Evidence-based analysis on European strategic autonomy. Filter by sector or search the archive.
A Team Enlargement coalition of EU member states can drive the changes needed to bring Ukraine and others into the bloc.
Rumen Radev is steering Bulgaria towards a more transactional foreign policy. The EU needs to engage with Sofia and push back on such hedging to secure future European cohesion
Europe is converging on a definition of economic security as reduced dependence – de-risking, reshoring, buying European. This column argues that the definition is mistaken. Three decades of evidence on financial and production networks shows that resilience is a property of a node’s position in the network – the depth, diversity, and quality of its…
Introduction The recent approval by President Donald Trump of a nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia—one that may grant the kingdom the capability to enrich uranium—represents a pivotal moment for global non-proliferation efforts. This deal, valued at tens of billions of dollars and designed to last 30 years, risks undermining decades of international norms aimed at […]
When the fighting in Ukraine stops, America and Europe will likely end up facing Russia in a low-grade rivalry for years to come. Here is how to prevent that disordered rivalry from sliding into another war
As the postwar international order fragments and universal agreement becomes increasingly elusive, policymakers face a pressing question: what form of cooperation can replace the postwar hegemon-led, rules-based system? This column examines two complementary answers. Mark Carney argues that coalitions of middle powers can preserve stability, resilience, and strategic autonomy in an era of great-power rivalry.…
There is growing evidence that place-based industrial policies lead to positive economic effects. This column analyses the “Million-Rouble Plants” programme of the 1950s when the Soviet Union helped China build state-of-the-art industrial facilities. By tracking the locations that benefitted, it finds positive economic spillovers in the short and medium run. Although the Million-Rouble Plants themselves…
Some European leaders seem to think that abasing themselves for Donald Trump’s pleasure is necessary to save NATO and keep the Western alliance alive. But by so desperately clinging to the good old days of the transatlantic relationship, Europe’s leaders are risking more than just their dignity
The war between the US and Iran is destabilising North African economies, putting an already fragile region at the very edge of polycrisis
Modern life runs on semiconductors — cars, phones, wind turbines, medical devices, and every military system now depends on chips that Europe, for the most part, does not make itself. The most advanced logic chips, the ones powering AI systems and cutting-edge computing, are produced almost entirely by a handful of facilities in Taiwan, with […]