The news that the Centre for Small State Studies recieved a Jean Monnet centre of excellence grant has attracted some attention in the Icelandic media in the last few days. Here is an interview with me from Tuesday in Morgunblaðið.
The story was also reported on the online news outlet eyjan.is.
The Centre for Small State Studies at the University of Iceland has been awarded a centre of excellence grant from the European Union’s Lifelong Learning Programme. The Centre for Small State studies will thus become a Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence for the next three years.
In regard to the grant, the centre will focus on three specific projects. Firstly, to strengthen interdisciplinary research and teaching on European integration, the European Union and the European Economic Area. Secondly, to establish an international school on small states, their administration and their position within the European Union. Thirdly, to publish an Icelandic textbook on European integration for high school and university students. In addition, the centre will continue organising various meetings and conferences, as well as publications, on European affairs.
The centre of excellence grant is a great acknowledgement of the work done by the Centre for Small State Studies, which has specialised in the position of small states in Europe. The establishment of a Centre of Excellence is a continuation of previous acknowledgements that the centre has recieved, such as grants from the Lifelong Learning Programme to organise a small states summer school for the last 12 years, as well as grants to develop teaching in European studies led by Baldur Thorhallsson, professor of political science, in collaboration with the Faculty of Political Science at the University of Iceland.
Students in the Small States Summer School 2013
Those involved in the application, in addition to professor Thorhallsson, were Guðmundur Hálfdánarson, professor of history, Ómar H. Kristmundsson, professor of public administration, Alyson Bailes, adjunct lecturer at the Faculty of Political Science, Maximilian Conrad, lecturer at the Faculty of Political Science, and Pia Hansson, director of the Centre for Small State Studies.
In addition, the centre recieved a special grant to host an international conference on governance in small states and the challenges they face in the international community.
Í veftímaritinu Stjórnmál og stjórnsýsla birtist nýverið grein eftir Alyson Bailes, Baldur Þórhallsson og Rachael Johnstone undir heitinu Scotland as an Independent Small State: Where would it seek shelter? Þar velta greinarhöfundar fyrir sér kostum og göllum sem Skotlandi myndi standa frammi fyrir yrði það að sjálfstæði ríki.
30. apríl síðastliðinn var Alyson og Baldri boðið að kynna niðurstöður sínar í háskólanum í St. Andrews, áður en sjálf greinin var birt. Daginn eftir var haldið til Edinborgar þar sem þau héldu málstofu fyrir tuttugu skoska embættismenn sem vinna nú að áætlun fyrir mögulegar aðgerðir eftir þjóðaratkvæðagreiðsluna um sjálfstæði Skotlands sem haldin verður í október 2014. Alyson hefur tvisvar áður verið til ráðgjafar fyrir þessa sömu embættismenn og 6. ágúst nk. mun hún hitta þá aðila sem fjalla um stöðu Skotlands út frá sjónarhorni smáríkja. Í millitíðinni hefur Baldur einnig haldið fyrirlestra um efnið í háskólanum á Grænlandi, og Alyson hefur birt aðra grein ásamt breskum samstarfsmanni, Paul Ingram, um sjónarhorn friðar í stefnu um sjálfstætt Skotland. Sú grein ber heitið Chasing the Nordic Option After Independence.
Alyson og Baldur stefna á að halda fyrirlestur í Háskóla Íslands í haust um málefni Skotlands.
The Institute of International Relations and Political Science at Vilnius University has published new pictures on their website from their recent conference on Lithuania's EU Council Presidency.
Here I am with my colleagues Ramunas Vilpisauskas, director of the Institute of International Relations and Political Science at Vilnius University, and Juha Jokela, director of the European Union research programme at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs.
Here are a few picture from an international workshop on the Nordic and Baltic small states at the Institute of International Relations and Political Science, University of Vilnius. It was held in October 2012.
In 2002, the Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study (SASS) published a special issue of its journal, Scandinavian Studies, titled: The Scandinavian Way to Europe.
It is the best selling volume of any previous publication by Scandinavian Studies and is intended to be republished soon as a book.
My contribution to the issue was an article on "The Skeptical Political Elite Versus the Pro-European Public: The Case of Iceland".
When Lithuania again became an independent and sovereign state, it immediately applied for membership of the European Union in order strengthen its sovereignty. In the coming months this small state will hold the presidency of the European Council and will thus have the opportunity to influence the development of the EU and world politics in general. This is a great opportunity for Lithuania and will furthen strengthen its position within the EU.
In the pictures below, you can see Lithuania's president, Dalia Grybauskaité, open a conference on Lithuania's presidency of the EU, held by various European institutes of international affairs; Lithuania's foreign minister, Linas Linkevicius, giving a speech at the conference; and finally a Finnish colleague and friend, Juha Jokela.
I was in Belgrade a few weeks ago, participating in a conference on the human rights of LGBT people in current and anticipated EU accession countries. All the presentations from the conference are now available here.
According to this website, I am the creator of a new invention - a pencil!
Socrates would have been proud 😉
