Prof. Maria Mälksoo and the RITUAL DETERRENCE project are featured in the exhibition ‘Exciting Minds’, initiated by the Estonian Research Council, and featuring the researchers from Estonia who have been awarded grants by the European Research Council (ERC).
See here.
The trope of resilience has emerged as a staple in NATO’s grappling with the many hybrid challenges it is currently facing both in the so-called grey zone of coercion, below the threshold of traditionally conceived violent attacks, and beyond. NATO’s coming to terms with the hybrid challenges through the past decade has been persistent, if somewhat piecemeal. There was a notable delay in recognising the nature and scope of the threat posed by Russia up until its brazen full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 on behalf of the North Atlantic allies. NATO’s framing of the Russia-challenge as primarily “hybrid” was paralysing the Alliance’s strategic diagnosis of its historical antagonist’s revisionist ambitions too long, thus delimiting the Alliance’s readiness and response to such a large-scale conventional challenge, at a tragic expense of Ukrainian lives. As the continuum between resilience and traditionally conceived deterrence by denial is shrinking, NATO’s tailorship of effective countermeasures to complex modern threats and challenges in and beyond the grey zone can only benefit from embracing resilience thinking, with an emphasis on anticipation, creative and flexible adaptation and the inclusivity of diverse decision-makers.
Prof. Maria Mälksoo presented her work in progress in the ‘Thinking Big’ seminar series, organised by the Global Europe & International Cooperation Research Group of the Centre for Modern European Studies (CEMES), Lund University. This series is a cross-strait collaborative venture between the Universities of Lund, Copenhagen and Malmö.
Her presentation ‘The Logic of Ritual Action in International Relations’ was followed by the interventions of four discussants:
Elsa Hedling, Joint Faculties of Humanities and Theology, Lund University
Haakon Ikonomou, Saxo Institute, University of Copenhagen
Michel Anderlini, Department of Political Science, Malmö University
Marja-Liisa Öberg, Faculty of Law, Lund University
This chapter investigates the development of ‘resilience thinking’ in NATO’s post-Cold War discourse and practice and raises questions about the compatibility between the logics of security and resilience. The increasing emphasis on resilience performatively enacts NATO’s self-projection as a comprehensive security organization, much beyond its standard military alliance repertoire. What deterrence and defence are to NATO’s original identity, now resurrected after Russia’s 2022 full-on aggression against Ukraine, resilience has been to the Alliance’s positive post-Cold War sense of self. The chapter offers a conceptualization and empirical documentation of NATO’s take on resilience, identifying four meanings of the term in NATO’s collective use, pertaining to the Alliance’s political unity, democratic essence, reputation/credibility, and institutional endurance.
In December 2024, Mariia Vladymyrova was asked by Danwatch, a major investigative outlet of Denmark, to comment on the relationship between the Russian fishing industry and the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). The investigation revealed that Norebo’s shipyards had signed three contracts for the servicing and repair of FSB vessels.
Previously, several ships from the Norebo Group had been suspected of espionage in Dutch waters, leading the Netherlands to close several ports to Russian fishing trawlers and reefer ships. These vessels had been operating under other states’ flags to evade comprehensive sanctions banning Russian-flagged ships from entering EU ports.
These developments indicate a further militarization of Russia’s civilian fleet, as outlined in the 2022 Maritime Doctrine of the Russian Federation. First, Russian civilian ships and their crews must be prepared for rapid mobilization in the event of war or a threat of war. Second, newly built civilian vessels must be designed with military adaptability in mind. Finally, civilian fleet crews undergo mobilization training to ensure readiness for naval deployment. In effect, the Soviet Navy utilised the same strategy using their fishing fleet and infrastructure as a dual-use asset, primarily for surveillance purposes.
Mariia Vladymyrova concludes that this doctrine sets Russia apart from comparable national contingency plans, including those in Europe, by establishing a framework for the military use of the civilian fleet in peacetime. The case of Norebo highlights how Russia’s hybrid maritime threats may become increasingly urgent for Europe, as the Russian government continues its efforts to coerce European states into accepting its terms for conflict resolution in Ukraine.
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Fish king has also had Russia’s intelligence service as a customer
