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Institute for Strategic and International Studies

The Institute for Strategic and International Studies (IEEI) was established in 1980 as an non-profit, independent organisation devoted to research and fostering debate on international affairs, defence and security issues.

In its twenty-five years of activity, the IEEI has established not only a national, but also an international reputation, as the leading centre dealing with international relations in Portugal. In Portugal, it has helped establish a previously non-existent tradition of study and debate in this field. It is today able to draw on a growing number of graduates in International Relations from Portuguese universities, which currently make up most of its staff, and started an internship programme in 1994 providing on-the-job training to graduate students. International conferences and smaller workshops have been numerous (on average three or four a year) and attended by leading international experts on the field. A policy-oriented institute, the IEEI has sought since its inception to bring together experts and decision-makers, military and diplomats, politicians and journalists, students and business people. This mix of milieus has been consistently maintained over the years, and is one of the reasons for the success of its initiatives and the specific results that have been achieved.

IEEI activities currently focuses on the following areas: Europe, Mediterranean & the Middle East, Southern Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia. The dominant research themes which cut across these areas are regional integration and co-operation; international and interregional co-operation; foreign, security and defence policies (both European and Portuguese); political transition; security and stability.

The IEEI is composed of a core of permanent directing and research staff and draws from a wider group of research associates for specific projects. Aside from adopting a multidisciplinary approach in its work, which along with research includes numerous conferences and workshops, the IEEI makes every effort to involve individual scholars, specialists and institutions from the regions and countries under study. Thanks to this long-established practice, its working relationships with centres and individual researchers and scholars, especially in North Africa and the Middle East, Southern Africa, South America and Eastern Europe are varied and extensive.

As far as networking is concerned, the IEEI is a member of the board of TransEuropean Policy Studies Association (TEPSA). It has helped establish and is the current secretary of EuroMeSCo - the network of foreign policy institutes and centres of the 35 Euro-Mediterranean partners. Besides GARNET, the IEEI is also a member of the European Foreign Policy Research Network (FORNET), the Observatory of the Relations between Europe and Latin America (OBREAL/EULARO) and EU-CONSENT (“Constructing Europe” Network).