Europe Speaks: A TEPSA Podcast

EuropeChats – Angela Merkel’s European Legacy

In this new episode of #EuropeChats, we’re taking a look at the legacy of German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Chancellor Merkel announced this year that she would be standing down after 16 years in power. The German elections took place on 26 September 2021, and for the first time since 2005, we knew she would not emerge as Chancellor.

TEPSA Secretary-General Jim Cloos prepared European Council summits throughout Merkel's period in office, and shares with us his impressions of her European leadership through a series of crises since 2005.

"Ms. Merkel came into power in 2005. This was the year when a new MFF was being negotiated. It was as always a highly controversial matter, with Germany playing a key role as the biggest net payer. After the failure to conclude under Luxembourg presidency (not the fault of LU!), she worked hard with the new UK presidency to find consensus at the EUCO. In other words, she almost immediately made her mark in Brussels. She surprised people with her quiet authority, her knowledge of the files and her tactical skills"

But we also look at some of Chancellor Merkel's failures and controversies, including the famous "Wir Schaffen Das!" statement which Jim argues created divisions in Europe at the time of the Refugee Crisis, and critiques of Merkel's indecision in the area of foreign policy

We’re discussing these topics and many more! Check it out!

EuropeChats is with Jim Cloos & Mariam Khotenashvili 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

EU History Explained - A Short History of the Euro

In this new episode of EU History Explained, Giulia Bonacquisti, Project Manager at the Trans European Policy Studies Association (TEPSA), takes a look at the history of one of the most important parts of the European Union: the Euro, our common currency. 

In a few months, we will celebrate the 20th anniversary of the introduction of Euro banknotes and coins, which came into circulation on January 1st 2002. But the history of our common currency stretches back a lot further than that, way back to 1957 and the Treaty of Rome, which outlined measures to promote coordination in economic and monetary matters. But it was not until the early 1970s that policy started to be shaped in the wake of the end of the Bretton Woods system and the Werner Report.  

Since then, economic integration has progressed through the Delors presidency of the European Commission, through the Chancellorship of Helmut Schmidt in Germany and the Presidency of Valéry Giscard d’Estaing in France, and into the 1990s when the Maastricht Treaty founded the modern European Union and economic integration accelerated, culminating in the introduction of the Euro in 1999 as a virtual single currency. 

EU History Explained is TEPSA's video series exploring the origins of the modern EU. If you have ever wondered how the European Union of today came to be, or what lies behind the talk of politics being shaped in 'Brussels', then this is the series for you! 

Script: Giulia Bonacquisti 
Recording & Editing: Tanguy Babled & Hugh Evans 
Music: Garrett Bevins - Infinite - Infinite (Wondershare Filmora X) 

DiCE Webinar - Brexit: From Internal to External Differentiation

In this podcast, Brigid Laffan from the Robert Schuman Centre of the European University Institute explains how Brexit is a perfect case study in two critical aspects of differentiated European integration: external and internal differentiation. In this DiCE Webinar, we explore the Barnier Escalier system of negotiation, and how the intersection of British and European red lines with this Escalier resulted in a ‘no deal’ outcome. Brigid Laffan is the DiCE Project Coordinator and a leading expert on differentiated European integration. 

This series from DiCE – Differentiation: Clustering Excellence, “DiCE Webinars” takes the full knowledge of Europe’s leading experts on differentiated integration, and presents it in an easy to digest video format. 

DiCE Webinar - Differentiation and the Future of Europe

In this podcast, Nicoletta Pirozzi gives her expertise on differentiated integration. She is the Head of the European Union Programme and Institutional Relations Manager at the International Affairs Institute in Rome, Italy; a Board member of TEPSA and coordinator of the EUIDEA project. In this DiCE Webinar, she explains how differentiated integration can – and should – factor into the future of Europe. 

This series from DiCE – Differentiation: Clustering Excellence, “DiCE Webinars” takes the full knowledge of Europe’s leading experts on differentiated integration, and presents it in an easy to digest format. 

DiCE Webinar - Differentiated Integration: Risks and Benefits

In this podcast, Sandra Kröger from the University of Exeter explains the risks and benefits of differentiated integration. In this video, we explore why differentiation can lead on the one hand to efficiency gains in a way which promotes diversity and makes things more fair; whereas on the other hand it risks fragmentation, division, and domination. 

This series from DiCE – Differentiation: Clustering Excellence, “DiCE Webinars” takes the full knowledge of Europe’s leading experts on differentiated integration, and presents it in an easy to digest video format. 

EuropeChats – European Strategic Autonomy

In this new episode of #EuropeChats, we’re analysing the newest buzzword in Brussels: "European Strategic Autonomy". We discuss the reasons why this new term arose: we live in an increasingly hostile global environment, and we have faced multiple crises in recent years, from the subprime crisis through the refugee crisis and Brexit, as well as the COVID crisis, and these have revealed weaknesses in our system that require the EU to become more resilient, more powerful, and more autonomous. 

We also discuss what exactly does this term mean, and how does it affect the EU as it currently exists? What practical applications of the concept of Strategic Autonomy should the EU try to achieve in the fields of trade policy, medical supplies, defence and digitalisation in the next decade? 

We discover what that new resilience might look like, how it might affect policy, and what this means for the EU on the world stage. Can the EU be a serious geopolitical actor? Can strategic autonomy strengthen the defense of European values against authoritarian regimes outside Europe? Can Europe become an innovation centre on par with Silicon Valley or China? And, most controversially of all, does strategic autonomy mean the EU should have a European Army? 

We’re discussing these topics and many more! Check it out! 

EuropeChats with Jim Cloos & Mariam Khotenashvili 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 

 

DiCE Webinar - Differentiation and Democracy

In this podcast, John Erik Fossum from ARENA Centre for European Studies (part of the University of Oslo) elaborates on the concept of differentiated integration in the framework of democracy theory. He discusses key elements of the debate around differentiation, including the fact that some forms of differentiation are necessary in order for democracy to function properly, and therefore that democratic governance is functionally differentiated. Moreover, the podcast elaborates on differentiated integration in the European Union. 

This series from DiCE – Differentiation: Clustering Excellence, “DiCE Webinars” takes the full knowledge of Europe’s leading experts on differentiated integration, and presents it in an easy to digest format. 

EU History Explained - The Origins of European Integration, Part 2

In this new episode of #EUHistoryExplained, Giulia Bonacquisti, Project Manager at the Trans European Policy Studies Association (TEPSA), takes us back in time to the early 1950s. 

Last episode, we learned about Europe in the wake of war, where an intellectual background dating back to the 1920s came to the fore to foster integration in Europe. This episode, we learn how an attempted defense and political community led to the formation of the European Economic Community. We also discover the progress of military cooperation, which starts to develop in the early 1950s. Initially, this is not much more than a military alliance, first among Western European countries, and then between them and the United States. These are the origins of what we know today as NATO. 

EU History Explained is TEPSA's newest video series exploring the origins of the modern EU. If you have ever wondered how the European Union of today came to be, or what lies behind the talk of politics being shaped in 'Brussels', then this is the series for you! 

Script: Giulia Bonacquisti 
Filming & Editing: Tanguy Babled & Hugh Evans 
Music: Garrett Bevins - Infinite - Infinite (Wondershare Filmora X) 

EuropeChats - The EU’s response to the COVID crisis

In this new episode of #EuropeChats, we’re analysing the EU’s response to the #COVID19 crisis. For more than a year, the world has been caught in the grip of the coronavirus pandemic, and providing a successful response has been a significant challenge to the EU throughout. 

In this episode, we discuss how and why the initial response was made, including why mask and PPE procuration was such a significant challenge in the spring of 2020. TEPSA Secretary-General Jim Cloos was a key player in organising the mammoth Special European Council meeting of July 2020, which resulted in the adoption of the Multi-Annual Financial Framework 2021-2027 and the COVID Recovery Package: #NextGenerationEU. With this expertise of the famous days-long negotiation, Jim speaks about the key elements of the more than EUR 1.8 trillion total funding agreed in that meeting. 

We also discover how the EU’s research funding resulted in the record delivery of a COVID19 vaccine, as well as how the EU’s joint procuration of vaccines has resulted in a successful vaccination programme in Europe and beyond Europe’s borders, thanks to a successful vaccine export programme and the EU’s heavy involvement in COVAX. The COVID vaccine was developed and released in only one year, as of May 2021, 200 million vaccine doses have been administered in the EU, and the EU is the biggest contributor to the COVAX initiative. 

EuropeChats with Jim Cloos & Mariam Khotenashvili 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 

EU History Explained - The Origins of European Integration

In this first episode of #EUHistoryExplained, Giulia Bonacquisti, Project Manager at the Trans European Policy Studies Association (TEPSA), takes us through the earliest years of European integration after the Second World War. 

In the wake of war in Europe, and with an intellectual background dating back to the 1920s, the origins of the modern EU formed. In this episode, we are looking at the timeline from the end of World War Two until the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951, with the Marshall Plan, the Hague Congress, and the Schuman Declaration along the way. 

EU History Explained is TEPSA's newest series exploring the origins of the modern EU. If you have ever wondered how the European Union of today came to be, or what lies behind the talk of politics being shaped in 'Brussels', then this is the series for you! 

Script: Giulia Bonacquisti 
Filming & Editing: Tanguy Babled & Hugh Evans 
Music: Garrett Bevins - Infinite - Infinite (Wondershare Filmora X)