The Third Conference on Baltic and Nordic Studies in Romania, May 2012

The Romanian Association for Baltic and Nordic Studies continued to organize in 2012 a series of events, one of the most meaningful of which was the third international conference on Baltic and Nordic Studies entitled European networks: the Balkans, Scandinavia and the Baltic world in a time of economic and ideological crisis opened on 25 May at Valahia University of Târgoviște and sponsored by the Romanian National Research Council, Niro Investment Group and other partners (http://www.arsbn.ro/conference-2012.htm). The main goal of the conference was to foster debate and academic discussion with regard to the challenges the Balkan and Baltic regions face today, within a time of severe global economic instability. The participants discussed and advanced solutions to problems such as the accession of Balkan states to the EU and/or NATO, with particular reference to the experiences of the relatively new EU and/or NATO Member States from South-Eastern Europe and the Eastern Baltic region; the economic, security or cultural threats posed by Balkan and/or Eastern European states or non-state actors to the Western or Nordic Europe as perceived there; the development of extremist movements and the Balkan organized crime in the Scandinavian countries; the Balkan Roma peoples as a “threat” for Western and Nordic Europe; strategies for integrating minorities in the Baltic Sea rim countries and the Black Sea areas.