Areas of expertise: Japanese foreign, security and defence policy; security and strategic issues in Asia and the Indo-Pacific region
Languages: Bulgarian, Russian, English, Dutch, French, Japanese
Dr Elena Atanassova-Cornelis is also a Professor of International Politics of the Asia-Pacific at the University of Antwerp and Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium, an adjunct professor at the Brussels School of Governance of Vrije Universiteit Brussel, as well as an Associate Fellow within the Global Fellowship Initiative of the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, Switzerland.
Dr Atanassova-Cornelis has authored numerous academic articles, book chapters, briefing papers and policy reports covering Japanese foreign and security policy; alliances, alignments and major power relations in the Indo-Pacific; regional security in Northeast Asia, including the geopolitics of the Taiwan Strain and the Korean Peninsula; as well as regional multilateralism and EU-Asia relations. She is regularly invited as a speaker at international conferences, high-level expert meetings and policy-oriented seminars, and as a guest lecturer at various universities in both Europe and Asia. She has extensive experience in professional and executive training on Asia-related topics in programmes designed for European, East Asian and other countries’ government and military officials, diplomats, civil servants and business representatives.
Previously Dr Atanassova-Cornelis was a Visiting Professor at Ghent University, Belgium, the Lille Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po Lille), France, and the University of Kent, Brussels School of International Studies. She was also a Senior Associate Analyst at the European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS) in Paris, and a holder of the Taiwan Fellowship of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China on Taiwan. She was a recipient of the Monbusho Scholarship of the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, and pursued graduate studies at Sophia University in Tokyo. She holds a PhD in Japanese Studies from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium.
Latest publications:
- Alliances in Asia and Europe: The Evolving Indo-Pacific Strategic Context and Inter-Regional Alignments. Editors: Elena Atanassova-Cornelis, Yoichiro Sato and Tom Sauer. Routledge, forthcoming 2024. https://www.routledge.com/Alliances-in-Asia-and-Europe-The-Evolving-Indo-Pacific-Strategic-Context/Atanassova-Cornelis-Sato-Sauer/p/book/9781032550404
- Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena and Sato, Yoichiro (2022). Asia and Europe in Japan’s Alignment Policies: Drivers, Strategic Expectations and Future Outlook. Asian Affairs, 53(3): 520-541.
Open Access: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03068374.2022.2093049 - Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena and Pejsova, Eva (2021). Minilateralism: an opportunity for the EU’s engagement in the Indo-Pacific. Center for Security, Diplomacy and Strategy (CSDS), Free University of Brussels, Policy Brief 22/2021.
https://csds.vub.be/minilateralism-an-opportunity-for-the-eus-engagement-in-the-indo-pacific - Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena (2022). Reshaping the San Francisco System Through Alignment Cooperation: Japan’s Security Partnerships in the Asia-Indo-Pacific. Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security. Editors: Yoneyuki Sugita and Victor Teo. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 241-262.
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_11 - Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena and Singh, Bhubhindar (2021). Security relations between the EU and Japan. The European Union’s Security Relations with Asian Partners. Editors: Thomas Christiansen, Emil Kirchner and See Seng Tan. Palgrave Macmillan, The European Union in International Affairs (EUIA) Series, pp. 369-389.
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-69966-6 - Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena (2021). The EU’s Indo-Pacific strategy: A roadmap for making a difference. Economic Policy Institute (Sofia, Bulgaria) & Korea Foundation Discussion Paper Series 2_2021. https://epi-bg.org/images/NGKF_Incubator/EPI__KF_Discussion_Paper_Series_2_2021.pdf
- Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena (2021). Japan, China and the territorial disputes in the China Seas: the uncertain dynamics of Asian-Pacific geopolitics. Maritime and Territorial Disputes in the South China Sea: Faces of Power and Law in the Age of China’s Rise. Editors: Yih-Jye Hwang and Edmund Frettingham. Routledge, Rethinking Asia and International Relations Book Series, pp. 116-136. https://www.routledge.com/Maritime-and-Territorial-Disputes-in-the-South-China-Sea-Faces-of-Power/Hwang-Frettingham/p/book/9780367476854
- Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena (2020). Why the “Indo-Pacific” Concept is Not in Competition with China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). East Asia Security in Flux. What Regional Order Ahead? Editors: Céline Pajon and Masashi Nishihara. French Institute of International Relations (Ifri) Centre for Asian Studies, Paris, and the Research Institute for Peace and Security (RIPS), Tokyo. https://www.ifri.org/en/publications/etudes-de-lifri/east-asia-security-flux-what-regional-order-ahead
- Atanassova-Cornelis, Elena (2020). Alignment Cooperation and Regional Security Architecture in the Indo-Pacific. The International Spectator, 55(1): 18-33. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03932729.2020.1712132
