Rikard Jozwiak

Join us as the MCs of the GLOBSEC Forum 2026 open the proceedings and set the stage for the forum’s key themes and discussions.

Join us as this year's Forum MCs kick off the official opening of GLOBSEC Forum 2026.

This session takes place under the Chatham House Rule.

With the NATO Ankara Summit just weeks away, the Alliance arrives at a defining moment shaped by concurrent pressures: Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine now entering its fifth year, a Middle East conflict reverberating through global energy markets, a landmark commitment to reach 5% of GDP in defence investment by 2035, and deep questions about the future distribution of responsibility between North American and European allies. The 2025 Hague Summit delivered historic spending pledges and, for the first time in a decade, all allies met the 2% GDP threshold — yet translating financial commitments into credible military capability, interoperable forces, and a genuinely stronger European pillar remains a work in progress.

• What does the Ankara Summit need to deliver — beyond reaffirming spending pledges — to demonstrate that NATO remains a coherent and credible alliance in the face of diverging national priorities?
• As European allies take on greater responsibility for conventional defence, how can the Alliance avoid capability gaps, industrial bottlenecks, and interoperability risks in the transition?
• How should NATO adapt its political and strategic framework to manage a transatlantic relationship in which the United States and European allies increasingly hold different positions?

GLOBSEC 2026 begins from a single premise: the crisis is not coming — it has already happened. The rules-based international order is not under pressure; it has fractured, and what is emerging in its place is not yet legible. The war in Ukraine, the rupture of the transatlantic relationship, the weaponisation of energy and supply chains, and the collapse of multilateral consensus are not separate crises to be managed sequentially. They are symptoms of a single deeper transformation — a global system in the process of becoming something else, without a clear picture of what that something is. Three figures who have lived this transformation from starkly different vantage points open the Forum by attempting not to resolve that uncertainty, but to name it honestly — and to give delegates the frame through which every conversation that follows can be understood.

• We describe the current moment as a crisis, but crises imply resolution — a return to stability on the other side. What if what we are living through is not a crisis but a permanent transition, with no guaranteed destination?
• The fracture has not affected all countries equally — some are losing the order they built, some are constructing a new one, and some are calculating how to profit from the space between the two. Is Europe positioned to shape what comes next, or merely to respond to it?
• If the leaders in this room had to identify one thing that must be preserved from the collapsing order and one thing that must be released, what would those things be?

Executive Summary

The panellists used this session to challenge the terms of conventional debate about Europe’s decline, arguing that the continent's apparent weaknesses — fragmentation, regulatory complexity, asymmetric threat perceptions across member states — are also sources of resilience that more centralised powers cannot replicate. The panel was unsparing about Europe's self-inflicted vulnerabilities: household savings flowing into American markets, capital markets that remain nationally fragmented despite decades of effort, procurement and regulatory cycles too slow to match Ukraine's battlefield innovation tempo, and a demographic trajectory that no government has found the political courage to address honestly. Ivan Krastev offered the session's sharpest reframe: the problem is not which answer Europe chooses but that it keeps asking the same questions, and genuine transformation requires changing the questions themselves. The session closed with a shared forecast: the strategic error Europe will most regret in ten years is not military unreadiness but the failure to secure control over its own data.

Livestream Link:  https://youtube.com/live/tlzX8it_OV0?feature=share

With the EBRD projecting regional growth of around 3.3% in 2026, placing CEE at the upper end of global GDP forecasts, and a record €42.5 billion flowing into the region, CEE has moved decisively from periphery to powerhouse. Strong growth numbers are one thing — turning them into better jobs, stronger industries, and real influence over Europe's future is another. The region has fresh momentum to shape the direction of the EU. That means making the most of the money flowing in, building homegrown strengths in energy and technology, and making sure the rules set in Brussels actually work for economies that are still on the rise.

• How can CEE governments turn record investment inflows and defence spending into durable, innovation-driven growth rather than a cyclical windfall?
• What structural reforms and EU policy shifts are needed to fully activate CEE as a driver of European competitiveness?
• How can the region leverage its energy transition and industrial base to attract strategic investment away from non-European competitors?
• What kind of leadership role should CEE play in shaping the EU’s economic and geopolitical direction over the next decade?

Executive Summary
This session reframed the conventional narrative about CEE — from aid recipient to growth engine, from Eastern Flank to economic locomotive. Jan Růžička presented data showing Poland's unprecedented convergence trajectory, the growing economic interdependence between CEE economies, and the region's ability to attract investment despite German industrial decline. Mateusz Morawiecki argued that CEE's future security and prosperity rest on three pillars:  a strong national defence industrial base, an integrated intermarium defence community, and a sustained transatlantic relationship, and that Europe's greatest strategic error has been to subsidise Chinese dominance of the green technology supply chain through its own climate policy. Eva Maydell called for the region to move from a cohesion mindset to a competitiveness mindset, to coordinate more systematically on EU legislation, and to ensure that the technological revolution in AI, data infrastructure and digital connectivity is captured within the region rather than exported. All three panellists converged on the view that the EU's most urgent economic priorities are a unified capital market, genuine single market completion and affordable energy, and that pursuing climate policy through regulatory prescription rather than innovation incentives has been counterproductive. On enlargement, there was careful consensus: Ukraine belongs in Europe, full accession in the near term is politically implausible, and the worst outcome would be another Turkey — decades of promises, no delivery, and eventual estrangement.

Livestream Link:  https://youtube.com/live/q7USkP9wULk?feature=share

EU enlargement is increasingly a strategic tool shaped by politics, security, and governance. Full EU membership for most candidate countries is unlikely in the near future, but gradual or staged integration offers a way to achieve meaningful progress while maintaining EU standards. Linking benefits such as Single Market access or EU funding to measurable reforms create both incentives and safeguards, but raises difficult questions about timing, institutional capacity, and political cohesion. These trade-offs frame the key challenges for both candidate countries and EU members in navigating the next phase of enlargement.

• How can staged integration deliver meaningful progress for candidate countries without immediate full membership?
• What institutional or treaty reforms are needed to make enlargement more predictable and reduce veto obstacles? • How can the EU link benefits to reforms while maintaining flexibility and safeguards? • How can enlargement strengthen European security and resilience, especially in relation to Russia? • What are the main risks and opportunities for EU cohesion, Single Market governance, and fiscal stability?

Livestream Link:  https://youtube.com/live/PVKOt1TqlFs?feature=share