Between high-level reports, bold statements, and internal negotiation, Europe struggles to outline a cohesive geostrategic vision for its place in the world. 

Sophia Besch, Dan Baer, and Rosa Balfour explore why the EU often fails to establish long-term solutions to the challenges it faces, and explain how Europe can overcome its political and institutional paralysis. 

Rosa Balfour, Stefan Lehne, and Elena Ventura, September 22, 2025, “The European Radical Right in the Age of Trump 2.0,” Carnegie Europe.

Sophia Besch, June 26, 2025, “The Price of Protection,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Dan Baer, May 13, 2025, “Trump’s Brain Drain Will Be Europe’s Gain,” Foreign Policy.

Rosa Balfour, April 30, 2025, “Europe Tried to Trump-Proof Itself. Now It’s Crafting a Plan B,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Rosa Balfour, March 25, 2025, “The Case for Europe,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Sophia Besch and Erik Brown, December 16, 2024, “Securing Europe’s Subsea Data Cables,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Dan Baer and Sophia Besch, December 12, 2024, “NATO’s Northeast Countries Have a Template for Europe’s New Security Reality,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.”

The ceasefire between Israel and Hamas seems to be holding, but much work will need to be done before it can transform into a lasting peace.

Rym Momtaz, Pierre Vimont, and Maha Yahya break down reactions from European and Arab leaders to Trump’s Gaza peace plan and discuss if Europe has a role to play.

Rym Momtaz, October 7, 2025, “The Trump Gaza Peace Plan Needs the EU, Too,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz, June 10, 2025, “Europeans and Arabs Must Take Historic Steps Toward a Palestinian State,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz, May 15, 2025, “Taking the Pulse: Should the EU Suspend its Association Agreement With Israel?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Pierre Vimont, July 22, 2025, “Reinventing European Diplomacy,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Pierre Vimont, October 10, 2023, “Europe’s Moment of Powerlessness in the Middle East,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Maha Yahya, February 17, 2025, “The Fatal Flaw of the New Middle East,” Foreign Affairs

The EU-U.S. trade deal concluded in July and the EU-China summit held the same month highlighted Europe’s weakening position on the global chessboard. 

Rym Momtaz, Rosa Balfour, and Erik Jones unpack why European leaders struggle to play power politics and explore what it will take for the EU to regain strategic agency. 

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:01:54] Europe's Summer of Delusion, [00:14:18] Prospects for EU Institutional Reform [00:24:18] Europe's Quest for a Strategic Vision

Rosa Balfour, April 30, 2025, “Europe Tried to Trump-Proof Itself. Now It’s Crafting a Plan B,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Rosa Balfour, March 25, 2025, “The Case for Europe,” Carnegie Europe.

Rosa Balfour, Sinan Ülgen, November 28, 2024, “Europe’s Fledgling Economic Statecraft and the Trump Challenge,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rosa Balfour, Erik Jones, et al., November 19, 2024, “Geopolitics and Economic Statecraft in the European Union,” Carnegie Europe.

Erik Jones, July 17, 2025, “Betting on Europe,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Erik Jones, Gideon Rose, June 23, 2025, “Europe’s Two-Front War,” Foreign Affairs.

Erik Jones, November 6, 2024, “How Draghi and Letta May Help in Dealing With Trump,” Encompass.

Rym Momtaz et al., August 28, 2025, “Taking the Pulse: With Trump, Has Europe Capitulated?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz, August 26, 2025, “Europe’s Summer of Trump Delusion,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz et al., July 24, 2025, “Taking the Pulse: Does the EU-China Summit Show a Weakened European Hand with Beijing?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz, July 15, 2025, “Europe’s Claim to Geopolitical Power Isn’t Passing the Trump Test,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

U.S. President Donald Trump perceives climate change not as an environmental crisis but as a geostrategic opportunity. 

Rym Momtaz sat down with Olivia Lazard and Milo McBride to explore whether Europe can still cooperate with the United States on the clean energy transition.

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:01:48] The Trump Administration’s Approach to Climate Change, [00:10:32] EU-U.S. Cooperation on Climate Action, [00:20:38] The Future of the Clean Energy Transition

Olivia Lazard, May 9, 2025, “What Are Rare Earths and Why Does Everyone Want Them?,” BBC Radio.

Milo McBride, Narayan Subramanian, June 5, 2025, “America’s Electric Vehicle Surrender,” Foreign Policy.

Milo McBride, May 29, 2025, “Clean Energy’s New Cold War: Can the U.S. Compete With China?,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Milo McBride, Daniel Helmeci, May 1, 2025, “The Global Trend of Turning Power Plants Into Clean Energy Hubs,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Milo McBride et al., February 26, 2025, “How the U.S. Can Stop Losing the Race for Clean Energy,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Milo McBride, Daniel Helmeci, February 26, 2025, “Minerals, Manufacturing, and Markets: Foreign Policy for U.S. Energy Technology and Minerals,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Relations between Turkey and Armenia remain frozen, largely because of Azerbaijan’s influence over Ankara and a lack of sustained Western diplomatic engagement. 

Rym Momtaz sat down with Thomas de Waal and Garo Paylan to discuss the main obstacles to a rapprochement and why reopening the Turkey-Armenia border matters for both regional and Western interests.

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:01:35] The State of Turkey-Armenia Relations, [00:11:58] Russia's Influence in the Process, [00:20:47] Can the West Play a Role?

Thomas de Waal, March 17, 2025, “Armenia and Azerbaijan’s Major Step Forward,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Thomas de Waal, September 19, 2024, “Armenia and Azerbaijan: A Fragile Peace Process,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, July 11, 2024, “Armenia Navigates a Path Away From Russia,” Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, Dimitar Bechev, and Maksim Samorukov, May 30, 2024, “Between Russia and the EU: Europe’s Arc of Instability,” Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, September 22, 2023, “A Tragic Endgame in Karabakh,” Carnegie Europe.

Garo Paylan, January 30, 2025, “Leveraging International Pressure to Reform Turkey,” CivilNet.

Garo Paylan, January 13, 2025, “Armenia-Azerbaijan Peace Deal: A Golden Opportunity for Trump,” Wall Street Journal.

Garo Paylan, July 3, 2024, “Why Washington Must Push Forward the Fragile Armenia-Azerbaijan Peace Plan,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

As transatlantic tensions over technology and AI regulation intensify, emerging powers like China, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates are seeking to assert their dominance in the tech domain. 

Rym Momtaz sat down with Sinan Ülgen and Sam Winter-Levy to discuss the dual-use nature of generative AI and large language models and how they might be misused by malign actors. 

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:01:28] Generative AI and Large Language Models, [00:11:57] The Efforts in Regulating Generative AI, [00:19:23] The Future of the Tech Sector

Sinan Ülgen, January 27, 2025, “The World According to Generative Artificial Intelligence,” Carnegie Europe.

Sinan Ülgen, August 13, 2024, “Turkey’s Instagram Spat Shows the Limits of Global Content Governance,” Financial Times.

Sam Winter-Levy, Sophia Besch, January 30, 2025 “How Will AI Export Policies Redefine U.S. Global Influence?” The World Unpacked, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Sam Winter-Levy, Matt Sheehan, January 28, 2025, “Chips, China, and a Lot of Money: The Factors Driving the DeepSeek AI Turmoil,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Sam Winter-Levy, January 24, 2025, “The United Arab Emirates’ AI Ambitions,” Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Sam Winter-Levy, January 13, 2025, “With Its Latest Rule, the U.S. Tries to Govern AI’s Global Spread,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Sam Winter-Levy, December 13, 2024, “The AI Export Dilemma: Three Competing Visions for U.S. Strategy,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Sam Winter-Levy, September 20, 2024, “Silicon Valley Hasn’t Revolutionized Warfare—Yet,” Foreign Policy.

One of the Trump administration’s first moves has been the dismantling of USAID, an agency that has been critical for international development and democracy promotion.

Rym Momtaz sat down with Thomas Carothers and Richard Youngs to discuss the implications of U.S. cuts to foreign aid and Europe’s role in keeping the global democracy agenda alive.

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:01:11] Trump’s Cuts to USAID, [00:10:07] The Need to Rethink the International Democracy Agenda, [00:20:33] Europe's Defensive Approach to Democracy.

Thomas Carothers, March 3, 2025, “Does U.S. Democracy Aid Have a Future?,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Thomas Carothers, February 4, 2025, “The Heartless Upheaval of American Foreign Aid,” Emissary, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Thomas Carothers, March 3, 2025, “Prospects for US Democracy Support During the Second Trump Presidency,” European Democracy Hub.

Thomas Carothers, Richard Youngs, May 2, 2024, “European and U.S. Democracy Support: The Limits of Convergence,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Richard Youngs, February 26, 2025, “European Reactions to the U.S. Retreat From Democracy,” Carnegie Europe.

Richard Youngs, February 26, 2025, “No world order: Europe needs more radical thinking for the Trump era,” The Conversation.

Richard Youngs et al., January 23, 2025, “European Democracy Support Annual Review 2024,” Carnegie Europe.

Richard Youngs, Elene Panchulidze, December 2, 2024, “Playing Defence: Europe and Democracy,” Survival.

Richard Youngs, September 25, 2024, “The European Union is becoming too obsessed with defence,” The Conversation.

After three years of war on its soil, Ukraine is grappling with manpower shortages and increasingly uncertain Western military support in the face of Russia’s continued aggression.

Rym Momtaz sat down with Yuliya Bidenko and Eric Ciaramella to unpack the situation on the ground and the war’s broader implications for European security and the transatlantic alliance.

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:02:01] The Military Situation on the Ground, [00:11:17] Ukraine’s Mobilization and Societal Priorities, [00:18:43] Europe’s Role in Ensuring Ukraine’s Security.

Yuliya Bidenko, February 8, 2023, “How Ukraine Forged a Culture of Resilience,” Europe Inside Out, Carnegie Europe.

Eric Ciaramella, January 30, 2025, “Triangle of Sadness: Prospects of Trump-Putin-EU Peace Talks on Ukraine, with Eric Ciaramella,” Carnegie Politika, Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.

Eric Ciaramella, December 5, 2024, “Rational Security: The "Ukraine in the Membrane" Edition,” Lawfare.

Rym Momtaz et al., December 5, 2024, “Taking the Pulse: Are Information Operations Russia’s Most Potent Weapon Against Europe?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz et al., January 9, 2025, “Taking the Pulse: Can Poland’s EU Presidency Be Credible Without Deploying Troops to Ukraine?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz et al., November 21, 2024, “Taking the Pulse: Would Freezing Ukraine’s NATO Membership Process Advance Peace?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rym Momtaz, November 5, 2024, “Behind the Scenes, Preparations for Russia-Ukraine Negotiations,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Russia’s belligerence and political interference in some of the Black Sea littoral states threaten the EU’s influence in the region. 

Rym Momtaz sat down with Dimitar Bechev and Thomas de Waal to discuss how the union can respond to Moscow’s destabilizing actions and keep the enlargement process on track. 

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:02:13] The Political Situation in Georgia and Moldova, [00:10:04] The EU’s Enlargement Strategy, [00:20:14] Europe’s Role in the Black Sea

Rym Momtaz et al., December 5, 2024, “Taking the Pulse: Are Information Operations Russia’s Most Potent Weapon Against Europe?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Dimitar Bechev, November 25, 2024, “Illiberal eastern Europeans look to play their Trump card,” Financial Times.

Dimitar Bechev, Richard Giragosian, Gorana Grgić, and Batu Kutelia, December 5, 2024, “In Brief: Russia’s Hybrid War,”War on the Rocks.

Dimitar Bechev, Iliriana Gjoni, October 24, 2024, “All Is Not Well With EU Enlargement to the Western Balkans,” Carnegie Europe.

Dimitar Bechev, June 27, 2024, “Between the EU and Moscow: How Russia Exploits Divisions in Bosnia,” Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.

Dimitar Bechev, June 20, 2024, “Can EU Enlargement Work?,” Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, January 16, 2025, “Moldova’s Gas Crisis Is Europe’s Headache,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, October 31, 2024, “Georgia’s Dangerous Moment Is a Challenge for the EU,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, October 9, 2024, “Can Georgia Stay on Its European Path?,” Europe Inside Out, Carnegie Europe.

Thomas de Waal, June 5, 2024, “Opportunistic Georgia joins Europe’s illiberal club,” Financial Times.

Thomas de Waal, October 9, 2024, “Between Russia and the EU: Europe’s Arc of Instability,” Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.

Trade wars, the contestation of neoliberalism, and the weaponization of interdependence have prompted the EU to adjust its political economic model. 

Rym Momtaz sat down with Rosa Balfour and Erik Jones to discuss how the EU is changing its economic strategies and what challenges lie ahead for the new European Commission. 

[00:00:00] Intro, [00:01:29] The EU’s Political Economic Model, [00:15:37] Europe’s New Economic Statecraft, [00:23:40] Priorities for the New European Commission.

Rosa Balfour, Sinan Ülgen et al., November 19, 2024, “Geopolitics and Economic Statecraft in the European Union,” Carnegie Europe.

Rosa Balfour, Sinan Ülgen, November 28, 2024, “Europe’s Fledgling Economic Statecraft and the Trump Challenge,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.

Rosa Balfour, November 27, 2024, “Europe Under Trump: Strategic Challenges and Opportunities with Rosa Balfour,” Europe’s Futures.

Rosa Balfour, November 4, 2024, “Europe is trapped between technocracy and democracy,” Financial Times.

Erik Jones, November 2024, “How Draghi and Letta may help in dealing with Trump,” Encompass.

Rym Momtaz et al., November 7, 2024, “Taking the Pulse: Can Europeans Significantly Reduce Their Security Reliance on the United States?” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.