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On 9 September 2024, the world’s press gathered in Brussels. On that day, Mario Draghi, former Italian Prime Minister and previous President of the European Central Bank, presented his eagerly awaited report on “The Future of European Competitiveness”. The publication of the so-called Draghi report was timed to coincide with the start of the Commission’s next mandate, which the Commission itself has declared to be the decisive phase in its fundamental reorientation. The Commission intends the Draghi report to have a significant impact on policy-making and priority-setting in the European Union (EU) in the coming years.
The Draghi report provides a comprehensive analysis of the challenges and opportunities facing the EU and develops strategic approaches to promote stability. Draghi notes that growth in the EU is slowing down, mainly due to weak productivity. He also sees recent negative developments in foreign trade, energy supply and external security as a threat to the EU’s previous growth model. But one of the main reasons for him is the poor performance in terms of breakthrough innovation and the initial concentration of innovation activities in medium to low R&D intensive sectors, which is forcing the new European institutions to adopt a new approach to EU R&D policy.
The report recommends creating science as a ‘fifth freedom’ and a ‘Research and Innovation Union’ to reduce the R&D spending gap between the EU and its main competitors. Draghi’s view is undoubtedly that the future of the EU hinges on the success of science and research and its policy.
Against this background, the question arises as to how science and research have become such an important policy area in the EU today. This question is addressed in a special issue recently published in the Journal of European Integration History entitled “EUropeanisation in and through Science: Unveiling the Long-Term Dimensions of European Integration” (Irion & Volf 2024). The six contributions to this special issue, written by historians and political scientists, take a multi-angle view of the impact of integration within the political framework of the European Union and its predecessors, covering a wide historical range of almost seventy years - from the formative years of post-war European cooperation to contemporary debates on research infrastructure.
The articles highlight that an indispensable part of the EU’s complicated journey to its present form is the fascinating but often overlooked story of the Europeanisation of science and research which comprises two interrelated strands: the transformation of European science and research in the wake of political, economic and monetary integration, on the one hand, and the transformative impact of scientific research on the evolving European Union, on the other.
Each contribution explores this symbiotic relationship, examining in detail how the various actors, institutions, practices and policies have been shaped by the process of European integration and, conversely, how they have influenced the development of the EU. In doing so some authors even look at networks and institutions that have emerged on the margins or even outside the EU framework, but have interacted with its structures in a lively way. One example is the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), which in the 1950s was one of the first major instances of scientific cooperation in post-war Europe. Another is the Standing Committee for the Social Sciences of the European Science Foundation (ESF), which was set up in the 1970s and is another organisation independent of the EU.
Looking at the EU itself, the Commission’s initiative for the so-called Framework Programmes illustrates how research is being integrated into the fabric of European governance in the 1980s. The special issue also looks at the evolution of key concepts within European research policy. It examines the evolution of ‘scientific excellence’ in European research, tracing its transformation from a critical concept in the early 1990s to a normative standard within the European Research Council (ERC) since 2007. The European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC), launched by the European Commission in 2009 and which represents a turning point in the organisation and management of European research infrastructures, is also investigated.
Taken together, the articles sketch the landscape of European scientific cooperation and examine its various forms and impacts, but there is still much to be explored in this area. We would therefore like to provide a starting point and some food for thought.
David Irion is a PhD candidate and research fellow at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich (Germany). His current research focuses on the emergence and development of European research policy since the 1980s.
Irion, D. & Volf, D. (2023) EUropeanisation in and through Science: Unveiling the Long-Term Dimensions of European Integration – Introduction. Journal of European Integration History, 30(2): 205–216. https://doi.org/10.5771/0947-9511-2024-2-205
This post was initially published on Europe of Knowledge blog.