European Social Union: From Idea to Reality?

The first webinar from our Social Europe series aims to disentangle the notion of European Social Union (ESU), its relationship and potential contradictions or complementarities with Social Europe and also the EMU project as such.

Our first speaker is Prof Frank Vandenbroucke (Universiteit van Amsterdam), who has extensively worked on the development of both conceptual and practical foundations for the notion of European Social Union. His analysis will provide a solid basis for us to explore other approaches and relationships in future webinars from the series.

A recent public forum debate organized by EuVisions about the idea of a ‘European Social Union’ can serve as a good introduction to the policy agenda that motivates Frank Vandenbroucke’s theoretical and empirical work on the social dimension of the EU. His introduction to this forum debate can be read at http://www.euvisions.eu/europea-social-union-public-forum-debate-vandenbroucke/. In addition, relevant publications can be downloaded at his website, at http://www.frankvandenbroucke.uva.nl/en_GB/publications/. Publication nr. 263 is an extensive introduction to a recent academic volume on European Social Union, which explores the normative justification for a Social Union. Publication nr. 334 is a short and accessible summary of the results of a survey on EU citizens’ attitudes towards cross-border solidarity in 13 EU member states. Publication nr. 316 is a chapter in a recent book on globalization, in which Vandenbroucke discusses the following question: ‘Addressing global inequality: is the EU part of the equation?’. Publication nr. 312 is a short policy-oriented paper written for a larger audience: ‘Social Europe: from slogan to reality?’.

We look forward to seeing you online!