Perspectives from International Organizations in Geneva

Atlantic Perspectives Interview Report, nº. 17

The purpose of this paper was to take the pulse of what international organisation representatives in Geneva perceived about the Atlantic, while providing evidence to answer the Atlantic Future project research question on whether a new pan-Atlantic system of relations is emerging in the Atlantic beyond the traditional North Atlantic alliance and the North-South dependency. With this objective in mind regional trends and dynamics have been presented and analysed in this paper. However, interviewees not only had particular difficulty thinking about the Atlantic in terms of a unified geopolitical space but also agreed that, for the time being at least, we could not speak of the emergence of this geopolitical space. Because, despite the common ground that exists among the regions of the Atlantic, the context of international reconfiguration being experienced today, and the prevalence of national and regional dynamics still have direct impact on the social and political mindset of the Atlantic sub-regions. For the interviewees, the notion of the Atlantic space is simply not in the quintessence of the region and lacks the political leadership that is needed for this.