Dr. Spyros Economides is Associate Professor in International Relations and European Politics at the LSE and a Visiting Scholar in the Center for European Studies at Harvard. He was a Research Associate of the Centre for Defence Studies at King's College and at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London and has acted as Specialist Advisor to the House of Lords Eu Committee. He has written about the external relations and security policies of the EU; Europeanisation and foreign policy, and the EU’s relationship with the Western Balkans. He is currently engaged on a project on the Persistence of the West in International Politics.