Join the REPAIR course

Since 2022, we have an EU-funded, online module for Master’s and PhD students, hosted at the Department of Political Science and Public Administration of Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam. It runs from November until early June and is taught in collaboration with the University of Lapland. The title of the Module is REPAIR, which stands for ‘Re-focusing the European Green Deal on the protection of the environment, security and Indigenous Peoples’ rights in the Arctic’.

The focus is as much on the geopolitics and challenges of the green transition as it is on environmental protection, and politics of Arctic governance. The European Arctic, including Greenland, is the case study. The rationale is that as much as we work on environmental issues, indigenous peoples, territorial conflict, issues of sovereignty, geopolitics of critical resources and extractive industries, most of existing research focuses on non-Western geographies as cases and promotes lessons learned on these examples. REPAIR turns a critical perspective onto European practices on these issues inside Europe. The European Arctic is Europe’s own climate vulnerable region and REPAIR engages with how the EU, its member states and close affiliates navigate the above-mentioned issues within their own jurisdiction.

It is a Master’s and PhD level extracurricular module that supports various programmes, ranging from political science and law to earth sciences and environmental resource management. Meetings take place in topic-based sessions every 2-3 weeks from 17.30 to 19.30 (CET), online.

Alongside 5 professors from VU Amsterdam in politics and law:

• Prof. Wolfgang Wagner (VU Amsterdam- Department of Political Science and Public Administration
• Prof. Tanja Aalberts (VU Amsterdam, Law Faculty)
• Prof. Gareth Davies (VU Amsterdam, Law Faculty)
• Assoc. Prof. Dr. Oscar Widerberg (VU Amsterdam- Institute for Environmental Studies)
• And Assist. Prof. Dr. Özlem Terzi (VU Amsterdam- Department of Political Science and Public Administration),

our teachers’ team also includes

• Prof. Dr. Monica Tennberg (Arctic Centre- University of Lapland)
• Dr. Marjo Lindroth (Arctic Centre- University of Lapland).

There are no exams, and no graded assignments. Alongside evening-hour teaching sessions, the opening and closing of the academic year are marked by day-time online events. The opening event will take place on 1 November, Friday.

• The benefits of REPAIR to the students on top of everything they will learn is: Certification of attendance if the criteria are fulfilled.
• Publication of their policy outlook paper online and its submission to the European Commission, if it is of sufficient quality.
• An exchange opportunity for research internship at the VU Amsterdam funded under the Erasmus+ mobility scheme. This can also be used as a field work opportunity for theses. This exchange is not a part of REPAIR and can be taken as a top-up. Students need to apply for this exchange around Christmas holidays with a CV and a motivation letter explaining how this exchange will benefit their theses. In previous years of REPAIR, four students from the VU and 2 students from University of Lapland have undertaken this research internship exchange to support their theses on top of the REPAIR classes.

Interested students from University of Lapland and from our partners in the Critical Arctic Studies (CAS) Thematic Network can join VU Amsterdam students in this online module by registering through the below link.

You can email your questions to the Module Coordinator via o.terzi@vu.nl. Upon registration, students will be given guest accounts for VU Amsterdam’s online learning environment, Canvas. The VU’s IT office needs about 2 weeks to create those accounts