Michael E Smith

Professor Michael E. Smith joined the University of Aberdeen in 2010; prior to that he was a Reader in International Relations at the University of St Andrews and an Associate Professor of Political Science at Georgia State University in Atlanta. He holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of California (Irvine) as well as an MA in International Affairs from The George Washington University. He has been a Fulbright scholar to the European Union in Brussels, a Council for European Studies fellow, a visiting research fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies in Brussels, a University of California Institute for Global Conflict and Cooperation/MacArthur Foundation fellow, and a Robert Schuman Fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies of the European University Institute in Italy. Professor Smith also was the founder and first co-chair of the “EU as a Global Actor” interest section of the European Union Studies Association (2003-07). 

His publications include two research monographs on European security with Cambridge University Press, one of the first comprehensive studies of the European Neighbourhood Policy, a 1,600-page edited compendium on European security studies, several award-winning journal articles, contributions to over twenty edited volumes, and an innovative research-focused textbook on international security studies. He has also served as an external reviewer for the Economic & Social Research Council (UK) and the Research Executive Agency of the EU (remotely and in Brussels), as an evaluator of academic programmes in the UK, and as a consultant to firms bidding for EU research contracts.

His current work involves the global governance of revolutionary or disruptive technologies, and a monograph on this topic has just been completed. This work pays special attention to transatlantic cooperation and conflict regarding technology governance, and to the rising power of the European Union to devise innovative approaches to managing these technologies.