Since February 2022, understandable concerns have been raised about the extent to which Russia has dominated EU policy and imaginings about the post-Soviet world at the expense of other post-Soviet states, most notably (in the context of Russia’s unprovoked war against it) Ukraine. At the same time, the Franco-German axis within the EU has lost influence as the voices of EU member states such as the Baltic states and Poland have finally been centred. Developments within EU member states have also reminded us that the domestic context cannot be ignored when thinking about any foreign policy relationship, something that becomes even more complex in the heavily integrated EU environment. That integration will be further complicated as Moldova and Ukraine seek to turn candidate status into membership, while Georgia pursues its own candidate status. Further complexity will also come as other states in the European neighbourhood continue or begin to feel the effects of Russia's reduced capacity to act as a provider of security, Armenian-Azerbaijan relations being a case in point.

In this panel, participants will consider what these, as well as other developments, mean for the future of EU-Russia relations – a question that is not at all separate from questions about the future of the EU itself.

(This is one of three "What Now" roundtables convened in the context of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine and its war, whether by extension or proxy, against the West, with consequential and wide-ranging implications for international relations.)