Professor Sten Rynning and Assistant Professor Anne Ingemann Johansen visited the University of Cambridge's Centre for Geopolitics to participate in the symposium 1945 in the Baltic and its Legacies, which brought together leading international scholars to examine how the end of the Second World War continues to shape the geopolitics and security of the Baltic region today.

Alongside the symposium, the visit provided an opportunity to strengthen research collaboration with colleagues at the Centre for Geopolitics. Discussions focused on future joint research on Nordic-Baltic geopolitics and regional security, building on the growing partnership between the Centre for War Studies at the University of Southern Denmark and the University of Cambridge.

The visit formed an important step in expanding the international research network surrounding the Mind the Gap project while also laying the foundation for future collaborative research beyond the project itself.

Building on insights developed through the Mind the Gap project, Assistant Professor Anne Ingemann Johansen convened the international workshop Resisting Bufferhood: Security Transformation and Small-State Agency in the Nordic-Baltic Region, generously funded by the Carlsberg Foundation and co-hosted by the Centre for War Studies and the Danish Institute for Advanced Study (DIAS) at the University of Southern Denmark. The workshop was organised in close collaboration with the Centre for Geopolitics at the University of Cambridge.

While Mind the Gap examined how Danish and Norwegian policymakers navigate an increasingly unstable European security environment and engage with external expertise, the workshop explored how these broader geopolitical changes are reshaping the Nordic-Baltic region. Bringing together leading scholars from across Europe, discussions focused on the region's changing strategic role, the emergence of collective Nordic-Baltic agency through formats such as the NB8, and the opportunities and challenges associated with new forms of regional security cooperation.

The workshop marked the beginning of a new international research collaboration extending the intellectual trajectory of the Mind the Gap project. Since the workshop, participants have jointly developed a proposal for a special issue on Contested Bufferhood, which examines how the Nordic-Baltic states are responding collectively to a changing European security order and what this tells us about the evolving role of small states in regional security politics. The special issue proposal is edited by Anne Ingemann Johansen, Donatas Kupčiūnas, and Trevelyan Wing and brings together contributions from many of the workshop participants.

As part of the Mind the Gap project, Anne Ingemann Johansen undertook a research stay as Visiting Researcher at the Centre for Geopolitics, hosted by the University of Cambridge from 11-19 October 2025.

The research stay provided an opportunity to advance her ongoing work on Ukraine while also developing ideas for a new comparative research agenda on Security Transformation and Small-State Agency in the Nordic-Baltic Region.

Beyond individual research, the visit was explicitly oriented towards strengthening institutional cooperation between the University of Southern Denmark (SDU) and the University of Cambridge. Meetings and discussions focused on developing shared analytical frameworks and identifying concrete avenues for collaboration through the Baltic Geopolitics Network, of which SDU is now an active participant. This includes plans for joint workshops, publication-oriented activities, and closer engagement between scholars working on Nordic–Baltic security and European geopolitics.

The Centre for Geopolitics provided an intellectually rich environment that bridges historical scholarship and contemporary policy debates — closely mirroring Mind the Gap’s ambition to connect academic research with policy-relevant expertise. Conversations with Cambridge-based scholars reinforced the value of sustained, in-person exchange for building durable research partnerships and advancing comparative perspectives on European security.

The research stay was generously supported by Independent Research Fund Denmark through the Mind the Gap project and contributes directly to the project’s longer-term goal of anchoring SDU more firmly in international research networks linking academia and policy.

On 28–29 August 2025, the Mind the Gap research team gathered in Copenhagen for an internal workshop dedicated to sharing and critically discussing work in progress on the relationship between academic expertise and foreign and security policy-making in Denmark and Norway.

The workshop brought together project members to explore how knowledge travels between research environments, ministries, and the public sphere — and how these connections are shaped by institutional design, geography, and power.

Rasmus Mariager and Anders Dramstad presented new comparative research on the historical development of foreign policy institutes in Denmark and Norway. Their contribution highlighted how ministries have, over time, sought not only to support but also to shape and manage these institutes—revealing distinct national approaches to organising and steering policy-relevant expertise.

Jamie Shea presented work tracing NATO’s evolution as a decision-making arena, with particular attention to when, how, and why external expertise has been invited into alliance deliberations. The presentation sparked discussion about openness, credibility, and the boundaries between insider and outsider knowledge in international security institutions.

Finally, Sten Rynning and Anne Ingemann Johansen presented joint work on the security studies communities in Denmark and Norway. Focusing on patterns of academic impact and public visibility, they explored how factors such as institutional affiliation, proximity to political power, and national knowledge infrastructures shape who gets heard in public debate — and whose expertise travels into policy-making arenas.

Across sessions, discussions returned to a shared set of questions at the heart of the Mind the Gap project: How do small states organise policy-relevant knowledge? What barriers structure access to decision-makers and public platforms? And how do these dynamics shape foreign and security policy outcomes over time?

The workshop marked an important step in developing a shared analytical framework for understanding how Denmark and Norway connect research, expertise, and decision-making — and how these connections can both enable and constrain informed public debate.

In continuation of our project’s core ambition to bridge the gap between academic research and security policy practice, Mind the Gap was represented at NATO’s 2025 Public Forum in The Hague.

Sten Rynning and Anne Ingemann Johansen participated in the Forum on 24 – 25 June 2025, which took place alongside the NATO Summit and brought together heads of state, policymakers, and experts to discuss the future of the Alliance. Their participation followed NATO’s selection of the University of Southern Denmark’s Center for War Studies as an official institutional partner.

By contributing academic insights to high-level policy discussions, Mind the Gap continues its work of engaging directly with the communities it seeks to understand—offering not just analysis from the outside, but active presence on the inside.

Read more about the NATO Public Forum here.