The University of Glasgow’s Central and East European Studies (CEES) is part of a project that has been awarded £5million to further understanding of a region spanning Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central, East and Pacific Asia.

The initiative will bring together a network of leading expertise and centres of excellence from across the UK and overseas to address gaps and needs in research during a period of major societal, geopolitical, and environmental transformation characterising the Eurasian continent. The funding was awarded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) as part of their Building a Secure and Resilient World strategic theme.

Polarities Plus aims to advance innovative new partnerships within academic and policy circles linked to a range of urgent thematic areas including social upheaval, geopolitics and security, environmental crisis, human rights, Russia-China relations, and post-conflict reconstruction. Through the network, open calls for new research, training, and arts-based initiatives will be funded each year between 2024 and 2028.

Professor Jon Oldfield, of the University of Birmingham, is leading the programme. He said: “There is an urgent need to generate greater insight into the issues, the challenges and the politics that intersect across these important geographical areas. The network’s activities will help us to better understand and identify global risks and help inform better decision-making.”

By building a network of expertise, the partnership aims to create new knowledge as well as build new capacities and train and mentor future leaders. An annual conference and training sessions for researchers and various stakeholders will serve to enhance the network and provide opportunities for dissemination of new ideas.

Luca Anceschi, Professor of Eurasian Studies and UofG project lead, said: “We are excited to start working alongside our partners on the Polarities & Regions Network+. The award confirms CEES as the leading UK institution for the study of the post-socialist countries of Europe and Asia: we now have external recognition for both our flagship teaching programme—the CEERES Erasmus Mundus Master—and our collective research.”

The CEES team, which also includes Sara Bernard, Marcin Kaczmarski, Leyla Sayfutdinova and David Smith, brings to the project the disciplinary diversity typical of the CEES subject area and an incredibly wide range of geographical specialisation, which spans from the Western Balkans and the Baltic States to the Caucasus and Central Asia.

Partners include the Universities of Glasgow, Manchester and Oxford, together with the Institute of Development Studies and the Royal United Services Institute in the UK. Overseas, partners include Colgate University in the USA; the Ukrainian Catholic University; OSCE Academy Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan; National Taiwan University; Helsinki University in Finland; and Hokkaido University in Japan.

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First published: 25 July 2024

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