Staff and Experts

Staff Profile: Jose Ignacio Torreblanca

Recent Commentary

• The remarkable rise of continental Euroscepticism
  25 Apr 13
• Europe's misgovernment
  05 Apr 13
• Europe has lost its citizens
  13 Mar 13
• Vanished frontiers earn EU its Nobel Prize
  10 Dec 12
• The view from the capitals: the EU budget summit
  21 Nov 12

Read More > Commentary

Recent Blogs

• Madrid view: Now, Eurunemployed
  16 May 13
• Madrid view: Bad blood
  07 May 13
• So what’s the plan, Mr Rehn?
  24 Apr 13
• Madrid view: Zero foreign policy
  12 Apr 13
• Empty house in Italy
  05 Mar 13

Read More > Blogs

recent press

• South China Morning Post
  09 May 13
• Reuters
  09 May 13
• Reuters
  08 May 13
• Deutsche Welle
  01 May 13

Read More >

José Ignacio Torreblanca joined the European Council on Foreign Relations as a Senior Research Fellow and Head of the Madrid Office in September 2007. Previously he spent three years at the Madrid's based Elcano Royal Institute for International Affairs as Senior Analyst for EU affairs.

He has a doctorate in Political Science and Sociology from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and teaches political science and EU affairs at the distance learning University in Madrid (UNED). He is also Fellow at the Juan March Institute of Studies in Madrid, member of the Board of the Instituto Nacional de Crédito (ICO) and member of the Board of the Charity Alianza por la Solidaridad. He has been Fulbright scholar in the European Union-US Program, Lecturer at the George Washington University in Washington DC and a researcher at the European University Institute in Florence. He is also a member of the editorial board of the journal Foreign Policy en español, co-editor of blogeuropa.eu and a regular columnist in daily EL PAÍS, for which he writes every Friday. He also blogs in Spanish at "Café Steiner", a blog in EL PAÍS, and at "A golpe de azul"

In May 2011, Foreign Policy en español has ranked him amongst the 10 most influential new intellectuals in Spain and Latin-America.

Languages: Spanish, English

Areas of expertise: EU enlargement and Neighbourhood Policy, EU institutional reforms, Common Foreign Security and Defence Policy

Contact details: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), Mob: +34 663 83 82 85.

Twitter: Follow @jitorreblanca

PUBLICATIONS

Op-eds & commentaries

José Ignacio Torreblanca writes the EL PAIS Friday column on international affairs, and has been doing so since June 2008. You can read his columns in his blog A golpe de azul (Blue strokes) or on the ECFR website - ecfr.eu. He also has a blog on El País website called Café Steiner. 

He has written extensively on the foreign policy of both the EU and Spain in news and current affairs magazines, as well as academic journals. For a full list of his published work, please visit his personal webpage at UNED University. But here is a snapshot:

The Euro Crisis: a Spanish perspective

As part of ECFR’s Reinvention of Europe project, José Ignacio Torreblanca and Jose M. de Areilza examine the euro crisis from the perspective of Spain. 

The paper argues that the origins of the crisis lie in the defective design of a monetary union born in haste without the proper political, monetary or fiscal institutions to support it. The system therefore needs a thorough restructuring aimed at completing the EMU with fiscal, banking and political union. Partial solutions will only aggravate the crisis.

Spain faces four likely scenarios: "exit", "intervention", "muddling through" and "economic Federation". Although these scenarios are dynamic and interact with each other, without decisive action at the European level, full political "intervention" is the most probable. This will not improve Spain's growth and stability perspectives, and also risks severely undermining the political system and giving rise to popular euroscepticism. 

His recent book in Spanish: The fragmentation of European power

"La fragmentación del poder europeo (The fragmentation of European power)", Política Exterior/Icaria. Madrid, 2011. To read a summary of the book in English, please click here.

Op-eds with impact on the European debate

"Europe has lost its citizens". Presseurop, 11 March 2013

"Europe's bitter harvest". Fresh Thinking Magazine, January 2013 

"Vanished frontiers earn EU its Nobel Prize". Presseurop, 10 December 2012

"Europe must show Spain it is the answer". Financial Times, 16 October 2012

"Time to say basta to the nonsense of austerity". Financial Times, 26 April 2012

"Democracy put to the test". Open Democracy, 28 November 2011.

"Rajoy poised for a 'Hail Mary' manoeuvre". Financial Times, 17 November 2011. Article quoting the Café Steiner's post "Rajoy tiene un plan: hacer un Hail Mary"

“Five reasons why Europe is cracking”. El País, 15 May 2011.

"Europe: in need of a lifeline", Financial Times, 18 April 2011.

“How Germany Became the China of Europe”, Time, 7 March 2011.

“Spain braces itself for a crisis made in Germany”, Financial Times, 29 November 2010.

"Spain’s World Cup shows that Pigs can fly", Financial Times, 12 July 2010.

Publications on the Spanish Presidency of the European Union (2010)

"A confused Spain in a disoriented Europe". Original version in Spanish "Una España confusa en una Europa desorientada", published in journal Política Exterior, volume 133, Jan-Feb 2010, pp. 45-60.

To see more on this topic in Spanish please visit our Shadow Presidency Blog.

More publications in English

"Spain after the elections, the 'Germany of the South'?", with Mark Leonard. European Council on Foreign Relations, Policy Brief. November 2011.

"A chance to reform: how the EU can support democratic evolution in Morocco", with Susi Denison and Nicu Popescu. European Council on Foreign Relations, Policy Brief. May 2011.

"Beyond Maastricht: a new deal for the Eurozone", with Thomas Klau and François Godement. European Council on Foreign Relations, Policy Brief. December 2010.

"Are the Arab Revolutions the last nail in the UM coffin?", with Jordi Vaquer. Bepa monthly brief, Issue 46,  April, 2011.

"Is Spain taking the right approach toward Cuba?", Latin America Advisor. The Interamerican Dialogue. October 30, 2009, pp. 1-2.

"Spanish government must recognize Kosovo", with Jordi Vaquer, El País, 22 April 2008.

"Is there a trade-off between deepening and widening? What do Europeans think?", co-author with Antonia M. Ruiz-Jiménez. EPIN Working Papers No. 17, 2 April 2008.

"Sarkozy's foreign policy: where do European interests and values stand?", FRIDE, February 2008.

"European public opinion and Turkey's accession: making sense of arguments for and against", (co-authored with A.M Ruiz-Jimenez). EPIN Working Papers 16/2007.

"20 Years of Spain membership to the EU (1986-2006)", co-author with Sonia Piedrafita and Federico Steinberg. Real Instituto Elcano y Parlamento Europeo - Oficina en España. ISBN 84-689-7384-X.

Publications in Spanish

"Una Unión (a)política". Journal Política Exterior, volume 150, November-December 2012.

"Más allá de Maastricht: nuevo pacto para el euro (Beyond Maastricht: a new deal for the euro)", by Thomas Klau, François Godement y José Ignacio Torreblanca. Journal Política Exterior, volume 140, March-April 2011.

"La gobernabilidad del mundo y la fragmentación del poder europeo (The world governance and the fragmentation of European power)", in Europa después de Europa, coordinated by Emilio Lamo. Academia Europea de Ciencias y Artes de España. Madrid, 2010. pp. 365-416.

"Una auditoría democrática de la política exterior española (A democratic audit of the Spanish foreign policy)", in Informe sobre la democracia en España. La erosión de la confianza y el bienestar: contra la desafección. Fundación Alternativas. Madrid, 2010.

"Francia y Europa: percepciones, sintonías y desajustes (France and Europe, perceptions, affinities and mismatches)". Journal Política Exterior, volume 122, March-April 2008.

"El impacto de una eventual adhesión turca sobre las instituciones comunitarias, la política exterior y el espacio de libertad, seguridad y justicia", co-authored with Antonio Barroso, in El impacto de la adhesión de Turquía en la UE. Colección La Sociedad Internacional Contemporánea. Editorial Biblioteca Nueva, S.L., Madrid, 2008.

"Una Europa poderosa, pero introvertida (A powerful but intro verted Europe)". CIDOB Yearbook 2008. Claves para interpretar la Política Exterior Española y las Relaciones Internacionales en 2007, pp. 263-269.

"Palabras que cuentan: potencias herbívoras (Herbivorous Powers)". Journal Foreing Policy en español, December-January 2008.

"Lo mejor de Europa" (The best of Europe)". Book review of Pablo Benavides' Europa entre bastidores. Journal Política Exterior, volume 120, November-December 2007, pp. 177-179.

"¿Necesita Europa Fronteras? (Does Europe need frontiers?)", in Borrell, Jose (ed), Europa en la encrucijada, Fundación Cajamar, December 2007.

"¿Levantará Europa la vista? (Will Europe raise its sight?)", Mark Leonard and José I. Torreblanca. Blogeuropa, October 18, 2007.

Click here for more by José Ignacio Torreblanca.