EuropeChats – What is the Role of the EUROPEAN COUNCIL? Pt. 1 | Discussion with Herman Van Rompuy

This episode of EuropeChats is the first in a number of discussions both within and outside of the EuropeChats series that TEPSA and its Member Institutes are conducting to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the European Council. In this discussion, TEPSA Secretary-General Jim Cloos sits down with former Belgian Prime Minister and the first ever permanent President of the European Council: Herman Van Rompuy.

President Van Rompuy has experiences different iterations of the European Council from different perspectives: he first joined the club as Belgian Prime Minister before the Lisbon Treaty entered into force and where Foreign Ministers where thus still taking part in the meetings. Then, when he became the Institution's first permanent President, he held the position in the iteration of the EUCO currently extant in the Treaties. All of this at a time where the EU's early 21st century so-called  'perma-crisis' was gathering momentum, with the fallout of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis continuing into the 2010s, and the early days of the Refugee Crisis coming to the fore towards the end of his tenure.

This episode is a discussion with Herman Van Rompuy. President Van Rompuy was Prime Minister of Belgium from 2008-2009, President of the European Council 2009-2014, and is Honorary President of the European Policy Centre. EuropeChats is the flagship podcast of TEPSA and it is part of the TEPSA Podcast Channel “Europe Speaks”

Music: Worakls, 22 September 2014, Salzburg, Hungry music

This video is co-funded by the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme of the European Union

Co-Funded by the European Union.