As part of efforts to build knowledge exchange and research networking the GCRI has to date held a number of thought-provoking events featuring speakers from various disciplines at Swansea University and beyond on geopolitical issues we face around the world.
The GCRI held its launch event on 17th April 2024 entitled Navigating Ukraine’s Future: Challenges, Opportunities and Geopolitical dynamics.
The panellists
Date: 17 April 2024
Speakers (third from the left to right): Dr Kris Stoddart (Swansea University / GCRI Director - Chair) Professor Brad Blitz (University College London), Dr Wojciech Michnick (Jagiellonian University), Dr Allyson Edwards (Bath Spa University), Dr Jenny Mathers (Aberystwyth University), Dr Victoria Vdovychenko (Centre for Defence Strategies – via Zoom) Professor Bettina Renz (University of Nottingham – via Zoom)
Event description:
The roundtable featured experts from around the globe specialising in Ukraine and Russia, who discussed some of the key questions and themes around the ongoing Russia-Ukraine War. These included geopolitical consequences of the conflict, humanitarian issues, strategies for ending the war with Russia, and evaluating the prospects for peace and stability in the region. Key questions addressed included why Russia invaded Ukraine, what peace could look like, the short-term and longer-term implications of the conflict for the security landscape of Europe and whether Russia’s war aims would end with Ukraine.
GCRI Director Kris Stoddart (left) and Keir Giles (right)
Date: 17 June 2024
Speaker: Keir Giles, Senior Consulting Fellow with the Russia and Eurasia Programme of the Royal Institute of International Affairs at Chatham House, and Director of the Conflict Studies Research Centre (CSRC)
Event description:
What kind of future lies in store for Europe depends on the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine. But the same is also true of Russia's own future path. Any prospect of near-term political or social change in Russia depends on how the country will respond to victory or defeat.
In this talk, Keir Giles considered not only variables and unknowns that depend on the future course of the war, but also the constants and objective factors that will constrain the possible paths of Russia's future development. He discusses both the scope for political upheaval in Russia following defeat, and the limits to that scope imposed both by the current Russian government and the nature of Russia's history and society.
Drawing on decades of studying - and accurately predicting - Russia, he places the current episode in the broader sweep of history, and considers what that can and cannot tell us about what to expect from Moscow next.
The panellists
Date: 1 July 2024
Speakers (left to right): Dr Matthias Dilling (PPIR - Chair), Ansgar Wohlschlegel (Economics), AP Matt Wall (PPIR Head of Department), Dr Ceri Hughes (Media and Communication), and Dr Ella Rabaiotti (CSSP Head of Department).
Event description:
In the lead up to the UK general election on 4 July 2024 the GCRI hosted a roundtable discussion with experts from various disciplines across Swansea University. They discussed some of the key challenges the next government and parliament would inherit including in areas like the economy, public confidence and trust in politics, crime and law and order, security and defence, and sustainability and climate change action. They also covered the electoral process itself, addressing how the political parties had run their respective campaigns, media coverage and focus, use of social media, and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s calculus and reasoning for calling an early election.
