Nicholas Ross Smith is Senior Lecturer of International Relations at the University of Waikato. His research coalesces around the regional implications of great power competition with a particular interest in the foreign policies of relatively smaller states that find themselves caught in the middle. His research has appeared in leading journals such as International Affairs, Review of International Studies, Global Policy, and The Pacific Review.

Martin Holland holds a Jean Monnet Chair ad personam and is the founding Director of National Centre for Research on Europe at Canterbury. He is internationally recognised for his work on EU Development policy, CFSP and Perceptions of the EU. In 2002 he initiated the "EU External Perceptions Project" which has been recognized as one of the top 20 "Jean Monnet Success Stories".