I’m a Senior Research Fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI), until September 2023 also a PhD fellow at the University of Copenhagen, Department of Political Science and the Danish Institute of International Studies (DIIS). I’ve had a monthly column on global politics for the Norwegian newspaper Klassekampen since 2020 (2017-2020 for Dagsavisen), and was between 2018 and 2024 Editor in Chief of the Scandinavian-language International Relations journal Internasjonal Politikk. I’m also a board member of the Human Rights House Foundation (2018-). I have lived/studied/worked in Wales, Egypt, the US, Russia, Kazakhstan, England, Tajikistan and Denmark, but am now permanently based in Oslo, Norway.

I work on questions of global order and global governance, ideology and ideological contestation in world politics, the function of different liberalisms and dominant state ideals in international politics historically and at the present time, tensions between liberal-democratic values and security and warfare, Western (liberal) exceptionalism and liberal self-perceptions, the global ideologies and networks of illiberal, reactionary, Far Right, and antiliberal forces, non-Western and radical right perspectives on global order, and the different meanings of sovereignty, morality, and (mis)recognition in global politics. I am particularly interested in social and political theory related to the international sphere, ideology, and idea(l)s of the state.

I have since 2017 been a part of international research projects and research networks that look at the implications of Far Right, ‘illiberal’, postliberal, and reactionary visions of global order, focusing particularly on the Far Right and ‘New Right’s’ international ideology, visions, and relationship to liberalisms in the US, Russia, and Europe, and official Russian and Chinese perspectives on global order. In short, my empirical work deals with critically examining both the historical and present-day function of international liberalisms and state ideals in global politics, and ‘illiberal’, anti-liberal, reactionary, and Far Right ideology and global ideas, and their implications for global order.

My doctoral thesis, a monograph (2018-2022, defended after maternity leave September 2023), is titled Towards a Social Theory of International Ideology, Ideological Scripts, and Counter-Ideology. Rethinking ‘Liberal International Order’ and the Far Right’s critique. How does ideology work in relation to the state as a legal and political subject and the international as a distinct realm, and what specific forms of resistance does the dominance of an ideology create that is distinct from other forms of resistance? Theoretically, it is about understanding how ideologies as realized ideal world views function in structuring the international through the state as a legal and political subject - and how projects of resistance differ depending on what they negate, both in form, content, and consequences. Empirically, I historicize specific forms of dominant liberal international ideologies after 1945 and 1989 and what I theorize more broadly as counter-ideological movements. What characterized the dominant liberal internationalism of the post-1945 UN Charter era, what structures and relations of power did it reproduce, and what changed (and didn’t change) within international society after 1989 with the declared End of History? For the counter-ideological movements I look at the Radical Right’s internationalism in the US, Russia, and Europe, their ideological critique and their ideological visions, and how where that intersects with other prominent so-called reactionary perspectives on global order. What do Far Right, postliberal, ‘illiberal’, and reactionary movements entail for global order and liberal internationalism?

The thesis and my work is theoretically situated in interdisciplinary dialogue with global historical sociology, international relations theory, social theory, critical international law, and realist political philosophy. I am especially interested in the implications of thinking through the world on sociologically materialist terms, with a particular attention to ideology. In relation to political theory, the thesis deals with the concepts of forms of resistance, ideology, and realist and radical politics.

I was part of the Velux-funded research project ‘World of the Right’ at DIIS (led by Vibeke Schou Tjalve), and led a multiyear policy research project at NUPI for the Norwegian Ministry of Defence on Far Right and New Right international politics in Europe, Russia and the US (2018-2022). At NUPI I am now part of the project ‘A Conceptual History of International Relations’ (CHOIR) funded by the Norwegian Research Council, as well as ANGER, on anger in global politics, also funded by the Norwegian Research Council.

Please follow the links above to see academic publications, my column on international affairs [in Norwegian, some available through external translation in Danish and English], work in progress and more. I can be reached at mh@nupi.no.