In a special episode recorded live from Lisbon, Jessica Hendrick puts six EU candidate countries through an enlargement simulation to find out what happens when crisis, cash, disinformation and political pressure collide with the race to join the EU
Mark Leonard welcomes Ellie Geranmayeh to discuss the latest phase of the US-Iran conflict, the escalating economic pressure campaign against Tehran and the risks of a prolonged war without a clear exit strategy
Mark Leonard welcomes Janka Oertel and Andrew Small to discuss how China’s industrial rise is shaking Germany—and Europe’s—economic foundations
China is already the undisputed champion of traditional manufacturing. But China’s leadership wants more: it aspires to lead in the next generation of production by 2035 – and biomanufacturing has emerged as a priority for China’s economic security, resilience and strategic autonomy. Europe has seen this movie before. As with solar panels or…
Mark Leonard welcomes Jörg Lau and Jana Puglierin to discuss Germany’s deepening political crisis, the rise of the AfD and how the country’s regional elections could impact Europe’s largest democracy
Mark Leonard welcomes Adriana Abdenur and Jorge Castañeda to discuss how China is reshaping the political imagination of Latin America
Jessica Hendrick welcomes Igor Bandović and Luka Filipović to discuss Serbia’s largest protest movement in decades
Mark Leonard welcomes Loubna El Amine and Cobus van Staden to explore how younger generations in Africa and the Middle East are shaping perceptions of China, the West and the future
Ellie Geranmayeh is joined by Alia Moubayed, Randa Slim and Maha Yahya to discuss what the trilateral framework deal signed by Israel, the US and Lebanon means for the Lebanese stability
Mark Leonard welcomes Camille Grand and Marta Prochwicz Jazowska to discuss last week’s NATO summit and how Europe can prepare for a future in which American security guarantees are no longer assured
Covid-19 has damaged Russia’s economy and President Vladimir Putin’s political agenda
The pandemic poses a threat to European cohesion by increasing economic divides and undermining trust in the EU and national governments
The arrival of the Biden administration in Washington, and the perception of US disengagement from the region, offers an opportunity for Europeans to help de-escalate tensions between GCC states and Iran
Instead of its rigid focus on the Oslo peace process, the EU should craft a new peacemaking paradigm based on equality and deoccupation
The covid-19 crisis has accentuated Western Balkans countries’ pre-existing vulnerabilities – but has not brought about a new political era in the region
To manage in this new world, the EU and its members need to embark on a broad-based effort to recover their strategic sovereignty
The EU’s tendency to shy away from security issues has helped make covert operations and military threats Russia’s tools of choice in the region
To achieve greater sovereignty, Europe needs to push back against rival powers, build leverage in armed conflicts, and be more effective in supporting reform
Europe should upgrade its security activities, and seize the moment to push multilateral institutions up the agenda. But it will be Europe’s connectivity agenda that provides the golden thread running through its foreign policy and its other objectives in the region
The Trump years galvanised Europeans’ efforts to strengthen their own sovereignty; they now need to agree concrete offers they can make to the new administration
Many in Europe think Russia is in decline, but basing EU policy on such deterministic thinking is a mistake. The EU should deal with Russia of today, not with that of 2050 or 2070
Europe and the United States have an opportunity to mount a major diplomatic effort that could halt the fighting and lead the way to political talks
Germany should rally its allies to imbue the Office of the High Representative with new purpose and authority to fulfil its mission
A new Africa-Europe strategic partnership is on the cards. But this will only come to fruition if the European Union gets its member states on board to engage in a substantive discussion with the African Union
If he had thoughts of leaving the Kremlin prior to the Navalny assassination attempt, Vladimir Putin likely now sees no exit for himself
The regulation sets a damaging precedent for trade restrictions on vaccines and undermines the EU’s credibility as a supporter of open trade
Much of the world is glad to move on from Trump – but Poles may still be hankering after earlier times
The EU can learn from Brexit how to manage divergence and differentiate integration – for the sake of its other neighbours
Kosovo and Serbia will likely make little progress this year in their long-running dialogue, due to a lack of honest leadership and genuine attempts to prepare the public for a compromise
By facilitating a rapprochement between Cairo and Ankara, European governments could make progress towards their strategic objective of stabilising the Middle East and North Africa
European cohesion is bouncing back after crisis years. The EU Cohesion Monitor presents new insights on cohesion as an underestimated source of strength and collective action in the EU
In a special episode recorded live from Lisbon, Jessica Hendrick puts six EU candidate countries through an enlargement simulation to find out what happens when crisis, cash, disinformation and political pressure collide with the race to join the EU
Mark Leonard welcomes Ellie Geranmayeh to discuss the latest phase of the US-Iran conflict, the escalating economic pressure campaign against Tehran and the risks of a prolonged war without a clear exit strategy
Mark Leonard welcomes Janka Oertel and Andrew Small to discuss how China’s industrial rise is shaking Germany—and Europe’s—economic foundations
Mark Leonard welcomes Jörg Lau and Jana Puglierin to discuss Germany’s deepening political crisis, the rise of the AfD and how the country’s regional elections could impact Europe’s largest democracy
Mark Leonard welcomes Adriana Abdenur and Jorge Castañeda to discuss how China is reshaping the political imagination of Latin America
Jessica Hendrick welcomes Igor Bandović and Luka Filipović to discuss Serbia’s largest protest movement in decades
Mark Leonard welcomes Loubna El Amine and Cobus van Staden to explore how younger generations in Africa and the Middle East are shaping perceptions of China, the West and the future
Ellie Geranmayeh is joined by Alia Moubayed, Randa Slim and Maha Yahya to discuss what the trilateral framework deal signed by Israel, the US and Lebanon means for the Lebanese stability
Mark Leonard welcomes Camille Grand and Marta Prochwicz Jazowska to discuss last week’s NATO summit and how Europe can prepare for a future in which American security guarantees are no longer assured
Mark Leonard welcomes Célia Belin and Jeremy Cliffe to discuss Marine Le Pen’s return to the French presidential race
China is already the undisputed champion of traditional manufacturing. But China’s leadership wants more: it aspires to lead in the next generation of production by 2035 – and biomanufacturing has emerged as a priority for China’s economic security, resilience and strategic autonomy. Europe has seen this movie before. As with solar panels or…
The Annual Council Meeting 2026 will take place on 17-18 June 2026 in Vienna
L’Ufficio di Roma dello European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), in cooperazione con il Ministero degli Affari Esteri e della Cooperazione Internazionale, ha organizzato lo scenario game “Which MENA Region in 2030?” a Roma l’11 giugno 2026, presso gli Uffici del MAECI. L’evento ha proposto due esercizi di scenario ambientati al 2030,…
Europe’s green transition is no longer a matter primarily of technocratic expertise and regulatory process. It is now contested at the heart of politics itself. The question is which vision will prevail: a pro-electric and future-oriented Europe, or a pro-fossil Europe anchored in the past. In this context, in Brussels on 8 June…
In a private discussion on EU and UK attitudes towards a renewed partnership, a decade after the referendum, Mark Leonard and Marcus Roberts will present some embargoed data from ECFR and Mandate looking at views in the UK but also across Europe on different modalities of the EU-UK relationship going forward…
The G7 and its close partners, particularly the Republic of Korea (ROK), face a rapidly evolving geopolitical landscape marked by growing economic competition, technological fragmentation, and mounting security challenges. From supply chain vulnerabilities to shifting alliances and rising geopolitical tensions, these developments are testing the resilience of existing frameworks for international cooperation
At a moment when rising oil prices and continued supply disruptions are raising the stakes of reliance on fossil fuels, decarbonising the global shipping industry is about more than curbing emissions—it is also about strategic diversification as geopolitical and geoeconomic tensions grow. The Net-Zero Framework (NZF) presents the strongest maritime decarbonisation proposal, designed to drive switching to low-emission fuels while also ensuring a predictable stream of revenues…
Recent coordinated attacks by jihadist and separatist groups in Mali, unprecedented in their scale and coordination, have placed the state’s security apparatus under strain and reinforced concerns over instability across the wider region, despite the reconfiguration of Bamako’s external partnerships. More broadly, the Sahel and West Africa are facing a complex set of…
Reflecting on the findings from our previous events and drawing on Mark Leonard’s latest IPPR paper, Britain’s strategy for a decade of danger: Our nation, our continent, our world, the discussion will examine competing visions for Britain’s role in the world—from renewed reliance on the US, to a more globally diversified approach, to a strategic pivot…
At a moment of heightened geopolitical turmoil and growing economic, climate and security pressures, Africa–Europe relations are undergoing an important recalibration. Last year’s AU–EU Summit in Luanda underscored the strategic interdependence of the two continents, the importance of multilateralism and the persistent gap between ambition and delivery. This year, ECFR is hosting its annual high-level Africa-Europe…
