Where will the XXV Aleksanteri Conference be held?

The conference will take place in Helsinki, FIN.

What is the primary focus of this year's Aleksanteri Conference?

The conference is dedicated to mapping security in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia.

When does the XXV Aleksanteri Conference occur?

The conference is scheduled to run for several days in the fall.

XXV Aleksanteri Conference (25th Aleksanteri Conference)

Name: XXV Aleksanteri Conference (25th Aleksanteri Conference)
Start: 2026-10-21T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-10-23T00:00:00Z
Location: Helsinki

Oct 21–23, 2026Helsinki, FinlandIn-person

Registration open

The XXV Aleksanteri Conference, hosted in Helsinki, FIN, focuses on mapping security in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia. This significant academic gathering brings together scholars and experts to analyze the evolving security landscape of a region undergoing profound geopolitical shifts. The conference provides a platform for in-depth discussions on the multifaceted challenges and transformations impacting the area. This edition of the conference is particularly timely, given the ongoing reconfigurations of international relations and security paradigms. Participants will engage with critical issues that define the contemporary security environment, fostering a deeper understanding of regional dynamics and their global implications.

Committees & topics

Topics
Security in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia · Historical Trajectories of (In)Security · War and (In)Security: Military, Technological, and Informational Dimensions · The Political Economy of (In)Security: Costs, Benefits, and Sanctions · Explaining Wars and Insecurity: Toward New Conceptualizations · Individuals and Insecurities: Mass Values, Attitudes, and Behavior · Human Dimension: Gender, Ethnicity, and Nationalism in the Age of Insecurity · Wartime Societies: Agency, Politics, and Resilience

Why it matters

The security of Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia is a critical nexus for global stability. This region, characterized by its complex historical legacies and diverse geopolitical interests, serves as a barometer for broader international security trends. Understanding the security dynamics here is essential for anticipating future challenges and formulating effective policy responses.

The conference's focus on 'mapping security' implies a comprehensive approach, moving beyond traditional military considerations to encompass economic, environmental, social, and cyber dimensions of security. This integrated perspective is vital for grasping the full scope of vulnerabilities and resilience within the region. Such an approach aligns with contemporary security studies that recognize the interconnectedness of various threats and the need for holistic analysis.

Furthermore, the gathering in FIN, a nation with its own distinct geopolitical position, offers a unique vantage point for these discussions. The insights generated from this conference will contribute significantly to academic discourse and could inform policy-making by shedding light on emergent risks and opportunities for cooperation in a volatile part of the world.

How to prepare

Participants should prepare by engaging with contemporary literature on security studies, particularly those focusing on post-Soviet spaces and the broader Eurasian region. A strong understanding of historical contexts and recent geopolitical developments will be beneficial. Familiarity with various theoretical frameworks for analyzing security, from traditional realism to constructivist approaches, will enhance engagement with the diverse perspectives presented.

Consider how various national interests intersect and diverge within the region. For instance, how do the security concerns of countries like FIN differ from or align with those of other regional actors? Analyzing the interplay of internal and external factors shaping security policies will be crucial. Reviewing concepts such as "hidden stakeholders" and "dynamic analysis" can provide valuable tools for this examination.

Attendees should also be prepared to discuss the implications of technological advancements on regional security, including cyber warfare and information operations. Understanding the role of non-state actors and transnational threats will also be important. Engaging with lessons on "engagement strategies" and "what is stakeholder mapping" can offer practical frameworks for analyzing the complex web of actors involved in regional security.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Finland

As the host nation, FIN is deeply invested in regional security discussions, particularly concerning its immediate neighborhood.

Role in topic

FIN provides a neutral and academically robust environment for discussing sensitive security issues, leveraging its own experiences and geopolitical position to foster dialogue.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Security in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia

Security in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia has been reshaped by the collapse of the Soviet Union, successive waves of NATO and EU enlargement, and a series of post-Soviet conflicts from Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh, and the Russo-Georgian War of 2008 to the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. These events have dismantled much of the post-Cold War European security architecture, including the suspension of the CFE Treaty, the collapse of the INF Treaty, and the effective paralysis of the OSCE as a pan-European forum. The war in Ukraine has hardened a confrontational geometry: NATO has expanded to include Finland and Sweden, the EU has imposed unprecedented sanctions packages on Russia, and Moscow has deepened strategic alignment with Belarus while courting partnerships with China, Iran, and the DPRK. In the South Caucasus, Azerbaijan's 2023 reassertion of control over Nagorno-Karabakh has redrawn the regional map and weakened traditional Russian mediation, while Central Asian states pursue increasingly multi-vector foreign policies. Today the region faces a layered insecurity: an active interstate war, frozen and unfrozen territorial conflicts, hybrid threats including sabotage and migration weaponization on EU borders, and contested influence between Russia, the West, China, and Turkey. The central question is whether a new, durable security order can be negotiated or whether prolonged confrontation will become structural.

Key players

Historical Trajectories of (In)Security

Contemporary insecurity in Eurasia cannot be understood without its long historical arc: the imperial competition of the 19th century, the two World Wars, the bipolar Cold War order, and the contested 'unipolar moment' of the 1990s. The 1975 Helsinki Final Act, the 1990 Charter of Paris, and the 1994 Budapest Memorandum embodied successive attempts to codify a cooperative European security order built on sovereignty, inviolability of borders, and human rights — commitments now openly contested. Different national memories generate different security imaginaries. Russian official discourse frames NATO enlargement and 'colour revolutions' as encroachment, invoking 1941 and a narrative of besieged great-power status. Central and Eastern European states, by contrast, read history through 1939, 1956, 1968, and 1981 as warnings against imperial revisionism. Post-colonial and post-Soviet states in the Caucasus and Central Asia navigate overlapping legacies of Russian, Ottoman, Persian, and Soviet rule. The topic invites delegates to examine how historical narratives are mobilized as instruments of policy — through commemoration, textbooks, monuments, and legal measures on 'historical memory' — and how competing trajectories of (in)security shape present-day threat perceptions, alliance choices, and the legitimacy of the international order itself.

Key players

War and (In)Security: Military, Technological, and Informational Dimensions

The war in Ukraine has become a laboratory for 21st-century warfare, combining mass artillery and trench combat reminiscent of the 20th century with drones, loitering munitions, electronic warfare, satellite-enabled ISR, and AI-assisted targeting. Commercial space assets such as Starlink, open-source intelligence communities, and ubiquitous smartphone imagery have collapsed traditional distinctions between battlefield and information space, while cyber operations against energy, financial, and governmental infrastructure have become a continuous feature of strategic competition. Parallel debates are unfolding in multilateral forums: the UN GGE and OEWG processes on responsible state behavior in cyberspace, the CCW discussions on lethal autonomous weapons systems, and stalled negotiations on the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space (PAROS). The erosion of arms control — the demise of the INF Treaty, the suspension of New START obligations, and the unraveling of the CFE and Open Skies regimes — has removed key guardrails just as new technologies destabilize deterrence. Informational dimensions are equally central. State-backed influence operations, deepfakes, and platform-mediated propaganda blur peace and war, while the targeting of journalists and civic infrastructure raises questions about international humanitarian law in hybrid conflicts. Delegates must assess how technology, doctrine, and norms can be realigned to manage escalation.

Key players

The Political Economy of (In)Security: Costs, Benefits, and Sanctions

Since 2022, the EU, G7, and partners have imposed the most extensive sanctions regime in modern history on Russia, including asset freezes on the Central Bank, SWIFT disconnections for major banks, an oil price cap, and sweeping export controls on dual-use technologies. Russia has responded with import substitution, parallel imports, deeper integration with non-Western economies, and the development of alternative payment infrastructures. The result is a partial bifurcation of the global economy along geopolitical lines. The costs and benefits are unevenly distributed. European economies have absorbed an energy shock and accelerated a transition away from Russian hydrocarbons; commodity exporters and sanctions-circumvention hubs in the Gulf, Türkiye, the South Caucasus, and Central Asia have gained transit and arbitrage rents; the Global South has experienced food and fertilizer price volatility. Debates over the use of frozen Russian sovereign assets to support Ukraine raise novel questions of international law and financial precedent. Beyond Russia, the political economy of insecurity encompasses defense-industrial mobilization, critical mineral competition, semiconductor export controls targeting China, and the weaponization of interdependence in energy, finance, and data. Delegates should weigh the effectiveness, legitimacy, and unintended consequences of economic statecraft as a substitute for, or complement to, military instruments.

Key players

Explaining Wars and Insecurity: Toward New Conceptualizations

Mainstream IR theories — realism, liberalism, constructivism — have been challenged by the empirical realities of contemporary conflict. The full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Israel-Hamas war, the protracted civil war in Sudan, and renewed instability in the Sahel reveal patterns that strain classic models: hybrid warfare, transnational private military companies such as Wagner/Africa Corps, ideologically driven irredentism, and conflicts in which informational and economic dimensions are co-equal with kinetic ones. Scholars and practitioners are revisiting concepts such as imperialism, decolonization, ontological security, and 'civilizational' discourse to explain why states accept enormous costs in pursuit of identity-laden goals. Debates over the relevance of nuclear deterrence, the durability of the nuclear taboo, and the meaning of 'victory' in attritional wars highlight the limits of inherited frameworks. Meanwhile, climate change, pandemics, and AI introduce systemic risks that traditional security studies struggle to integrate. This topic asks delegates to engage analytically rather than only operationally: which conceptual tools best capture today's insecurities, and how can multilateral institutions designed around mid-20th-century assumptions adapt to a world of overlapping, hybrid, and transnational threats?

Key players

Individuals and Insecurities: Mass Values, Attitudes, and Behavior

Survey research from the World Values Survey, European Social Survey, Levada Center, and Razumkov Centre documents significant shifts in public attitudes across Eurasia since 2014 and especially since 2022. Ukrainian national identity and support for EU and NATO membership have consolidated dramatically; Russian public opinion shows a mix of stated support for the 'special military operation,' political apathy, and exit through emigration; populations across CEE report heightened threat perceptions and greater willingness to support defense spending. Individual-level insecurity is not only about war. Inflation, energy prices, migration, and pandemic aftershocks shape how citizens evaluate governments and international institutions. Trust in media, science, and elections has eroded in many democracies, while authoritarian regimes invest heavily in shaping information environments. Behavioral responses range from volunteering and civic mobilization to emigration, draft evasion, and political withdrawal. The topic invites delegates to consider how mass values and attitudes feed back into foreign and security policy: how leaders read or manufacture public opinion, how diaspora and exile communities shape politics, and how multilateral actors can engage citizens directly in an era when state-society relations are themselves a security variable.

Key players

Human Dimension: Gender, Ethnicity, and Nationalism in the Age of Insecurity

Wars and protracted insecurity have profoundly gendered and ethnicized impacts. UN Security Council Resolution 1325 and the Women, Peace and Security agenda frame women not only as victims of conflict-related sexual violence — documented by the UN Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, in Tigray, and in Sudan — but as combatants, negotiators, and political actors. The mass mobilization of men in Ukraine and Russia, the recruitment of ethnic minorities disproportionately into Russian military units, and the rise of feminist anti-war movements all complicate simple narratives. Ethnicity and nationalism remain central drivers and outcomes of conflict. The destruction and displacement of communities in eastern Ukraine, the exodus of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh in 2023, the situation of Crimean Tatars, and contested minority rights from the Baltics to Moldova all illustrate how identity politics intersect with geopolitics. Resurgent nationalism — civic and ethnic, defensive and revisionist — is reshaping domestic politics across the region. Delegates should examine how international frameworks on minority rights, refugee protection, and gender-responsive peacebuilding can address these realities, and how nationalism functions both as a resource for resilience and as a source of exclusion and violence.

Key players

Wartime Societies: Agency, Politics, and Resilience

Wartime is not only experienced by states and armies but by societies that adapt, resist, and reorganize. Ukraine since 2022 has demonstrated remarkable civilian mobilization — volunteer battalions, crowdfunded drones, decentralized humanitarian logistics, and resilient digital public services such as Diia — even as critical infrastructure has been systematically targeted. Local governments, civil society organizations, and religious institutions have absorbed responsibilities that overstretched central states cannot fulfill alone. In Russia and Belarus, wartime has narrowed political space, with the criminalization of dissent, the exile of independent media, and the cooptation or repression of civil society. Yet pockets of agency persist: anti-war networks, soldiers' mothers' committees, partisan movements, and migrant communities continue to shape political outcomes. In neighboring states hosting millions of refugees — Poland, Germany, Moldova, the Czech Republic — host societies have themselves been transformed. Resilience is not automatic; it depends on institutions, trust, resources, and external support. Delegates should consider how international actors can support wartime and post-war societies without crowding out local agency, how to protect civic space under authoritarian pressure, and how lessons from Ukraine, Sudan, Syria, and beyond can inform broader doctrines of societal resilience.

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for XXV Aleksanteri Conference (25th Aleksanteri Conference).

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Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Gender Dynamics Across Cultures

Hidden Stakeholders

Engagement Strategies

Dynamic Analysis

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

Conflict Resolution

The states in play, with the data that shapes their stance

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

By committee

Frequently asked questions

XXV Aleksanteri Conference (25th Aleksanteri Conference)

Oct 21–23, 2026Helsinki, FinlandIn-person

Registration open

Committees & topics

Topics
Security in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia · Historical Trajectories of (In)Security · War and (In)Security: Military, Technological, and Informational Dimensions · The Political Economy of (In)Security: Costs, Benefits, and Sanctions · Explaining Wars and Insecurity: Toward New Conceptualizations · Individuals and Insecurities: Mass Values, Attitudes, and Behavior · Human Dimension: Gender, Ethnicity, and Nationalism in the Age of Insecurity · Wartime Societies: Agency, Politics, and Resilience

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Finland

As the host nation, FIN is deeply invested in regional security discussions, particularly concerning its immediate neighborhood.

Role in topic

FIN provides a neutral and academically robust environment for discussing sensitive security issues, leveraging its own experiences and geopolitical position to foster dialogue.