Elisabeth Austrheim

Elisabeth is a political scientist from Norway with a dual master’s degree in International Relations and Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Queensland. Elisabeth also has a bachelor’s degree in Comparative Politics from the University of Bergen. Before starting her PhD, she worked as a researcher for NORCE, where her main research area was the growing Norwegian offshore wind industry.

In her PhD thesis, Elisabeth studies why some armed conflicts that were initiated after the termination of World War Two and that have lasted 22 years or longer become protracted. She investigates three possible explanations for conflicts’ protraction: specific causes, specific conditions, or conflict processes (or a combination of the three). The comprehensive research puzzle allows for a mixed methods approach (a large N study with a discriminant function analysis and a qualitative case study) on a topic that continuously requires updated research as older conflicts persist and new, possibly protracted, conflicts arise.