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educational institutes. Despite this, even today knowledge about the region is fragmented, partial and limited. It is difficult to obtain an overview o f the region and its development. This is for a reason, I argue. The limited knowledge base about the region serves a neoliberal agenda o f regional development and cooperation based on the idea o f governance at distance, non-intervention and self-identification. Neoliberal governmentalisation of the Barents Region th rough knowledge The claim of the author is that the best way to understand the region is through the idea o f neoliberal regionalism. In terms o f governmentality, a region emerges as a site o f competing political strategies and an instrument of government (Larner and Walters 2002, 423). From this perspective, the Barents Region is made up o f fragmented peoples and territories linked by asymmetrical relations o f political and economic power, as has been suggested by Larner and Williams (2002, 411). Knowledge and expertise are prerequisites for regional governmentalisation. Knowledge - in various forms such as maps, statistics, and interpretations o f available information - helps us to know the Barents Region and render it an object o f governance. In the case o f the Barents, the task of governmentalisation has not been completed. Knowledge about the region is partial, limited and fragmented. While the region has been governmentalised, the Barents case is also an example of how the producers o f knowledge have been “governmentalised” as well: “Whereas the liberal subject had as part o f its responsibility the maintenance of a distance from government and a responsibility to call it to account, the neoliberal subject does not” (Davies and Bansel 2010) describing the change in the role o f academia vis- a-vis the political decision makers. In particular, the Nordic scholarship has supported governmentalisation of the region through the self-identification o f the Barents Region. The scholarship has furthered this self-identification in the name o f a European or global resource region. The Barents Region is most often depicted as “a rich resource region” serving European and global markets, making this particular feature of the region a regional marker (see Larner and Walters 2002, 413). Most importantly, the academic debate about identity helps the self-identification o f the region: governing operates through subjectivities committed to the regional idea o f a “resource region”. The fragmented nature of knowledge and knowledge production where the Barents Region is concerned supports non-intervention. Knowledge is needed for governmental intervention, but neoliberal governmentality promotes non-intervention. References Adams, Paul (2011) Multilayered regionalization in Northern Europe. GeoJournal DOI 10.1007/s10708- 011-9408-8. Cotoi, Calin (2011) Neoliberalism: a Foucauldian perspective. International Review o f Social Research 1, 2:109-124. Davies, Bronwyn and Bansel, Peter (2010) Governmentality and academic work. Shaping the hearts and minds of academic workers. Journal o f Curriculum Theorizing 26, 3: 5-21. Friedrichs, Jorg (2004)_ European approaches to International Relations theory: A house with many mansions. London and New York: Routledge. Goede, Marieke de (2003) Beyond economism in international political economy. Review o f International Studies 29, 79-97. Larner, Wendy and Walters, William (2002) The political rationality of ‘‘new regionalism’’: Toward a genealogy o f the region. Theory and Society 31, 391-432. Nielsen, Jens Petter (2007) The Barents Euro-Arctic Region - the return o f history. In M. Lahteenmaki (ed.), The flexible frontier. Change and continuity in Finnish-Russian relations, pp. 231-244. Helsinki: Aleksanteri-instituutti. Moisio, Sami and Vilho Harle (2010) On the interface: The Finnish geopolitical tradition in human geography and in IR. Cooperation and Conflict 45, 4:449-467. 47