I joined Noragric and NMBU in fall 2014 when I commenced my position as associate professor and joined the master program in international relations. I also acted as Noragric’s Head of Education from 2014 to 2016. When Noragric as a result of NMBU’s re-organisation in. 2016 became part of the Faculty of Landscape and Society, I became LANDSAM’s first Head of Education (2017).

At NMBU I teach and supervise international relations and development. I am the academic chair of the international relations program (2018-).

My research is centered on multiple themes within the field of international relations: security theory and practice (state and human security, gender and security); state-society relations in post-communist Russia, and cities, violence and security in a global perspective.   

Currently my main research focus is centred on the city as vantage point from which to study violence, security and global transformation. I am part of international collaborative research projects on Somali cities: "Security on the Move", 2017-2019, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, UK and the Department for International Development (DFID). I am project leader in a project focused on urban change in post-socialist Russia: "Urban Margins, Global Transformation: Everyday Security and Mobility in Four Russian Cities", 2019-2022, funded by the Norwegian Research Council.

Before I joined NMBU, I was associate professor in international relations at Lillehammer University College (2010-2014) and postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Tromsø (2009-2010). I competed my doctoral degree in 2009 at the University of Tromsø, which I joined in 2003 after studies of political science (major), Easter European Studies and Economics (minors) at the University of Hamburg, Germany. I also have several studies abroad (UK, Russia) and extensive field research experience.