Schmidt Speaks at CEPS Ideas Lab
Vivien Schmidt, Professor of International Relations and Political Science at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, spoke at the annual Center for European Policy Studies (CEPS) Ideas Lab held on February 22, 2018.
The CEPS Ideas Lab is an annual forum that gathers Europe’s top decision makers and thinkers to discuss all the major issues confronting the EU. The theme of this year’s forum was “Europe – Back on Track.”
Schmidt spoke as part of a panel entitled “Is Differentiated Integration Unavoidable for Europe?” that explored the future of Europe. The panel also included Frank Schimmelfennig, Professor of European Politics at ETH Zürich, and was moderated by CEPS Researcher Sophia Russack.
The panel focused on questions including whether to expect more inclusivity or differentiated integration in the EU27 at a time when Europe is being buffeted by various countervailing forces, how to accommodate more flexible ways of integration without creating a hard dichotomy and isolating certain member states, whether EU institutions need to adapt their composition and procedures to accommodate various differentiated integration modes, and how unity can be assured overall.
Schmidt is a Jean Monnet Professor of European Integration at Boston University. Her research focuses on European political economy, institutions, democracy, and political theory. She has published ten books, over 100 scholarly journal articles or chapters in books, and numerous policy briefs and comments, most recently on the Eurozone crisis. Her current work focuses on democratic legitimacy in Europe, with a special focus on the challenges resulting from the Eurozone crisis, and on methodological theory, in particular on the importance of ideas and discourse in political analysis (discursive institutionalism).