strategic and international studies

Download Action Plan 2019 - Spanish version (528KB - PDF)

Although in recent years the Elcano Royal Institute (RIE) has begun to pay attention to the technological dimension of international relations (in areas such as techno-geopolitics, cybersecurity, the European digital agenda, big data and misinformation and interference in electoral processes), this 2019 Action Plan seeks to make digitalisation and its governance a central strand running through all the Institute’s research work and publications.

Moreover, a new line of research will be opened up in 2019 addressing ‘The digitalisation of the economy and its governance’, which will have the support of the Working Party on Technological Transformations and Global Governance. In the short term, these efforts will manifest themselves in a specific study into what is known as ‘digital wellbeing’ in the context of the European Union. We will also continue to take part in a highly active way in the T20, the network of think tanks attached to the G-20, contributing our thoughts on the possible social and political consequences of digitalisation.

As far as the various geographical regions on which the RIE focuses are concerned, this Plan will prioritise attention on Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa. In terms of the former, the opportunities of all kinds that are provided by our Brussels Office to raise awareness of our output on Latin America in the EU capital, where we detect growing interest in everything related to this region, will be harnessed more systematically (and strategically). We will also redouble our efforts to position the RIE among the European think tanks that pay special attention to Sub-Saharan Africa, above all in areas such as investment, trade and security, without neglecting other more traditional areas such as migration and development aid.

Lines of work to be pursued in 2019:

The 2019 Action Plan may be summed up in four major lines of work:

1. The first will address the ‘Keys of Spanish foreign policy’, and encompasses the following initiatives and projects:

Spain’s foreign and European policy:

• The Catalan crisis and its foreign dimension
• Bilateral relations: Germany, Portugal, the United Kingdom, the United States, China, India and Japan
• What weight does Spain have in the European Union? Towards a map of Spanish presence and influence in Brussels
• Spanish aid 2030
• The European Commission’s ‘Defence Package’ and the future of the technological-industrial basis of defence in Spain
• Towards a new Spanish cybersecurity policy
• The evolution of jihadist terrorism in Spain
• Project on ‘Methodological Innovation in Risk Analysis in Intelligence’

Spanish responses to the new threats to security:

• Security and defence in the Spanish context
• Spain amid the threat of jihadist terrorism in Spain: institutional responses and social reactions

Spain and the new global governance:

• Spanish aid 2030
• The Spanish language on the multilateral stage
• Gender equality as a global public good and a goal of foreign policy

2. The second is entitled ‘The future of the European Union: new scenarios, new policies’, and will focus on the following themes:

• The EU amid a new political cycle, 2019-2024
• The EU amid the economic uncertainty generated by the Trump administration
• Migration and asylum policy from the Spanish perspective
• European societies amid the threat of global jihadism and its consequences
• The EU amid climate change and its governance

3. The third line of work will address ‘The Global Agenda from the Spanish and European perspective’, and will encompass the following projects:

• The crisis (and the future) of the liberal international order
• The digitalisation of the economy and its governance
• Transformations in the Mediterranean and the Middle East
• The neglected Arab revolutions: scenarios for 2030
• Latin America in the regional and global context
• Transnational criminal networks and illegal trafficking: a shared area of Atlantic insecurity

4. The fourth and final line of work will focus on ‘The Elcano tools for analysing international relations and Spain’s position and image in the world’. These tools, which were designed and created internally and are wide-ranging in scope, include the following indices and barometers:

• Elcano Global Presence Index
• Spain’s Image Barometer (BIE)
• Barometer of the Elcano Royal Institute (BRIE)
• System of Indicators of the Distance between Image and Reality (SIDIR)

Dowload Action Plan 2019 - Spanish version (528KB - PDF)