Security

The SFA builds upon the principles described in NATO’s 2010 Strategic Concept as the basis for ensuring Alliance security in the future. It is based on recent national and international studies that address the timeframe out to 2030 and beyond. The SFA used previous ACT futures analyses (e.g. the Multiple Futures Project) as a starting point for its investigation. The report also captures the results of four separate ACT-led workshops that discussed political, sociological, economic, technological, scientific and environmental trends and their implications for NATO as an organisation and for Alliance members’ security as a whole.

For this project, disruptive emergencies are defined as unplanned and non-routine events that have a significant consequence or impact on people, property and infrastructure, or could seriously damage the security of the EU. The impacts include harm to people (including psychological impacts), short or long term economic damage, and physical damage to property and the environment. Disruptive emergencies have been classified as either:
- Hazards - the results of nature or technical failure, including human error; or
- Threats - the results of terrorist or criminal activity (including state sponsored)
Disruptive emergencies do not include everyday occurrences, such as street crime.
The scope of the project includes emergencies that occur either within the EU (or are covered by the EU Civil Protection mechanism, such as the forest fires in 2007), or events outside the EU, that have a major impact within the EU, such as the potential break down of the energy system due to the decision to close nuclear plants as a result of Fukushima.
In undertaking this project I drew on my experience of undertaking FLA in the UK government and as a consultant; and experience of work on the preparedness for and resilience towards disruptive emergencies. This includes work on disruptive emergencies as part of the UK National Security programme (CONTEST) and the associated National Risk Register. I conducted desk research and interviewed a number of experts on the subject. I also took account of comments made following a presentation to the EFFLA Committee at the commencement of the project.
This report neither covers the provision of humanitarian assistance by the EU after emergencies; nor an assessment of future risks or an audit of the capability of DG Research and Innovation to respond to them.
There is lot of activity by Member States and the European Commission directed towards the anticipation of, preparedness for, response to and recovering from disruptive emergencies. The recommendations cover areas where DG Research and Innovation can contribute to these activities.

The first challenge to be addressed within the current design of H2020 is how to network more closely the three analytical dimensions chosen – inclusion, security, innovations – and clarify better the different perspectives and possible readings ascribed to each of the dimensions. As an example, inclusion related to migrations don’t have just to do with people coming to Europe but also with Europeans leaving Europe, security is not just related to preventing something bad from happening it also deals with what might destroy positive dimensions like freedom of speech and privacy. When analysing the H2020 point 6 on “Inclusion, Innovation and Security” one-dimensional perspectives are much more present than multi-dimensional ones and each of the three areas is very much thought as non-networkable with the other two. Such a choice in the design of the H2020 proposal constitutes a general challenge because it might limit the possible contributions by research in social-economic sciences and humanities to the proposed objectives.

A report to the European Council by the Reflection Group on the Future of the EU 2030.

The independent Reflection Group was set up by the European Council under the chair of Mr. González to identify, analyse and propose solutions to the challenges the EU will be facing at the horizon 2030. It is composed of 12 members with outstanding expertise in their field of activity. They have also sought the opinion of experts from the academic and business worlds.

This report to the European Council lists a wide range of problems with which the EU and member states are confronted, for instance the global economic crisis and states coming to the rescue of banks, climate change and energy supply as well as the threats of terrorism and organised crime.

The Reflection Group is convinced that the EU can overcome the difficulties, if everybody - politicians and citizens - are decided to pull together and act in a decisive manner to develop this ambitious political project. It is therefore essential that citizens back up the Union and participate in its further development.

Strategic Trends is an annual publication of the Center for Security Studies (CSS), ETH Zurich. It offers a concise analysis of major developments in world affairs, with a primary focus on international security. Providing succinct interpretations of key trends rather than a comprehensive survey of events, Strategic Trends targets a broad audience ranging from analysts to policy-makers, the media, academics, and the interested public.
Strategic Trends 2011 is the second issue of the Strategic Trends series. It contains a brief overview as well as chapters on global power shifts and fractured geopolitics, changing regional dynamics in the Middle East, terrorism and counterterrorism ten years after 9/11, and narcotics as a growing security concern.

This study analyses the current picture and prospects for EU–Brazil relations in the political and security arenas. As actors experiencing relevant changes, albeit in different directions in their respective international status quo, the EU and Brazil have found some common ground for convergence at the macro level on some structural issues, such as the normative framework of a changing global order, the striving for a multipolar world and the relevance and desirability of multilateralism. At the same time, it is argued that they differ significantly as to the strategies pursued in the attainment of those shared interests, resulting in competing, or eventually divergent, policy preferences when addressing specific issues and developments at the international level, limiting the prospects for a deep mutual commitment and engagement in political and security dynamics at the global level.

"Thinking about the U.S.-ASEAN relationship in 2030 is a useful exercise for testing the tenets of U.S. strategy in the region and in Asia generally. Does the United States have plans in place that will move it toward a vision—along with ASEAN, its members, and other key actors—that promotes its best interests on issues ranging from economic growth and prosperity to regional security to coping with transnational threats and disaster? And can the United States do so while promoting strong people-to-people ties, innovation, and collaboration? Are we investing in these efforts? Do we have the resources and political will to follow them through to fruition?

The answers are at our fingertips. We have the momentum and resources to make choices. This may not be the case 18 years from now, however."

This study provides the initial results of a survey of foresight activities undertaken by a select group of governments around the world.
The study was begun following the recent initiative by European Union (EU) institutions to build a joint foresight capacity (European Strategy and Policy Analysis System – ESPAS) that assesses long-term global trends to help them strengthen policy planning. In addition to contributing to the discussion about this new EU activity, the study is also intended to be of interest for the wider European policy planning community and to anyone interested in learning about how governments practise ‘the art of the long view’ (Schwartz, 1991).
This study looks at the way governments approach foresight, the issues they try to grapple with and the challenges they face in connecting foresight and policy. Its focus is on foresight exercises that look ten years or more into the future. The study does not include within its scope foresight activities undertaken at the initiative of business, academic or non-governmental organisations, though some government-led activities do involve these other actors.
Foresight work includes a range of activities related to the production of knowledge about possible futures. This knowledge is not of the future, nor any real future, but rather ‘the manufactured knowledge of [a] restricted number of possibilities’ (Sardar, 2010). The output of foresight work very often involves the creation of scenarios for the future which can be analysed for their likelihood and potential impact.
sight also commonly uses practices such as ‘trend impact analysis’, ‘horizon scanning’, or the Delphi method (see Box 1).
This study presents an initial tour d’horizon of a limited number of countries who undertake foresight activities: Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Finland, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States (US). The countries were chosen to represent a diverse selection of countries based on location, economic profile, power status and political regime. The analysis is based on desk research and interviews conducted with professionals in government, academia and think tanks. This study also looked at the foresight activities of a range of international organisations with mandates for public service and which interact with governments as sources of knowledge and policy advice. As foresight activity tends to be scattered across departments and not always made public, it was not possible to be exhaustive in our analysis of the countries in this study. Time constraints and language barriers may also have affected the outcome of the study.
The first part of the study identifies the main issues that governments grapple with and offers a preliminary historical overview to shed light on current practice. The second part compares the approaches to foresight taken by governments and the institutional setting for foresight activities. The third part tries to assess the conditions for fruitful foresight.

There is a general sense of urgency among experts regarding the situation in Afghanistan. The period of transition that is currently underway is seen as a last opportunity to create the necessary conditions for transforming international support in a way that reinforces a viable democratic state. The key lies in transforming what is basically a foreign military operation into a peace building operation led by the Afghan government and the UN backed by international support, including military support if necessary, but always subordinate to civilian authorities. Thus, as ISAF scales down, the EU and the US must work closely and intensively together, starting with supporting a strengthening of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), along the following lines.

While the US has been constantly modernizing its armed forces, NATO European states, with the partial exception of the United Kingdom (UK) and France, have lagged far behind (even if one factors in the differences in resources). When pondering on how much and on what to spend public money, European governments are invariably driven by domestic considerations – which for Europeans rarely revolve around military issues – rather than NATO commitments. As a result, a growing imbalance has ensued, with certain allies proportionally contributing to Alliance activities much more than others. While this problem is anything but new in NATO’s history, its proportions – augmented by the economic crisis, which has led to cuts in military spending in most NATO member states – have now acquired an unprecedented scale.