Mats Berdal is Professor of Security and Development in the Department of War Studies at King's College London. He is currently a Visiting Professor at the National Defence and Command College, Oslo. From 2000 to 2003, he was Director of Studies at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London. Professor Berdal’s recent writings have focused on developments at the UN since the start of the war in Iraq in 2003 and the political economy of armed conflict. He is also in the process of completing The UN and the Search for International Order, a book that covers the immediate post-Cold War period and focuses in particular on the UN's involvement in the mitigation, containment and resolution of civil wars.