Project ‘Moral Beliefs about Violent Political Conflict (MoViCon)”. MoViCon will study how citizens form moral

Project ‘Moral Beliefs about Violent Political Conflict (MoViCon)”.

MoViCon will study how citizens form moral beliefs about different forms of political violence, ranging from low-scale types of political violence such as violent protests to civil- and interstate wars. The project will conceptualize and theorize moral beliefs about political violence and investigate these beliefs in a set of survey experiments in different countries. More specifically, MoViCon explores when and under what conditions citizens condone or condemn political violence, and on what moral grounds they do so.

MoViCon also investigates how these moral beliefs among citizens affect actual political violence in different societies. The project seeks to make three innovations to address these questions. First, it will develop a concept of “moral beliefs about political violence”, and a new survey-experimental template to be used to measure this concept. Second, it will develop and test a theory of how moral beliefs about political violence are formed and evolve in different societies. Third, MoViCon will conduct surveys in different societies to explore how these moral beliefs vary within and between communities. Finally, the project will investigate whether within- and between-country variation in moral beliefs about political violence predict actual occurrences of political violence.

The PhD candidate is expected to pursue research ideas in close connection with the research questions in the MoViCon-project.

The project is led by Professor Tore Wig and is funded by a Norwegian Research Council grant. It runs from 2021 to 2025. The project team includes several internationally leading scholars within conflict research and political science, at UiO and collaborating institutions. As a member of MoViCon, the successful applicant will also be part of the Department’s internationally leading research group on Comparative Institutions and Regimes (CIR).

Requirements

A research proposal (maximum 3000 words including references). The proposal should clarify the research theme, main research questions, how the research plan fits with the MoViCon project, how the research contributes to the existing literature, theoretical approach, methodology, and a time line.

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