(Reihe "Deutsch-Französischer Strategischer Dialog")

08. April 2021, 9:00 - 11:00 Uhr

The current scientific and economic objectives of ESA’s and EU’s space missions and infrastructures are set in a highly political landscape of European industry and internal political dynamics, and Europe’s strategic alignment against great powers such as China, America and Russia. Despite the increasing political and economic importance of space research and exploration, legal competencies and policy activities of the EU and ESA still stand apart. This fragmentation in space policy, which is additionally flanked by national space strategies of the EU member countries, activities of the intergovernmental organization EUMETSAT and several intergovernmental bodies for satellite communications, bears important consequences and challenges for the near future of a coherent and competitive EU space policy. This Webinar seeks to identify the challenges ahead and discusses potential pathways of the future European space policy.

Die Veranstaltung fand als Webinar via Zoom statt.

Participants

Matthias Wachter is Head of Department for International Cooperation, Security Policy, Raw Materials and Space at the Federation of German Industries (BDI). He is a member of the Space Program Commission at the German Aerospace Center (DLR).

Dr. Nina Klimburg-Witjes is a post-doc researcher in Science and Technology Studies at the University of Vienna. Her work focuses on the politics of innovation, securitization processes and imaginations of social order vis-à-vis space technology and politics. She was a visiting fellow at the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI), is a member of the German Expert Network on Security & Technology in Outer Space and a founding member of the international Social Studies of Outer Space Network.

Dr. Jean-Christophe Mauduit is a lecturer in science diplomacy at University College London Department of Science, Technology, Engineering in Public Policy. He holds a PhD in astronomy and an MA in international relations. He worked as a researcher on ESA and NASA satellite missions and as a Project Officer for the International Astronomical Union.

Dr. Andrew Williams is External Relations Officer at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and is responsible for strategic government relations. Prior to ESO he worked for over a decade as senior policy advisor for NATO and as a physicist for the government of the United Kingdom. He holds a degree in physics and a doctorate in public policy.

Chair
Dr. Katharina C. Cramer is a research fellow at CASSIS working on international relations and the global politics of technology. Her research interests include various aspects of the history and politics of research infrastructures in the 20th and 21st centuries and the role of knowledge, innovation and technology in global contexts. She is author of A Political History of Big Science: The Other Europe (Palgrave) and co-editor of Big Science and Research Infrastructures in Europe (Edward Elgar).