01.11.2011

The Nordic & Baltic Small States: Perceptions on Economy, Security and Identity in an Increasingly Regionalized Europe

An NOS-HS Exploratory Workshops project 2011-2013

The Institute of International Affairs/Centre for the Study of Small States (IIA/CSSS) at the University of Iceland received a new grant in summer 2011 from NOS-HS (the joint committee of the Nordic research councils for the humanities and social sciences) to carry out an exploratory research project from autumn 2011 to autumn 2013. The project addresses current challenges facing the small states of the Nordic/Baltic region in their regional and international environment, with special emphasis on the policy fields of economy, of security (interpreted broadly), and of identity - which relates to sovereignty, autonomy, multi ethnicity and integration choices among other things. How have these states viewed the developments of recent years in these fields, and how far have they defined their own predicament in terms of 'smallness'? Have they adopted parallel, or diverging, strategies to deal with the challenges involved, and what could be the reasons for this?

The research themes will be explored in three workshops over an 18-month period, and the immediate findings will be reflected in an ambitious publishing programme including workshop reports, article publications and a final monograph. However, a major aim of the project is also to identify questions that need further research within and/or beyond the Nordic/Baltic area: and a final task will be to prepare a joint proposal for such follow-on work.

The IIA/CSSS is fortunate to have as its partners in this programme the Universities of Copenhagen, Stavanger, and Vilnius, the Latvian Institute of International Affairs (LIIA) and the International Centre for Defence Studies (ICDS) at Tallinn. Each of the main workshops will be co-organized by one Nordic and one Baltic partner. Adding further value to the project, representatives from the Faroes and Greenland - organized by the respective universities in Torshavn and Nuuk - will join in all meetings to discuss how the same policy challenges affect them mutatis mutandis. Finally the project will be observed and supported by the major Nordic institutes of international affairs, including those based in Sweden and Finland who may complete the Nordic picture.

The first public event of the programme is a workshop on economic challenges, co-organized by IIA/CSSS and LIIA, scheduled for 18 November 2011 at Reykjavik. Please watch this space for details that will follow.

Queries about the project may be directed to Alyson Bailes at alyson[@]hi.is or to Pia Hansson at ams[@]hi.is.