Denisa Cepoiu is an MA candidate in International Relations (IR) at Central European University in Vienna and a cum laude IR graduate from Leiden University. Her work centers on security issues through a critical realist lens. She has researched wartime propaganda, the security crisis in the DRC, and narratives around anti-corruption protests in Romania. Her current research focus is on populism, international security, and global order politics.
Evaluating the European Union’s security architecture reveals that strategic documents often perform the grammar of grand strategy without establishing its functional logic. To overcome functional splintering and institutional circularity, the EU should adopt a binding Grand Strategy Doctrine und…
Main question: How have international legal norms adapted to the rise of private military and security companies (PMSCs), and with what consequences for accountability? Argument: States have responded to PMSCs primarily through soft-law mechanisms that normalise private force while avoiding bindi…
1. What cyber capability gaps does the EU grapple with? 2. The EU lacks operational coherence, offensive capabilities, and personnel infrastructure to combat complex cyberthreats. Institutional fragmentation, national sovereignty concerns, and an overreliance on civilian regulation hinder cyberse…
1. Was the Rwanda-DRC ceasefire agreement effective in ending humanitarian struggles in the eastern DRC? 2. The ceasefire was not effective since it did not include non-state militias which are actively present in the region and are pursuing violence against civilians. 3. Civilians continue to di…
