Since late 2019, the world has sought – frantically at times – to appropriate policies for respon... more Since late 2019, the world has sought – frantically at times – to appropriate policies for responding to the coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19). This Working Paper reviews the political significance of Covid-19 in order to understand the ways in which it challenges the existing domestic order, international health governance actors and, more fundamentally, the circulation-based modus operandi of the present world order. The analysis begins with the argument that contagious diseases should be regarded as complex open-ended phenomena with various features; they are not reducible to biology and epidemiology alone. In particular, politics and social reactions – in the form of panic and blamecasting, for example – are prominent features with clear historical patterns, and should not, for the sake of efficient health governance, be treated as aspects extraneous to the disease itself. The Working Paper further highlights that when a serious infectious disease spreads, a “threat” is very often externalized into a culturally meaningful “foreign” entity. Pandemics tend to be territorialized, nationalized, ethnicized, and racialized. This has also been the case with Covid-19.
The role of the community of foreign policy intellectuals and academics is very important for the... more The role of the community of foreign policy intellectuals and academics is very important for the practice of foreign policy. Instead of there being separate archipelagos in terms of culture, policy-making and research communities often share the same epistemic-...
Since late 2019, the world has sought – frantically at times – to appropriate policies for respon... more Since late 2019, the world has sought – frantically at times – to appropriate policies for responding to the coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19). This Working Paper reviews the political significance of Covid-19 in order to understand the ways in which it challenges the existing domestic order, international health governance actors and, more fundamentally, the circulation-based modus operandi of the present world order. The analysis begins with the argument that contagious diseases should be regarded as complex open-ended phenomena with various features; they are not reducible to biology and epidemiology alone. In particular, politics and social reactions – in the form of panic and blamecasting, for example – are prominent features with clear historical patterns, and should not, for the sake of efficient health governance, be treated as aspects extraneous to the disease itself. The Working Paper further highlights that when a serious infectious disease spreads, a “threat” is very often externalized into a culturally meaningful “foreign” entity. Pandemics tend to be territorialized, nationalized, ethnicized, and racialized. This has also been the case with Covid-19.
The role of the community of foreign policy intellectuals and academics is very important for the... more The role of the community of foreign policy intellectuals and academics is very important for the practice of foreign policy. Instead of there being separate archipelagos in terms of culture, policy-making and research communities often share the same epistemic-...
Neglect of the cross-cutting confluences between different domains of security can lead to insula... more Neglect of the cross-cutting confluences between different domains of security can lead to insular notions of global security as well as to lost opportunities for security sensitive contributions to the adjoining issue areas. This article attempts to overview the patterns of interactions during three security scenarios of early 2003: wars, as, for example, the War against Terror and the war in Iraq; pandemics such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS); and air mobility. The overview approach is meant to draw attention to the synoptic interplay between global security scenarios that go beyond the usual disciplinary and conceptual boundaries separating security studies, global health and mobility infrastructures. How does the context of war amplify other security concerns? What were the synoptic interactions within temporally situated ‘bundles’ of security-related concerns? How did global air mobility politics and pandemic politics construct their combined security problematiques? The main research findings point to the relatively unique yet momentary qualities of the emergent nexus of security scenarios. This sheds light on the difficulties of managing pandemic diseases as purely epidemiological processes, on the complexities of securing global air mobility networks, and on how tense situations are prone to lead to speculative projections as people’s fears find different somatic, material and political manifestations. The primary material for the textual analysis is provided by World Health Organization’s SARS chronology.
The complex process of co-evolution between humans, their social structures and biological diseas... more The complex process of co-evolution between humans, their social structures and biological disease agents have from time to time established relationships between the three. Recently, one such set of paths has opened up faster and closer global connections. As new and more inclusive approaches emerge from the shadow of strict intra-disciplinary containment, it is tempting to formulate the relationship between epidemics and international relations in new terms deriving from new metaphors. The argument that components central to international relations (state, sovereignty, power) do not associate with disease can be viewed sceptically. Throughout history, epidemics have had a direct impact on political interaction by vindicating, weakening, testing, and moulding international relations. This paper examines the past relationships between epidemics and international relations, and illustrates these interactions with the example of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (mad cow disease) and its link with human Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
Studies of small state foreign policy tend to draw relatively bleak conclusions when it comes to ... more Studies of small state foreign policy tend to draw relatively bleak conclusions when it comes to small state agency. However, I will examine alternative and more positive modalities of small state agency. One such modality is agility, the strategic maneuverability to take advantage of a chancy environment. Besides leading to dangerous rigidities and biases, particular types of foreign policy imageries and heuristics may also facilitate experimental and agile agency. In studying this possibility, Finland is chosen as an illustrative case because historically Finland has faced a particularly constraining geopolitical context and because it has managed to adapt to multiple upheavals and to different geopolitical contexts. The emphasis is on the heuristic dynamics inherent in Finnish foreign policy culture that have allowed it to actively meet the emerging challenges. Instead of taking a detailed historical approach, I seek to understand the role of the relatively flexible and combinable embodied cultural models, i.e. thick images. They allow for agency- related experimentation that may bring added value that allows Finland to exceed the constraints of the brute geopolitical position. After reviewing multiple embodied foreign policy images, I will use them to analyse New Year’s speeches by the Finnish Presidents Ahtisaari and Halonen in order to see how the fickle present is made to resonate innovatively with the known, commonplace, and mythical.
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