Ten Years of Belt & Road – Quo Vadis?
A decade ago, President Xi Jinping announced the Belt and Road Initiative. Promising large infrastructure projects, the initiative was welcomed by vastly underinvested countries all over the world. Also on […]
Europe in the World
In a world that is largely driven by competition and rivalry (and partnership, yet) between great powers, understanding the Grand Strategy of each of these powers is crucial. So is developing a Grand Strategy for the EU itself. An EU that acts as one, as one pole of the multipolar world on a par with the other powers, is the only way to safeguard the way of life that the Member States of the EU have chosen, based on democracy, the free market, and equality.
Power cannot be divided: a global player must have political, economic, as well as military power. To that end, the Europe in the World Programme analyses the diplomacy and defence of the US, China, and Russia, and of the EU, NATO, and their members. We also focus on geoeconomics, researching Open Strategic Autonomy and the Global Gateway as key EU instruments, as well as the geoeconomic approaches of the other powers.
Defence policy is our third main axis of research, with a particular focus on European defence and its interaction with NATO, but also on nuclear deterrence and the deterrence of hybrid threats. Throughout all three research axis, we devote special attention to the role of Belgium, including notably the development of its own National Security Strategy and diplomatic and military capabilities.
Publications
Commentaries
Behind the Hamas attack on Israel, Hard Geopolitics lurk
Three key strategic issues underpin Hamas’s timing and extremely violent method in its recent attack on Israel. Rather than describing the facts, and staying away from the (very justified) emotional […]
Charting Belgium’s Economic Security – a complex country in a complex world
Economic Security is mentioned as one of the four pillars of the Belgian National Security Strategy (NSS). Ever since the inception of the NSS, the geoeconomic arena has been turbulent […]
Commentaries
Countering FIMI: A Critical Imperative for Mission Safety
Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) has been largely viewed as a communications’ threat undermining the soft cornerstones of the democratic order, e.g., trust, legitimacy, and cohesion. *****
Masters of Grand Strategy
Grand strategy has principles that, when adhered to, will definitely benefit the state. In order to thrive, a grand strategy needs to be sustained by a strategic culture. A state’s […]
My Summer in Beijing
When I told people that I was planning to travel to China for the first time since the pandemic, many strongly warned me against it. Many European academics have become […]