Call for Papers/Panels: Junge AFK Early-Career Conference 2027 in cooperation with the Peace Institute at the Protestant University of Applied Sciences Freiburg, 8 – 9 March 2027
Freiburg, Deutschland
Research under Pressure? Peace and Conflict Research in a Changing Political Climate
Contemporary authoritarian and anti-democratic developments are not only reshaping political orders and social conflicts. They are also changing the conditions under which knowledge is produced, communicated, and publicly negotiated. Academic institutions are increasingly subjected to political and economic pressures; research agendas are constrained, critical voices are delegitimized, and researchers as well as their research partners face evolving forms of intimidation, surveillance, and repression. While science and the production of scientific knowledge are increasingly being called into question, scientists are at the same time expected to take public stances and contribute to strengthening democratic societies. These developments pose particular challenges for early-career researchers in peace and conflict studies. They often work under precarious conditions shaped by institutional dependencies while conducting research in politically sensitive, socially polarized, or violent contexts. Questions of safety, responsibility, and positionality are therefore closely intertwined with academic demands, institutional expectations, and professional uncertainties.
We particularly welcome research that examines politically sensitive, socially polarized, or violent contexts, critically interrogates existing power relations, or makes visible social structures, conflict dynamics, and shifting constellations of power. At the same time, we understand research as a social, political, and epistemic process. Research questions, methods, and theoretical perspectives shape which experiences become visible, which actors and which forms of knowledge are acknowledged or marginalized. We therefore also invite contributions that reflect on the political, epistemic, and institutional conditions under which such research is conducted, including questions of field access, safety and positionality, responsibilities toward research partners, and the recognition of diverse perspectives, experiences, and forms of knowledge. Together, we aim to discuss what kinds of research practices are needed in complex political and social contexts and how early-career researchers can contribute to a plural, responsible, and critical field of peace and conflict studies.
Possible Topics
We particularly welcome contributions on, but not limited to, the following topics:
● Critical engagements with social and political conflicts, violence, inequalities, and processes of transformation;
● Authoritarian and anti-democratic developments and their implications for research, teaching, and science communication;
● Topics, perspectives, and experiences that have so far received limited attention within peace and conflict research;
● Fieldwork in politically sensitive, violent, or contested contexts;
● Field access, data security, surveillance, and the protection of researchers and research partners;
● Positionality, situatedness, responsibility, and research ethics;
● The conditions of knowledge production, epistemic exclusions, and the pluralization of knowledge;
● Decolonial, postcolonial, feminist, queer, intersectional, and other critical approaches to power;
● The relationship between academia, the public sphere, politics, and civil society, including questions of science communication;
● Precarity and the working and research conditions of early-career researchers;
● Solidary, collective, and emancipatory forms of academic practice.
Formats, Submission, and Deadlines
We invite early-career researchers from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and at different career stages to submit theoretical, conceptual, methodological, empirical, or practice-oriented contributions. Work in progress is warmly encouraged! Completed research is not a prerequisite for participation.
Please submit your proposal (in English or German) by 11 November 2026 via email to jungeafk@gmail.com . Abstracts should not exceed 300 words . Each person may participate in a maximum of two submissions.
For more details, refer here
