Ordinary people want peace: Can citizen diplomacy build a safer future for everyone? 

Ordinary people want peace: Can citizen diplomacy build a safer future for everyone? 

Jan Oberg February 19, 2026 What a thrill to be interviewed by former British diplomat Ian Proud! Don’t waste a minute: acquaint yourself with him here on his homepage, which he elegantly calls “Proud Diplomat.” Notice also his book, A Misfit In Moscow. Ian is, of course, also on Substack, where he calls himself The […]

A New Perspective and Blueprint: A Demilitarised Arctic for the Common Good — and Why It Is Rational

A New Perspective and Blueprint: A Demilitarised Arctic for the Common Good — and Why It Is Rational

This is not another geopolitical commentary on the Arctic. It is a visionary peace proposal that can save the region from militarised rivalry and ecological ruin. A blueprint for shared security, sustainable development, and human dignity — benefitting Greenland, the Arctic, and the rest of us. Jan Oberg TFF director Lund, Sweden, February 17, 2026 […]

TFF at 40 # 4 – Manifesto for True Peace Ahead

TFF at 40 # 4 – Manifesto for True Peace Ahead

TFF founders & Board January 1, 2026 On January 1, 2026, TFF – The Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research – turns forty. In a West where peace has been cancelled in politics, research, and media, we might just as well have used the anniversary to close down. But we shall move on — because peace by peaceful […]

TFF at 40 # 3 – A Record of Predictive Analyses That Time Confirmed

TFF at 40 # 3 – A Record of Predictive Analyses That Time Confirmed

To celebrate TFF’s 40th Anniversary, we have re-published – on TFF Substack – two earlier articles that were published here on The Transnational. They are: TFF at 40 #1 – Peace research at Lund University closed down in 1989: Why and how?And why I lived happily ever after. This is a piece of Nordic academic […]

50 years in peace and conflict research

50 years in peace and conflict research

Jan Oberg November 28, 2025 It is hardly of any importance to the world, but it is to me as a peace scholar, TFF co-founder and director: On September 1, 2025, it was 50 years since I got my first article published in what was the flagship of peace and conflict research, The Journal of […]

What the Sachs–Mearsheimer Debate Misses

What the Sachs–Mearsheimer Debate Misses

The World Is a Sphere, But It Needs Zones of Peace Biljana Vankovska Professor emerita, TFF Board member November 13, 2025 As members of a global intellectual public, concerned not merely with knowledge but with humanity’s survival, we hunger for debates that are as rigorous as transformative, i.e. debates capable of imagining a fundamentally different […]

Two Conferences in Shanghai: Reflections on Discourse, Dialogue, and the Non-Studies of Peace

Two Conferences in Shanghai: Reflections on Discourse, Dialogue, and the Non-Studies of Peace

Jan Oberg, TFF Director In October 2025, I attended two major academic conferences in Shanghai—both by invitation, and, curiously, as the only scholar from Scandinavia. That absence felt unjust to the more experienced Nordic experts in China studies who deserve a seat at such global forums. What unfolded was a journey through two distinct but […]

TFF PressInfo # 776: 40 years on, TFF still asks the only question that matters: How do we build peace when others only prepare for war?

TFF PressInfo # 776: 40 years on, TFF still asks the only question that matters: How do we build peace when others only prepare for war?

“The future belongs to those who imagine it — not those who declare it doomed.” Silence is unusual for us. But even a foundation devoted to peace and ideas needs a pit stop now and then — a moment to refuel, re‑engineer, and prepare for the road ahead. Because the road ahead matters. On January […]

“If You Want Peace, Be Creative and Focus on The Future.”

“If You Want Peace, Be Creative and Focus on The Future.”

People’s criticism without offering any solutions and their focus on the past and present, but almost never on the future, are the two biggest obstacles to real change. And to making peace… Jan Oberg August 21, 2025 This conversation is not about Endless Militarism. The real title of Pascal Nottaz’ and my conversation is the […]

SIPRI’s ongoing decay from peace to mainstream military security – its new director

SIPRI’s ongoing decay from peace to mainstream military security – its new director

Naturally, nobody cares about that fraud in today’s Sweden. Jan Oberg April 15, 2025 SIPRI is the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, established in 1966. Read about it here and see how it has twisted its aims to not include the words ‘peace research.’ Because here is what it should do according to § 2 […]