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Description
The activities are focused on discussions of leading foreign policy experts from the Czech Rep. and Norway on pre-identified common fears of the two countries - illiberalism, destabilisation and Russian aggression, migration and its political and social effects, energy and climate security etc. As a result of two workshops, a desk-based research and skype/e-mail consultations of the partners and other CZ/NO stakeholders, an initial study (''COMFEAR'') which should identify common concerns and shared threats will be created. Subsequently, a more comprehensive detailed study should be developed
Summary of the results
We, the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI) and the Czech Institute of International Relations (IIR), organized three expert meetings in Oslo and in Prague to carry out research of public resources and academic studies and for the purpose of personal contacts between the representatives of the two research teams. We have discussed topics related to common fears of both the two countries - illiberalism, destabilisation and Russian aggression, migration and its political and social effects, energy and climate security.
These discussion lead to the completion of two main summative documents – Policy Brief and Policy Summary and mainly to the application of our project TRANSFEAR to the programme KAPPA operated by the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic.
The COMFEAR initiative contributed to a better understanding of the key factors of the fears that are shared by the foreign policies of both countries. As a result we have: a) better understanding of the (positive and negative) results and the results of the various reactions to fear factors in the two countries; b) greater awareness of the Czech Republic and Norway’s common reactions and approaches to fear factors; c) deeper shared understanding of the controlling and configurative forces of the two countries’ foreign policies; d) deepened the cooperation between the IIR and NUPI, and strengthened the Czech Republic and Norway’s respective understandings of the other country’s foreign policy.