2018 — Paris

Rather than positing a direct link between the supposedly offense dominant character of digital technologies and the risks of instability associated with cyberspace, this contribution highlights the importance of two key variables. On the one hand, the way in which the digital space is configured and, on the other hand, the way in which the actors seize it and integrate it into their logic and strategic capacities. Digital technologies provide incentive for the offensive more than they determine in advance the structure of power relationships.

Theories considering certain cyber-attacks as acts of aggression seem to be only aimed at gearing international public opinion to accept the idea of a lawful recourse to armed force in reaction to some cyber-attacks. Nevertheless, these theories do not seem to have an effective legal basis in international law considering that an act of aggression always entails the use of kinetic armed force. On the contrary it seems easier to reconnect some uses of ICT to the hypothesis of a threat of international peace and security because there are no obstacles in supporting that United Nations Security Council (UNSC) could establish - under article 39 of UN Charter - that a specific use of cyber force constitutes a threat to international peace and consequently react resorting to measures set forth in articles 40 to 42 of UN Charter. Indeed, the practice has illustrated, over the course of years, that the notion of threat to peace has exceeded situations characterised by serious violations of human rights expanding practically to “any violation of an essential obligation for the safeguarding of the fundamental interests of the International Community”: an expansion which could also extend to cyber operations especially when aimed against critical national infrastructure and cause serious damage to persons and property. Once this point is well resolved, it remains to evaluate to which kind of reaction the UNSC could resort to: from the cease-fire to smart sanctions against non-state actors (e.g. in the case of private hackers) until the use of armed force.

This contribution analyses how States’ may rely on existing academic publications and expertise in the process of (re)interpretation international law in this new context as well as in the shaping of their approach and strategy. In this perspective, an important part of this contribution focuses on the two editions of the Tallinn Manual on the international law applicable to cyber operations published in 2013 and 2017 by Cambridge University Press. The Tallinn Manual, despite its funding by an international organization, is only an academic work and not an official document of any State or international organization. It has, however, proven being particularly influential on the approach and practice of some States.

This presentation will argue that the key to the seeming restraint in the use of cyberweapons lies in their unclear legal character. While the debate on the use of cyberweapons constituting an armed attack is far from closure, the 2017 US law on critical infrastructure protection as well as the EU NIS Directive put emphasis on cyberresilience rather than active defence. This is primarily due to the lack of legal certainty surrounding the use of those cyberweapons in defensive, preemptive or offensive capacity. The presentation will discuss the international law background behind cyberweapons and offer solutions rooted in traditional international law on state responsibility, international liability and due diligence.

When discussing the development of national security in cyberspace, it is important to bear in mind that different states may interpret this term broadly. This presentation will analyse how the Chinese stance on global cyber security and governance issues has been informed by both a consistently evolved domestic policy approach to questions of security and sovereignty, and a pragmatic response to a succession of external events. It combines a view that takes seriously the Chinese Communist Party’s primary importance in defining national security, and that invites Western researchers to view existing cyber policies “from the other side”.

In November 2014, Frontex started its Southern Mediterranean border monitoring operation Triton, followed in June 2015 by the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) anti-smuggling mission EUNAVFOR Med ‘Sophia’. Both operations’ outward communication has placed considerable emphasis on the conduct of maritime Search and Rescue (SAR). Still, this commitment was not matched by consistent action. Both Triton and EUNAVFOR have conducted a relatively limited number of SAR operations, prioritizing border control and anti-smuggling tasks. This article explains the gap between EU missions’ humanitarian rhetoric and an operational conduct primarily focusing on curbing irregular migrations as a form of organized hypocrisy. Decoupling talk and action allowed Triton and EUNAVFOR to reconcile the conflicting expectations arising from European governments’ willingness to reduce migrant arrivals and the normative imperative to act against the loss of life at sea. However, EU mission’s organized hypocrisy had several negative externalities, hindering an effective management of the humanitarian crisis offshore Libya.

This paper will examine European options to respond to American restraint. What does it take to keep the U.S. engaged in Europe? Is increased defense spending enough? What alternative policies could Europe adopt in response to American restraint? What does it mean to increase self-sufficiency? What would assertiveness entail? If such options are to be implemented, is the E.U. the best option to enact such a grand strategic posture? The paper engages in this intellectual thought experiment, using IR theory alongside empirical evidence. It will outline three grand strategic scenarios, and engage in a first attempt to describe a possible, grand strategic landscape for European action.

The purpose of the paper is to identify the main ‘cracks’ in Europe’s post-war geopolitical architecture. The paper’s central contention is that Europe is undergoing a balance of power crisis that is animated by three structural developments. The first is U.S, retrenchment in Europe. The second relates to Germany’s economic, political and diplomatic ascent in Europe, and its emerging leadership position within the EU. And the third is Russia’s push to recreate a sphere of influence in Eastern Europe and subvert the Western liberal order on the continent. A key theme in this paper is the powerful tension between power and weakness that defines the role of Europe's three main powers: the US, Germany and Russia. The paper argues that even though these three countries are and are likely to remain the most significant powers in Europe, none of them has the wherewithal, legitimacy (notably in the case of Russia) or willingness (in that of Germany) to provide order in the way the U.S. has done in the past. The result: it's no one's Europe.

This paper examines what type of military capabilities Europe (the European Union) needs to ensure its security under three different scenarios: deep engagement with the United States, self-sufficiency, and assertiveness. It looks at the minimal requirements under each scenario, in terms of conventional and non-conventional capabilities. What investments are needed in each case, especially with regards to cyber-capabilities, unmanned vehicles, and maritime capabilities? The paper will also analyze what type of deterrence Europe could generate vis-à-vis Russia, and its options for power projection into the Asia-Pacific.

This contribution will explore the current state of U.S.-EU counter-terrorism cooperation. It will outline the main patterns that have characterized the transition from the Obama to the current Trump administration, focusing both on cooperation on kinetic counter-terrorism operations and on preventive initiatives adopted by member states and by the Union at large. The main goal of the paper is to highlight trends concerning evolving priorities for engagement, new actors, platforms, and issue areas, in particular in the field of preventing/countering violent extremism (P/CVE). The paper will offer an assessment of the extent to which existing patterns of cooperation in counter-terrorism have been affected by the changing dynamics of U.S. global leadership after the 2016 election. The analysis will seek to evaluate the likely impact (if any) of a diminished U.S. involvement on the effectiveness of the multilateral counter-terrorism regime and the Union’s prospects to achieve its key counter-terrorism objectives.

Regarding illicit routes, Africa, and concretely the Sahel becomes one on the main doors of the drug sent from Latin America. But there is no only drug. The same routes are used by the mafias as routes of migratory flows. In this sense, the Maghreb and the Sahel had registered recently an important increase in the illicit traffics. These routes are used by the transnational organized crime groups, which have illegal activities of arms traffic, money laundry, traffic of human beings as well as other illicit traffics. In this sense, Africa is the new ‘paradise’ for any type of illicit traffics: drugs, human beings, weapons and raw materials such as precious stones, ivory, gold, platinum, wood, or oil... Particularly, across the Sahel region there are some specific conditions such as conflicts and unresolved internal tensions, political instability, state fragility and widespread power vacuum, vast uncontrolled and permeable frontiers, institutional weaknesses or corrupt regimes, that constitute a perfect breeding ground for the criminal networks. All of these circumstances contribute also to generate the proliferation of non-State actors in North Africa, as armed groups, insurgent movements, ethnic militias, organized crime groups, contrabandists, traffickers as well as extremist religious groups. The result of this is a region with an important increment of violent extremism and terrorist activity (sometimes linked with criminal groups creating a hybrid hazard), the proliferation of migrant smuggling mafias, as well as the drug caravans. The aim of the paper is analyzing the new transnational crime organizations based in Africa, and at the same time, the tools to deal with this threat. The research focuses on the main conglomerates of crime, the links between Africa and Latin American organized crime groups and how this danger in combination with terrorist groups could have a massive impact in the security of the region as well as for the world security.

Given consistent Eurobarometer data-based claims by the EU, that 'large majorities in all Member States would like to see “more Europe” in security and defence' (CSDP), and in the wake of EU legislation establishing an EU army ("PESCO") passed in December 2017 to operationalise the EU's mutual defence clause (Article 42.7 TEU), it is timely to critically examine the relationship between the use of opinion poll data and EU member-states' true public preferences on security and defence, with a particular focus on gender. Whilst there is a literature on feminist/critical security studies, and a literature on gender and public attitudes to the use of force, to date, there is has been little integration of the two fields. This paper problematises the current discourses on public support for EU CSDP and provides a data-based, feminist critique of how the European Union uses surveys to capture public attitudes to European Security and Defence Policy.

Our goal is to explore the determinants of aggregate public opinion support for a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), operationalized as the European public's mood towards this policy area. To answer this question, we look at four sets of determinants and their workings both over time and cross-nationally. First, we examine the Left-Right ideological dimension. For many years, in several countries, this has been the main source of contention on how foreign policy should be coordinated between European countries and with the US. Second, there is the European dimension. The CFSP mood, and its evolution over time, could be seen as a manifestation of the wider politicization of the European integration process, started with Maastricht in the 1990s and since then a persistent, and increasingly, relevant, cleavage in the European political space. While both factors look at what could be defined as ideological orientations – being them on the Left-Right space or on the more or less EU integration – the third set of determinants simply ignore the role of ideology and look at the national dimension and countries' international posture as sources of explanation for the ebbs and flows of the CFSP mood. In this perspective, the different level of coordination the public supports has to be traced back to the economic, historical and geo-political characteristics of each single state, irrespective of the ideological landscape. Fourth, we examine the impact of Anti-Americanism on support for a common European foreign and defence policy.

The Democratic Peace debate and the 'domestic politics turn' in International Relations more broadly have highlighted the importance of democratic politics in foreign policy decision-making and the use of military force in particular. Yet, some three decades of research into the distinctiveness of liberal democracies' security and defence policies, our understanding of the democratic politics of foreign and security policy, is still limited. Although a large number of case studies have by and again confirmed the importance of a country's domestic politics for understanding decisions to use armed force, we still lack a systematic understanding of the patterns that characterize the politics of using armed force in liberal democracies. This paper contributes to a better understanding of the democratic politics of military missions by zooming in on a key actor in the politics of liberal democracies: political parties. The paper examines empirically a) to what extent the use of force is contested amongst political parties; b) to what extent party political contestation is structured along the established left/right cleavage or along new cleavages pitting cosmopolitan post-materialists against traditional nationalists; c) to what extent the party's political composition of government impacts on actual decisions to use armed force. Based on analyses of party manifesto-, expert survey- and parliamentary roll call vote-data, the paper finds that a) the extent to which foreign and security policy is contested varies considerably across countries and periods, b) party political contestation is first and foremost structured along a left/right dimension in a curvilinear way and only to a lesser extent along a nationalist/cosmopolitan dimension; c) the party's political composition of government has a limited impact on state policy.

Our goal is to contribute to the debate on public opinion about foreign policy by studying French opinion on European defence. According to surveys, around 80% of French people support it. From a minimalist point of view, such a support must result from answers given au hasard to questions that only political elites are interested in. But such an explanation is short-sighted. People may lack information about European defence and may not pay much attention to it, but even though: why would the hazard be so much positively inclined? To answer this question, this paper proposes to use James Stimson's public policy mood applied to French opinion on European defence, in order to observe its evolutions over time (1991-2016). This aggregate measure reveals that behind this support, there are movements in the public opinion linked to international events, demonstrating people's capacity to think about this issue and connect the dots. It also shows that the support to European defence is correlated to opinions towards the transatlantic relationship, whereas it is not correlated to attitudes towards European integration. However, one question remains: how can this correlation be explained? The way the media frame European defence is assumed to explain this trend. By looking at the way surveys questions on these topics are asked on the one hand, and by comparing surveys results to media coverage of European defence on the other hand, we demonstrate this relationship between public opinion and media frames.

In the aftermath of World War Two, Winston Churchill spoke of Britain's international engagement in terms of three co-existent, neatly linked circles: "the [Empire and] Commonwealth"; "the English-speaking world"; and "United Europe." Public opinion on Britain's role in the world, if it was respected or paid attention to by elites, likely was assumed to fall along an "all or nothing" isolationist-interventionist axis. Following the breakup of the Empire and the passage of the European Communities Act of 1972, these interlocked circles appeared to morph into separate spheres. Attention paid to each varied, with interest in the European Union project and the "special relationship" Britain had with the United States frequently overshadowing engagement with the Commonwealth. Aside from periods of UK involvement in US led military action, questions of European Integration became the focus of the bulk of day-to-day attention by media and political elites. In this paper, we ask how the politics and debate over Britain's membership in the European Union shaped wider aspects of the British public's beliefs concerning multilateral engagement. Did contentiousness over Europe cloud the atmosphere so much that "leavers" also were those wanting less engagement with non-governmental organisations, American allies, and developing nations? Or, did Euroskeptics want to unshackle themselves from the Continent to be freed to engage more with the rest of the world? This paper/chapter will be an attempt to explore further British attitudes towards multilateralism.

The rise of China has determined a process of contestation of the several normative and strategic pillars of the regional order in East Asia, ranging from the regional hierarchy to the US capacity to provide public goods in the region (e.g. security and extended deterrence). This has led the United States and its major partners in East Asia, South Korea and Japan, to put in place a complex strategy that aims to uphold the current regional order while developing a new approach to great power management. On the one hand, this strategy entails the recognition of the new major social status of great power for China, and a quest for cooperation in theatres, such as the Korean peninsula, where it can maintain order. On the other hand, Washington, Tokyo and Seoul have actively cooperated to set limits to the revisionist elements of China’s rise. This has generated a process of evolution in the US-led hub-and-spokes system, in three distinct ways: Tokyo and Seoul have expanded their security roles; the US-Japan and US-ROK bilateral alliances have been consolidated and deepened; and despite significant obstacles generated by domestic politics in South Korea and Japan, limited but significant steps have been taken to turn the bilateral structures into a ‘security triangle’.

The US and China are increasingly engaged in a competition for maritime security that does not merely concern changes in the balance of power, but also the rules underpinning good order at sea. China has been particularly determined to change the rules governing freedom of navigation for military vessels and aircraft. As a subscriber to the law of the sea and freedom of navigation in its widest sense, Europe is becoming increasingly involved in defending the US interpretation of the law of the sea and at the same time adopt a more conciliatory approach to China to avoid contributing to conflict in the maritime domain. This paper addresses Europe’s role in the competition for defining the rules underpinning good order at sea and if Europe contributes to lowering tension levels between the US and China.

Cyberwarfare is an intensely debated issue both in the policy community and in academia. Among scholars, a major point of discussion is whether the new technology empowers militarily weaker actors against stronger ones. Is cyber technology working as a new weapon of the weak? Or is it rather consolidating the power advantage enjoyed by strong actors in other areas of military competition? The aim of the proposed paper is to address this theoretical issue through a case-study on Chinese perceptions of cyberwarfare. As a rising power, China is a crucial case for the theoretical debate. What is China’s threat perception when it comes to the new technology and its national security implications? Is cyberwarfare perceived as a threat posed by a stronger actor – and, more precisely, a threat posed by the United States? Or is it rather perceived as a threat posed by weaker actors, including regional powers and non-state groups? To answer these questions, the paper will analyse how cyberwarfare is debated in a specialized Chinese journal: Guofang Keji. Established in 1979, this journal is the official publication of the National University of Defence Technology (NUDT), the PLA institution in charge of scientific education and research. Over the past decade, Guofang Keji has published several articles on information and communication technology, on cyberspace and cyberwarfare, with a focus not only on the technical aspects of the new domain, but also on its wider strategic implications. Authored by military researchers affiliated to NUDT or other military institutions, these articles help to understand how cyberwarfare is perceived and theorized in China.

Since the election of Donald Trump, there are (even more) fears about the level of commitment of the US to its Asian partners; made more evident by Shinzo Abe being as the first world leader to visit Trump after his election, provocations of and by North Korea, and the withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Given these oscillating policies and approaches, how should or can the US’s engagement in East Asia be evaluated? The argument here is that the issues in the Asia-Pacific should not be understood simply as an issue of Trump’s election or as an evaluation of the Obama administration. But, rather that Trump’s inheritance in Asia is a long-term pattern ineffectual political leadership by the US, since the end of the Cold War, which exacerbates the regional security dilemma. This paper makes this argument by identifying leadership as an essential component in the provision of stability and security. Yet, it is in an under-recognised issue in understanding the nature and success of alliances, deterrence, and their interconnection with multilateral institutions.