Reasearch

Krampe’s research sits at the intersection of peace and conflict research, environmental studies, and international security. His primary academic interest is the foundations of peace and security, especially the processes of building and sustaining peace after armed conflict. He is currently focusing on three research streams.

Peacebuilding and Sustaining Peace

Krampe’s work on peacebuilding and sustaining peace is rooted in an understanding of peace as the relationship between politics, namely the state in particular, and the wider society. As such, Krampe understands peacebuilding as the process wherein the structural-normative setup of the post-war state vis-à-vis society is renegotiated through various interactions between domestic state and non-state actors with, or without, the involvement of international or other external actors. The degrees to which this domestic relationship will be sustainable and peaceful is largely contingent on whether society finds it legitimate, or not. This understanding of legitimacy is important because it recognizes the importance of relational agency, which neither rejects the role and existence of the state nor understates the agency of society in the process of rebuilding countries after internal armed conflict. Krampe critically examines various peace processes, among others in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, East Timor, Nepal, and Sri Lanka.

Environmental Security and Peacebuilding

Krampe’s work focuses on the dynamics and foundations of environmental security and peacebuilding, as the link between post-conflict peacebuilding and environmental governance and natural resource management. To build and sustain peace we need to acknowledge and understand the long-term interplay of social, political, and ecological processes in post-war countries. As these processes interact and divisively shape the post-war landscape, it is essential to building a peace that is ecologically sensitive, while equally socially and politically relevant and desirable. Relying on qualitative methods, filed work, and elite interviews, Krampe explores various aspects of this research area, among others how the governance of natural resources and the environment influences peacebuilding after civil wars. Krampe work distinguishes itself through in-depth empirical research and thorough conceptional and theoretical set up. Overall, his work leverages an understanding of what works and how peacebuilding efforts can utilize their interventions to achieve long-term gains.  

Climate-related Security Risks

As part of SIPRI’s Climate Change and Risk research team, Krampe’s work on climate change and risk aims to provide reliable insights on how climate-related security risks evolve and how they are interlinked and interact with different social, political and economic processes. SIPRI researchers also analyse how different policy organisations are responding to these risks and advise them on conflict-sensitive adaptation and mitigation strategies and international efforts for sustaining peace.