My research examines the making of expert knowledge in national and transnational regulatory institutions. I focus on diplomatic and geopolitical practices in Europe and the Arctic, but my broader interest lies in knowledge and power in bureaucratic settings. Blending political geography with international relations and sociology, I am also interested in how identity and belonging work in policy-making organisations.

Further information on my research, teaching, and graduate student supervision is available on my research website (link above).

The list below highlights the key themes in my current research. Bibliographic information on publications, including links to the webpages of the books, is listed under the tab ‘Publications’ and on my personal website.

Policy processes and the politics of expertise

Policy impinges on all aspects of self and society. It shapes not just societal outcomes but, more importantly, the processes that produce these outcomes. To study policy is to investigate a dynamic and unpredictable process that transgresses the convenient distinctions between state and non-state actors. Empirically, my research focuses on the European Union as a key power center in today’s world. Any attempt to understand the diffuse operation of power in the international sphere must closely consider the EU in its ambiguously transnational operation.

Geopolitics, security, and diplomacy

This strand in my research focuses on the geographical assumptions and definitions that underpin international politics in general and diplomatic negotiation in particular. These assumptions are central to the processes by which complex political issues come to be defined and managed in a particular manner. Empirically, my current work focuses on transnational diplomatic practices in the European Union. This example anchors a broader argument about knowledge and authority in bureaucratic settings.

Arctic governance

The Arctic is a scene of hot diplomatic activity as many state and non-state actors seek to influence governance processes there. A new strand in my research focuses on regulatory power and regulatory competition in the Arctic. It examines, in particular, the efforts of China and the European Union to increase their influence in Arctic governance. My effort is to advance our understanding of the emerging inter-national and trans-national regulatory regimes in the Arctic.

The list is complete for the last year or so but includes only the principal publications on some of the earlier years. See my research website for the complete list.

2021

KUUS, M. 2021. Professions and their expertise: charting the spaces of ‘elite’ occupations. Progress in Human Geography. 45(6): 1339-1355. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132520950466

KUUS, M. 2021. Bureaucratic sociability, or the missing eighty percent of effectiveness:  the case of diplomacy. Geopolitics. doi:https://doi.org/10.1080/14650045.2021.1934672

Constantinou, C. M., J. Dittmer, M. Kuus, F. McConnell, and S. M. Opondo. 2021. Thinking with Diplomacy: Within and Beyond Practice Theory. International Political Sociology 15 (4): 559-587. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/ips/olab028

2020

KUUS, M. 2020. “Professions and their expertise: charting the spaces of ‘elite’ occupations”. Progress in Human Geography. Online early: https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132520950466

KUUS, M. 2020. ‘Regulatory power and region-making in the Arctic: China and the European Union’ (Euro commentary). European Urban and Regional Studies vol. 27, 4: pp. 321-324. https://doi.org/10.1177/0969776420925539.

KUUS, M. 2020. ‘Europe’s future depends on perspective not policy’. New Perspectives 28 (3): pp. 270-274. Essay based on Keynote Address 1B at the Hamburg (Insecurity) Sessions, 21 November 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/2336825X20934970

KUUS, M. 2020. ‘Toward the geopolitics of geoeconomic ideas’. In ‘Reading Geopolitics of the Knowledge-Based Economy by Sami Moisio’ (review forum). Political Geography 80, June 2020.  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0962629820301980

KUUS, M. 2020. ‘Political Geography III: Bounding the International’. Progress in Human Geography vol. 44, 6: pp. 1185-1193. This is the third of three progress reports commissioned by the journal. (https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132519869457).

KUUS, M. 2020. Powerful and Elite Subjects. In J. Darling and H. Wilson (ed.). Research Ethics for Human Geography: A Handbook for Students, pp. 202-210.

KUUS, M. 2020. ‘Political Geography II: Institutions’. Progress Report. Progress in Human Geography  44(1) 119–128. Second of three progress reports on political geography.  https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132518796026.

2019

KUUS, M. 2019 ‘The terroir of bureaucratic practice: Everyday life and scholarly method in the study of policy’ Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space 37(4), 617-633   https://doi.org/10.1177/0263774×18802954

KUUS, M. 2019. ‘Political Geography I: Agency’, Progress in Human Geography 43 (1): 163-171, 2019. First of three progress reports on political geography. http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0309132517734337

KUUS, M. 2019. ‘State Power, Spatial Inequality, and Geographical Expertise: Notes on Method’. In Thilo Lang and Franziska Görmar (eds). Regional and Local Development in Times of Polarisation: Rethinking Spatial Policies in Europe. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 79-94.

2018

KUUS, M. 2018 ‘Transnational institutional fields: Positionality and generalization in the study of diplomacy’ Political Geography 67, 156-165   https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2017.02.008

KUUS, M. 2018 ‘Political economies of transnational fields: harmonization and differentiation in European diplomacy’ Territory, Politics, Governance 6(2), 222-239                  https://doi.org/10.1080/21622671.2016.1266960

I work with students whose interests focus on policy processes, the politics of expertise, security, and political identity. See my research website for further information.