Skip to main content

Skip to main menu

Skip to search

Skip to sidemenu

NUPI
Frontpage News Staff Events Publications Contact Help
 
A A A Norwegian Nynorsk English
 
  • Whole of NUPI
  • Person
  • Publication
  • Library

Reidar Visser

 
 
nupi.no Activities Department of International Politics Reidar Visser

Reidar Visser [Senior Research Fellow]

E-mail:
rvSPAMFILTER@nupi.no
Direct:
(+47)22 99 40 16
Post address:
Pb 8159 Dep, 0033 Oslo
Visiting address:
C.J. Hambros plass 2 D
Download High Resolution Photos
Image
 
Current research

Reidar Visser specialises in the history of the state system of the modern Middle East, regionalist movements, the politics of city states, and historiography in politics. His work on the question of decentralisation and federalism in southern Iraq is available from the website historie.org. 

Engaged in the research project  Iraq's future on Iraqi terms  .

Formal education
[2003]
D. Phil., University of Oxford
[1995]
Cand. polit., University of Bergen
Professional experience
[1996]
Research Fellow, NUPI
 

Publications [vis kronologisk]

Articles (in books and journals)
  • Visser, Reidar (2009). New Non-State Players and Implications for Regional Security: The Case of the Shiite Religious Establishment of Iraq,

    SAIS Review vol. 29, no.2 (Summer-Fall 2009)

    . The Johns Hopkins University Press.p. 11-20. The main argument outlined in this article is that the Shiite religious establishment in Iraq remains reluctant in its interactions with state institutions, and continues to fear that its transnational character and unique legitimacy worldwide could become compromised by too close an association with the temporal governments of individual countries.
  • Visser, Reidar (2009). Proto-political conceptions of ‘Iraq’ in late Ottoman times,

    International Journal of Contemporary Iraqi Studies, Volume 3, Number 2

    . Intellect Ltd..p. 143-154. This article criticizes the so-called ‘artificiality paradigm’ concerning the emergence of the modern state on Iraq, according to which the kingdom of Iraq that came into being in 1921 was nothing but a random collection of Ottoman provinces that had little in common. On the basis of documents from the late Ottoman period, the article shows that the opposite appears to be the case.
  • Visser, Reidar (2009). Europeisk Irak-politikk,

    i Rieker, Pernille og Walter Emanuel Carlsnæs [red.] Nye utfordringer for europeisk sikkerhetspolitikk. Aktører, instrumenter og operasjoner

    . Oslo, Universitetsforlaget.p. 207-216. Kapittelet drøfter europeisk Irak-politikk på ett utvalgt område: Europas overordnede syn på Irak som en politisk enhet og dens levedyktighet.
  • Visser, Reidar (2008). Taming the Hegemonic Power: SCIRI and the Evolution of US Policy in Iraq,

    International Journal of Contemporary Iraqi Studies vol. 2, no. 1

    . Bristol, Intellect.p. 31-51. This article discusses the historical development of the United States' special relationship with the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), one of the Shi'ite religious parties of Iraq.
  • Visser, Reidar (2008). Historical Myths of a Divided Iraq,

    in Survival, vol. 50, no. 2

    . Abingdon,Routledge Journals.p. 95-106. This article challenges the conventional view that Iraq is an "artificial" creation and points out the substantial pre-modern roots of a centralised, multi-ethnic Iraqi state with Baghdad as its capital.
  • Visser, Reidar (2008). The Western Imposition of Sectarianism on Iraqi Politics,

    in Arab Studies Journal vol. 16 no. 1

    . Washington DC,Georgetown University.p. 83-99.
  • Visser, Reidar (2007). Ethnicity, Federalism and the Idea of Sectarian Citizenship in Iraq,

    in International Review of the Red Cross, vol. 89, nr. 868

    . Cambridge,Cambridge University Press.p. 809-822. The article discusses the “ethnic paradigm” that currently prevails in analyses of Iraqi history and politics.
  • Visser, Reidar (2007). The Surge, the Shiites and Nation Building in Iraq,

    Terrorism Monitor volume 5, Issue 17

    . Washington D.C.,The Jamestown Foundation.
  • Visser, Reidar (2007). Basra, the Reluctant Seat of Shiastan,

    Middle East Report , no. 242.

    http://www.merip.org/mer/mer242/visser.html

     

     

    . On Basra resistance to the scheme for a single Shiite federal entity.
  • Visser, Reidar (2007). Other People's Maps,

    The Wilson Quarterly, Winter 2007.

    http://www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=wg.essay&seeay_id=215618

     

     

    . On the parallels between US partition plans for post-war Iraq and the Sykes-Picot Agreement of World War I.
  • Visser, Reidar (2006). Sentralisme i Irak: en overlevning fra mandatperioden?,

    Babylon: Journal on the Middle East and North Africa, vol. 4, no. 1

    English text available at: http://www.historiae.org/Maliki.asp

    . p. 28-35.
  • Visser, Reidar (2006). Osmanli eyalet sinirlari, Sii federalizmi ve Iraktaki enerji anlasmazligi,

    Stratejik Analiz

    English text available at: http://www.historiae.org/vilayet.asp

    Turkish text available at: http://www.historiae.org/documents/Ottoman.pdf

    . p. 83-90.
  • Visser, Reidar (2004). Shi'i Perspectives on a Federal Iraq: Territory, Community and Ideology in Conceptions of a New Polity,

    In Daniel Heradstveit and Helge Hveem (eds.) Oil in the Gulf: Obstacles to Democracy and Development.

    . Aldershot,Ashgate.p. 125-166. A survey of diversity of opinion among Shiites on the subject of federalism in Iraq.
Books and reports
Working Papers
Popular publishing