Europe is quietly building a new layer of strategic insurance – and Canada is moving closer to the centre of it. GMF argues that the EU-Canada relationship is becoming more important as Washington grows less predictable, transatlantic trade tensions rise and Europeans search for reliable partners beyond the traditional US-led framework.

Britain is still behaving like the custodian of an international order that is disappearing beneath its feet. ECFR argues that Brexit, political turmoil and two Trump presidencies have badly weakened the assumptions underpinning British foreign policy, leaving the country more exposed to economic coercion and strategic dependence.

Washington is pushing Europe towards a security order in which America carries less of the burden. Geopolitical Futures sees US negotiations with Moscow over Ukraine and demands for Europeans to defend themselves as parts of the same strategic shift – responsibility is moving back towards regional powers.

Europe survived a bruising year of transatlantic confrontation, but EUISS warns against believing America’s midterm elections will bring the old relationship back. Washington challenged European allies over Greenland, threatened NATO troop withdrawals and piled pressure on the EU over trade and digital regulation.

Europe still talks like a rule-maker in a world increasingly shaped by bargaining, competing powers and countries determined to choose their own partners. DIIS argues that the shift to multipolarity is exposing a serious weakness in European foreign policy – the assumption that European priorities and values will automatically carry universal authority.

Hungary is undergoing its biggest political overhaul since Viktor Orbán and Fidesz took power in 2010. OSW’s assessment finds that Péter Magyar has used a two-thirds majority and exceptionally strong public support to tear into the institutional system built during 16 years of Fidesz rule, restore ties with Brussels and pull Hungary back towards the Western mainstream.

Germany’s reputation for predictable, consensus-driven politics is taking a serious hit. The AfD’s 43.8 per cent victory in Saxony-Anhalt more than doubled its 2021 vote and left it only three seats short of an absolute majority.