Changing Regional Security Structure? The EU’s Opportunities to Play a Role in Asian Security Politics

EIAS has contributed to a report commissioned by the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the EU’s role in Asian security in collaboration with the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, a partner in the European Strategic Alliance for Asian Studies (insert link).

On 19 May, EIAS travelled to Copenhagen to discuss the draft of the report entitled The Security Situation in Asia: Changing Regional Security Structure? The EU’s Opportunities to Play a Role in Asian Security Politics.

The study, directed by NIAS’s Dr Timo Kivimäki and Jørgen Delman, highlights the major security interests of the EU vis-à-vis Asia, identifying key actors, challenges and threats to both intra and interregional stability, and the opportunities and scope for interregional security cooperation. Within this context, a set of recommendations will be formulated to the EU in its approach to future engagement with the region.

Other chapter contributors include Dr. Timo Kivimäki, Dr. Geir Helgesen and Camilla Tenna Sørensen of NIAS; Clemens Stubbe Østergaard, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Aarhus; Christian Fjäder, Director, International Business Risk Services, Helsinki; and Professor David M. Lampton, Dean of Faculty, George & Sadie Hyman Professor of China Studies, Director of China Studies Program, Johns Hopkins University, Maryland.

In Copenhagen, the authors met initially at NIAS to discuss preliminary changes to the report before making a formal presentation at a seminar in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, chaired by Susan Ulbæk, Head of Department for Asia. The occasion provided an opportunity for thoughtful and candid debate from both officials and academics that will be reflected in coming drafts.

Further information concerning the study will be made available upon final completion and publication.