Our new research group on Ocean Infrastructures was launched with a workshop exploring how marine activities are shaped by various infrastructures on 13th and 14th of October.

How do infrastructures enable and restrict oceanic practices and produce new forms of agency, spatiality and materiality in the oceans? That was the key question we addressed with 20 scholars from different disciplines, including geography, international relations, law and science and technology studies. The goal of the workshop was to explore the variety of ocean infrastructures, but also the question in how far the conceptual vocabulary of infrastructures can shed new light on how the oceans are governed today.

We explored infrastructures reaching from shipping to under water tunnels and choke points, but also in how far international institutions, treaties and global ocean narratives can be conceptualized as infrastructures.

Part of the workshop was also an excursion to the maritime history of Denmark with a visit to the naval facilities at Holmen, and a public roundtable that took the current interest on critical infrastructure protection as its focus.

The workshop not only marked the launch of our research group funded by the Velux Foundation, but also kickstarted our work on an edited volume on ocean infrastructures which we hope to complete by the end of 2023.