ABSTRACT
City-twinning has some puzzling features. Entities like cities generally originate from moves of differentiation and by expressing what they are not. Arguably the likeness integral to twinning is even more conducive to cooperation and interaction than familiarity since difference has been discursively downplayed to the extreme in the context of twinning. The twinning between Kirkenes and Nikel also apparently offers insight into broader issues, particularly since Norway and Russia have invited Kirkenes and Nikel to contribute to conducting their foreign policies. Local concerns are fused with state-related interests, thereby undermining the states' traditional prerogative and contributing to a decentralization of foreign affairs. Particularly, Kirkenes has become a major meeting point for Russian–Norwegian contacts since the 1990s on various levels and in different forms. Balanced judgment must also take account of top-down input from Norway and Russia about the emergence of a cooperative cross-border relationship and the construction of an integrated borderland.
