While national differences must be acknowledged in our pursuit of the European project, common challenges faced by the European Union must be addressed jointly: through our shared identity, interests and values we can work together to tackle Europe’s immediate and future priorities.
In 1974, both the European Council (EUCO) and the Trans European Policy Studies Association (TEPSA) came into being. The former created itself on the impetus of the Heads of State or Government, and has ever since played a crucial role in the story of European integration. The latter was the result of leading European experts from Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom coming together to form an association capable of exchanging knowledge and collaborating on EU affairs research. Fifty years later, the first research network on European affairs – TEPSA – has 49 Member Institutes in 37 European countries.
On the occasion of TEPSA’s and the EUCO’s 50th anniversaries, we hosted a public conference “Forging the Future of Europe” on 28 May at the Fondation Universitaire in Brussels. The conference ran between 14:00 – 18:00 CET. We had a roster of amazing and insightful speakers lined up for this conference – click below to learn more about them!
The public conference began with a short introduction on TEPSA at 50: “The Past, Present, and Future of Pan-European Knowledge Exchanges”, which took stock of TEPSA’s role in European affairs, featuring keynote speeches by people closely involved in TEPSA’s history throughout the past half century. After this, the panel “50 years of the European Council“ featured a conversation between former members of the EUCO and researchers to discuss the institution’s role and influence in shaping the last 50 years of European integration. The conference concluded with a panel titled “The Future of EU Enlargement” which served as the launch of TEPSA’s latest book “Enlargement and the Future of Europe: Views from the Capitals”, co-edited by Michael Kaeding, Paul Schmidt, and Johannes Pollak.
With this conference, TEPSA aimed to highlight exemplary efforts in the promotion of trans-European knowledge exchanges and cooperation in an engaging and lively discussion. We will soon publish our panel recordings so you can relive the discussions which took place, so stay tuned! And in the meantime, check out our Twitter highlights here.
