Eiki Berg

University of Tartu

Eiki Berg is Professor of International Relations at the University of Tartu. Since 1996, he has worked at the Institute of Government and Politics, generally focusing on critical geopolitics and the studies of borders and border regions, in particular. Among his recent research activities, studies about territoriality and sovereignty issues in contested states have gained more prominence. He has published widely in leading peer-reviewed journals on bordering practices, identity politics and power-sharing in post-conflict settings. He is co-editor of Routing Borders Between Territories, Discourses and Practices (Ashgate, 2003) and Identity and Foreign Policy: Baltic-Russian Relations and European Integration (Ashgate, 2009). During the years 2003-2004 he served as MP in Estonian Parliament and observer to the European Parliament, EPP-ED faction, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defence Policy. In 2012, he received National Science Award in the field of Social Sciences for the research in “Identities, Conflicting Self-Determination and De Facto States”.

Email: eiki.berg [at] ut.ee
Website
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Recent publications

Berg, Eiki and Kristel Vits. 2020. “Exploring de facto state agency: negotiation power, international engagement and patronage.” In Handbook on the Politics of Small States, edited by Godfrey Baldacchino and Anders Wivel, 379–94. Elgar.

Berg, Eiki and Kristel Vits. 2020. “Transnistria’s European Drive: A Means to What End?” Geopolitics.

Berg, Eiki and Scott Pegg. 2020. “Do Parent State Strategies Matter in Resolving Secessionist Conflicts with De Facto States?”, in R. Griffiths and D. Muro, eds. Strategies of Secession and Counter-Secession. London: ECPR Press: 52-68.

Berg, Eiki & James Ker-Lindsay (eds.). 2019. The Politics of International Interaction with de facto States: Conceptualising Engagement without Recognition. Routledge.

Berg, Eiki. 2018. “Bridging the divide between parent states and secessionist entities: a new perspective for conflict management?” Space and Polity 22 (1): 15–29.

Berg, Eiki. 2018. “The Do-or-Die Dilemma Facing Post-Soviet De Facto States.” PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo No. 527.

Berg, Eiki, Piret Ehin, Andres Kasekamp, Maria Mälksoo, Eva Piirimäe, Raul Toomla, and Rein Toomla, eds. 2018. Sissejuhatus rahvusvahelistesse suhetesse: õpik kõrgkoolidele. Tartu University Press.

Berg, Eiki and Maria Mälksoo. 2018. “Konfliktid ja nende reguleerimine.” In Sissejuhatus rahvusvahelistesse suhetesse: õpik kõrgkoolidele, edited by Eiki Berg, Piret Ehin, Andres Kasekamp, Maria Mälksoo, Eva Piirimäe, Raul Toomla, and Rein Toomla. Tartu University Press.

Berg, Eiki and Martin Mölder. “The politics of unpredictability: Acc/secession of Crimea and the blurring of international norms.” East European Politics 34 (4): 400–17.

Berg, Eiki and Scott Pegg. 2018. “Scrutinizing a Policy of ‘Engagement Without Recognition’: US Requests for Diplomatic Actions with De Facto States.” Foreign Policy Analysis 14 (3): 388–407.

Berg, Eiki and Kristel Vits. 2018. “Quest for Survival and Recognition: Insights into the Foreign Policy Endeavours of the Post-Soviet de facto States.” Ethnopolitics 17 (4): 390–407.

Berg, Eiki and Henk Van Houtum. 2018. “Prologue: A border is not a border. Writing and reading borders in space.” In Routing Borders between Territories, Discourses and Practices, pp. 1-10. Routledge.

Eiki Berg and Alar Kilp, “Face to Face with Conservative Religious Values: Assessing the EU’s Normative Impact in the South Caucasus,” in Ansgar Jödicke, ed., Religion and Soft power in South Caucasus (Routledge 2017): 191-214.

Eiki Berg, Martin Riegl and Bohumil Doboš, “Introduction,” Annual of Language & Politics and Politics of Identity 10:1 (2016): 3-6.

Eiki Berg and Scott Pegg, “Scrutinizing a Policy of “Engagement without Recognition”: US Requests for Diplomatic Actions with De Facto States,” forthcoming in Foreign Policy Analysis.

Vahe Gabrielyan, Peter Stroobants and Eiki Berg, “How Do You Tailor Diplomatic Training? Sizing up Peer Institutions and Their Training Practices for the Diplomatic School of Armenia,” Global Affairs 2:2 (2016): 223-231.

Scott Pegg and Eiki Berg, “Lost and Found: The WikiLeaks of De Facto State-Great Power Relations,” International Studies Perspectives 17:3 (2016): 267-286.

Eiki Berg and Martin Mölder, “When ‘Blurring’ Becomes the Norm and Secession Is Justified as the Exception. Revisiting EU and Russian Discourses in the Common Neighbourhood,” Journal of International Relations and Development 17:4 (2014): 469-488.

Eiki Berg, “Merging Together or Drifting Apart? Revisiting Political Legitimacy Issues in Cyprus, Moldova, and Bosnia and Herzegovina,” Geopolitics 18:2 (2013): 467-492.

Eiki Berg and Raul Toomla, “Mission Impossible in Cyprus? Legitimate Return to the Partnership State Revisited,” Nationalities Papers 41:2 (2013): 276–292.

Eiki Berg and Martin Mölder, “Who is Entitled to Earn Sovereignty? Legitimacy and Regime Support in Abkhazia and Nagorno-Karabakh,” Nations and Nationalism 18:3 (2012): 527-545.

Sandra Kamilova and Eiki Berg, “How Can De Facto State be Distinguished from the Puppet State? Analysis of Transnistrian-Russian Relations and Dependences,” in Andres Kasekamp, ed., The Estonian Foreign Policy Yearbook 2011 (The Estonian Foreign Policy Institute, Tallinn 2012): 151-182.

Eiki Berg, “Parent States versus Secessionist Entities: Measuring Political Legitimacy in Cyprus, Moldova, and Bosnia and Herzegovina,” Europe-Asia Studies 64:7 (2012): 1271-1296.

Eiki Berg and Martin Mölder, “Janus-Faced Human Security Discourse: EU and Russia Talking Past Each Other in Kosovo and the Caucasus?,” CEURUS EU-Russia Papers 4 (2012).