Due to the current corona pandemie situation there will be deviations in the implementation of the program of COST Action ENTER with immediate effect.

Nevertheless, we are available for all of you, please use email contact possibilites first, as TU Darmstadt is more or less shut down.

Please use this link for comprehensive information on regulations implemented by COST in connection with the corona virus.

We wish you all the best and stay healthy

Michèle Knodt, Patrick Müller and Sigita Urdze

I attended the International Conference on International Security Studies in February 2020 with my supervisor, Dr Constantinos Adamides. In presenting our research and preliminary findings, we were able to interact with other scholars and researchers in an interdisciplinary fashion. As the overarching theme focused on international security, we were equally receptive of other views within security studies, such as the role of culture and identity, software use and technological innovation, as well as questions on the relationship between small states and other bigger states in blocs such as the European Union. Our presentation mainly focused on how the lack of a comprehensive security framework in small states might present itself as a considerable threat for the overarching bloc – in this case, a weak security and defence infrastructure in Cyprus would leave the entire EU bloc exposed. We engaged with both the theoretical and empirical concepts behind this reasoning. Our preliminary data also presented case studies in which Cyprus indeed left the EU exposed (e.g. the hacking of diplomatic credentials discovered in December 2018 gave Chinese hackers access to confidential information on migration, security and energy policy, and others – thus effectively jeopardizing the bloc).

Although our initial work focused on mainly the abstract, keywords, theoretical challenges, as well as some practical and technical understanding of empirical cases, we have emphasized that this is part of a larger project on security studies in Europe and in international politics. In fact, this segment we had analyzed is a portion of my on PhD, thus I am proud that my own research has led to an exciting new path, which is supported by own supervisor’s work.

As a Research Associate at the Diplomatic Academy – University of Nicosia and PhD candidate at the Department of Politics and Governance, I received useful feedback from my supervisor during the in improving further on my presentation skills. In fact, the support provided to me by both my supervisor, as well as from other fellow researchers at the conference was of paramount importance. I have been able to utilize this and attend classes as a guest lecturer on International Relations Theory and Digital Diplomacy at my University.

Finally, this preliminary work has opened up new opportunities for further research within small states in Europe, particularly Cyprus, Malta, and Estonia. I have pursued partnerships with other researchers from King’s College London, the LSE, and the University of Auckland (New Zealand). Such partnerships are expressed in the form of future articles – a future publication examines grand strategy of small states within the EU, whereas another looks at the importance of critical infrastructure systems in small states.

Yesterday our Public Panel on “EU Foreign Policy in Times of Populism” was held in the Diplomatic Academy in Vienna. We are proud that we had renown speakers:

• Gerda Falkner (Professor at University of Vienna): Right Wing Populist Parties in the EU and their positions on Foreign Policy
• Ivan Krastev (Permanent Fellow, Institute for Human Sciences, Vienna): After Europe
• Kristi Raik (Director Estonian Foreign Policy Institut)

We had a large audience participating in this stimulating event.

There is a lot of discussions and working going on in Vienna in the framework of COST Action ENTER right now.

Working group 3 “Contestation” just finished their workshop “Contestation and politication of EU foreign policy: New realities or same old?”. The workshop addressed the need for conceptualization and at the same time looked at the changing politics of EU foreign policy, with the aim of making a contribution that helps shape up existing literature.