Category: News

Prof. Mälksoo participated at the 18th Pan-European Conference on International Relations of the European International Studies Association (EISA PEC2025) at the University of Bologna, Italy on 26-29 August 2025. She presented two empirical chapters from her book project in progress (‘Making Deterrence Real: Wartiming NATO’s Readiness in the Eastern Flank’ and ‘Peacetiming for Future Deterrence’). She further contributed to two roundtables on the role of the emerging Nordic-Baltic nexus in the new European security order and the prospects of the critical security approaches in Europe in the present, respectively.

Maria Mälksoo spoke about her editor’s selection of articles on ritual published in the Review of International Studies at the journal’s podcast, hosted by Sebastian Kaempf. The episode is available here.

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Prof. Maria Mälksoo presented her book chapter in progress ‘Making Deterrence Real: Wartiming NATO’s Readiness in the Eastern Flank’ at the European Workshops in International Studies 2025, held at the Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland on 2-4 July 2025. The workshop was entitled ‘Reconfiguring Collective Deterrence and Defence on NATO’s Northern and Eastern Flanks: Towards a Resilient Force Posture’ (convenors: Tobias Bunde and Monika Sus).

Prof. Maria Mälksoo spoke at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA) panel ‘Taming the Bear: Countering Russia’s Enduring Threat’ at the strategic dialogue hub ‘NATO in the Huis’ organised by  the Munich Security Conference (MSC) and the Netherlands Institute of International Relations Clingendael on the occasion of  the 2025 NATO Summit and NATO Public Forum in the Hague, Netherlands, 24-25 June 2025.

Half of the RITUAL DETERRENCE team presented research at the 50th anniversary conference of the British International Studies Association (BISA) in Belfast, UK. The conference took place on 18-20 June 2025.

Prof. Maria Mälksoo presented a paper ‘Envisioning Future Deterrence: Peace, Accountability and the End Times after the Russo-Ukrainian War’ in the panel investigating temporal security in international relations. She further participated in a roundtable on critical perspectives on NATO and another dedicated to Georg Löfflmann’s book ‘The Politics of Antagonism – Populist Security Narratives and the Remaking of Political Identity’ (Routledge, 2024).

Dr Cameron Hunter presented a paper ‘Ritual Interaction Chains in US-China Lunar Competition’ in the panel on a new space race convened by the BISA Astropolitics Working Group. He further chaired a panel ‘Middle Space Powers and Non-State Actors in Outer Space’ and presented at the ERC Third Nuclear Age Roundtable on understanding and addressing contemporary nuclear challenges.

(Image below courtesy of Lauren Rogers, picturing part of the editorial team of BISA’s flagship journal Review of International Studies meeting in Belfast).

(Image below courtesy of  Bleddyn Bowen, picturing Third Nuclear Age Roundtable participants).

Prof. Maria Mälksoo presented her paper ‘Peacetiming for the Future: Deterrence, Accountability and the ‘End Times’ after the Russo-Ukrainian War’ at the Johns Hopkins University, Department of Political Science in Baltimore, MD, USA on 12 May 2025. She further participated as an external discussant at the Hopkins PhD Prospectus Workshop for the critical IR doctoral students working at the department on the invitation of Prof. Tarak Barkawi (JHU) on 13-15 May 2025.

Prof. Maria Mälksoo presented her research in progress on Russian accountability as the problem for future international order at the workshop “Memory and Speech: From benign neglect to authoritarian prohibition?” at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, Oxford University, UK, 30 April-1 May 2025. The workshop was organised by the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights (Oxford) and the Academy for European Human Rights Protection (Cologne).

Prof. Maria Mälksoo participated at the 16th Conference on Baltic Studies in Europe (CBSE) ‘Converging Paths: The Baltic Between East and West’ at the University of Cambridge, UK on 24-26 April 2025. She convened and chaired a panel ‘From the Margins to the Vanguard? The Security Politics of/on the Baltic states from the Early 1990s till Today’, presented a paper ‘The Baltic Politics of Post-War Accountability for Russia’, and shared her experiences as an ERC grant recipient at a panel dedicated to introducing European Research Council funding opportunities. She further participated at the Baltic Geopolitics Network meeting as the representative of the Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen.