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If the Bomb Never Explodes, That Does Not Mean It Leaves No Trace
Why the environmental cost of nuclear deterrence belongs in the security debate There is a rather strange system of accounting in nuclear policy. We carefully count warheads and missiles, range and flight time, and the capacity to launch a retaliatory strike, yet we are far less likely to count the land, water and human lives…
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From Minsk to Vilnius: Transnational Repression, the Case of Maksim
The European Parliament warns that modern transnational repression often appears as a chain of seemingly lawful decisions. Maksim’s story shows how this mechanism can already operate inside the European Union—gradually depriving a former Belarusian political prisoner of his safety, livelihood, and hope. Why Contemporary Transnational Repression in Europe Is Almost Impossible to Recognize For many…
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Reconceptualising Care: Why Democratic Theory Needs Care
Why do democratic institutions weaken even when they remain formally intact? This article argues that democracy depends not only on elections and laws, but also on care—the social practices that cultivate trust, participation and the capacities citizens need to sustain democratic life. Democracy is often judged by the strength of its institutions, yet institutions alone…
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Reconceptualising Democracy: Democracy as Everyday Practice
What makes democracy endure after elections are over? This feminist analysis argues that democratic resilience is built through everyday practices of care, trust, participation and solidarity, showing that institutions survive only when the social relationships sustaining them remain strong. Why do democracies weaken even when elections, constitutions and courts remain in place? This article explores…
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What Is Politics? Beyond Institutions and Elections
Politics is more than governments, elections and institutions. This article explores how feminist political thought redefines the political by connecting everyday life, care, lived experience and social relations with democracy, power and participation—revealing where political change truly begins. Politics is often reduced to elections, governments and institutions—but this leaves much of democratic life unexplained. This…
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The War in Ukraine and the Crisis of Masculinity: Impacts on Society and the Path to Peacebuilding
How does war reshape ideas of manhood—and why does that matter for peace? This analysis explores how the war in Ukraine reinforces militarized masculinity, deepens social divisions, fuels violence against women, and marginalizes those who reject aggression, while highlighting pathways toward inclusive peacebuilding. The war in Ukraine has intensified more than armed conflict—it has accelerated…
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OUR HOUSE: Rethinking Politics Through Feminist Perspectives
Democracy is shaped not only by institutions but by everyday life. This essay explores how feminist political analysis broadens conventional understandings of democracy, security, peace and participation, arguing that care, lived experience and social relations are essential to building resilient, inclusive and democratic societies. Introduction Contemporary political analysis continues to rely predominantly on institutional frameworks…
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Humanitarian Assistance as the Restoration of Human Dignity and Social Trust
Beyond food and shelter, humanitarian aid can help people reclaim dignity, trust, and hope for the future. Introduction Over the past six years of working with refugees, forced migrants, deserters, conscientious objectors, former military personnel, and people affected by war and political repression, we have come to understand that humanitarian assistance is far more than…
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Conscientious Objection, Former Combatants and Democratic Security: Preventing the Reproduction of War in Eastern Europe
Context Core challenge: War creates not only destruction, but also the people through whom it can return. Security rationale: Supporting conscientious objectors, deserters and former combatants is not only a humanitarian or social policy concern. It is an investment in preventing future violence and reducing the risk of renewed escalation. Target groups: Former combatants, conscientious…
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Those Who Never Make It into the History Books
They left no monuments, won no medals, and rarely appear in history books. Yet their quiet courage may be among war’s most important stories. When we speak about war, we tend to think first of shattered cities, of lives lost beneath bombardment, of shifting borders, or of armies colliding on the battlefield. Yet every war…
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How EU public funds risk enabling environmental degradation and militarisation in the Neris river basin
The Neris River – known upstream in Belarus as the Viliya – is a transboundary ecosystem of high ecological value. It is also a case where EU public funding frameworks are being positioned in ways that risk enabling outcomes that directly contradict the environmental objectives they are meant to support. Flowing from Belarus through Vilnius…