The EU’s New Resilience Agenda in the MENA Region

The Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) and the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS) organised an international conference in Lebanon to present the results of the one-year research project entitled "The EU's New Resilience Agenda in the MENA Region". Hosted by the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik (USEK), the conference brought together researchers, practitioners and policy experts from different fields to discuss the EU's Global Strategy (EUGS) and its impact on the Middle East and North Africa region (MENA). Structured around a keynote speech by Nathalie Tocci, IAI Director and Special Advisor to EU HRVP Mogherini, and three panel sessions, the conference involved seventeen guest speakers drawn from local and international research centres, universities and organisations.
Debate focused on the EUGS's emphasis on "building state and societal resilience" in the MENA region. Individual panel sessions addressed the themes of governance and socio-economic reforms, security threats, declining state authority and non-state actors as well as the role of bottom-up dynamics and civil society as important incubators of state and societal resilience. The IAI-FEPS project comprises six country case studies (Turkey, Qatar, Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon and Tunisia) and a final comparative report.