aid-Land

AbstractThis article explores a so far little researched aspect of the Norwegian development aid – the privatised, personalised aid giving. Elsewhere in Europe, researchers have explored this phenomenon, which they refer to as citizen initiatives (CIs) for global solidarity [Pollet, I., R. Habraken, L. Schulpen and H. Huyse, 2014, The Accidental Aid Worker: A Mapping of Citizen Initiatives for Global Solidarity in Europe, Nijmegen: KU Leuven/HIVA and CIDIN]. This phenomenon coincides with a generalised crisis in the established state-sponsored international aid industry reflecting the extended financial crisis. Against the background of a first exploratory mapping of CIs in Norway, we discu…

The Role Of Elites In The Diffusion Of Social Norms Of Humanitarianism

Certain social norms evolve without punishment as conventions that do not adversely affect society. In this paper, we depart from the notion that humanitarianism is one such social norm, where peer pressure may be the only type of punishment that encourages individuals to conform. Using an agent-based modeling approach, we examine the role that networked elites have in diffusing a non-punishment-enforced norm through an artificial society. The model considers norm advocates who promote a norm of humanitarianism, elites who have wide networks to spread the new norm, and general individuals who evaluate the norm pushed from elites and adopted by their peers. The study finds that, regardless o…

Et kjønnet rom for akademisk skriving. Den vitenskapelige publiseringens sosiale organisering, sett fra ståstedet til kvinnelige førsteamanuenser ved Universitetet i Agder

I denne artikkelen bruker vi institusjonell etnografi til å utforske kvinnelige førsteamanuensers arbeidshverdager og forskningskarrierer ved Universitetet i Agder (UiA) og hvordan disse erfaringene er sosialt organiserte og kjønnede. Vi retter særlig fokus mot en utbredt utfordring med å finne/skape rom for akademisk skriving. Vi viser hvordan kvinnenes «sakte karrierer» er et resultat av et vell av sosialt koordinert «virksomhet» (Smith 2005) som kan forstås som viktig og riktig, både for kvinnene og folk rundt dem, for UiA og for samfunnet for øvrig. Vi viser hvordan kjønnede idealer som brukes lokalt ved UiA inngår i trans-lokale relasjoner. Disse idealene former kvinners hverdager og f…