Survival Strategies of Small States in a Changing Security Environment

This project, funded by NATO’s Science for Peace and Security Program, successfully hosted a closed two-day workshop at the University of Macedonia in Thessaloniki, Greece in November 2025.

The project brought together researchers, policy-makers, and practitioners to examine the security challenges faced by small states in the evolving European security environment following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The workshop provided a structured setting for in-depth and candid exchanges among stakeholders and resulted in the formation of an international expert network.

This network is collectively producing an edited volume analyzing the Russia–Ukraine war from a small state perspective and prepared policy-relevant, theoretically informed policy briefs targeted at ministries and policy-makers. The project contributes new insights into how small states, given their structural vulnerabilities, responded to the war through strategies such as sheltering, hedging, and hiding.

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has fundamentally disrupted the European security order and highlighted the heightened sensitivity of small states to systemic change. By applying small state theory, the project generates comprehensive knowledge on the impact of the Russia–Ukraine war on the security and foreign policies of small states inside and outside NATO. It systematically addresses questions related to variation in state responses, the role of survival strategies, and the ways in which small states sought to influence NATO policy amid a shifting security environment.