Sam Twietmeyer

My research and teaching interests lie in the field of peace and conflict resolution, with specific emphasis on negotiation processes and conflict management in diverse and divided societies. My doctoral research critically analyzed the impact of third-parties upon elite perceptions in settlement negotiations in Northern Ireland and Cyprus through the lens of the Double-Minority Dilemma. This research project was supported by an Ireland-Canada University Foundation Fellowship. The findings from this project lay the foundation for future comparative investigations into the role of perceptions of majority and minority status in cases of contested territorial spaces, including in application to Russia-Ukraine, Serbia-Kosovo, and elsewhere. Additionally, the study of these European periphery crises has highlighted the relationship between these deeply divided conflicts and territories and the emergence of the European Union and processes of Europeanization. For the past two years I have been teaching the Politics of European Integration with a specialized focus on the interaction of this federalizing regime with disputed border regions and I am developing a book project on a comparative investigation on these questions.

I am currently the project manager for the Politics of Complex Diversity in Contested Cities and the lead researcher for the Belfast case. This multi-city project investigates the impact that the institutions of deeply divided societies have on new migrant populations and how these newcomers exercise their political agency in such contexts. This research was completed, in part, as a Visiting Researcher for the Centre for the Study of Ethnic Conflict, Queen’s University, Belfast in 2022.