On 9th November, the H2020 UPTAKE project and COMPASS organised a workshop together with the Rome-based Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI). The workshop, titled “The EU and resilience: interrogating theory, policies and practice” brought together over forty participants to reflect on the concept of resilience and its application in the EU’s policies towards the eastern neighbourhood and Central Asia.
Participants included COMPASS team members from all six project institutions; COMPASS Advisory Board members; PhD students from the UPTAKE consortium; and external participants. The key note was delivered by Dr Nathalie Tocci (AB member, Special Adviser to the European Union’s HR/VP Federica Mogherini, and Director of the IAI). The School of Politics and IR was represented by Nele Ewers-Peters, Chris Henry, Conny Jumel, Elena Korosteleva, Muzaffer Kutlay, Oybek Madiyev, Zhouchen Mao, Luca Mavelli, Zach Paikin, Eske van Gils and Marwa Wasfy.
In each of the three roundtable sessions speakers presented their views on resilience in light of theory; policies; and practice. The presentations were followed by interventions of provocateurs and discussions with the whole audience. Specific issues that were raised during the workshop and that will contribute greatly to the formation of the project’s conceptual framework, concerned the different interpretations of ‘resilience’; the link between resilience and capacity-building, as well as policy impact. The workshop will lead to several concrete outputs, including working proceedings and possibly a Special Issue.