Welcome
German-French working group of experts on EU institutional reforms
Joint press release of the German Federal Foreign Office and the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs:
On the occasion of the German-French Council of Ministers, a working group of experts has been launched in order to make recommendations for EU institutional reforms. In the follow-up of the Conference on the Future of Europe, the working group has been initiated by German Minister of State for Europe and Climate, Anna Lührmann, and French Secretary of State for European Affairs, Laurence Boone. It is composed of twelve non-governmental experts from both countries. To include a wider European perspective, the working group will also reach out to other member states and candidates.
It is obvious that the EU needs an institutional overhaul to maintain its capacity to act. This is especially important with the perspective of future enlargements. To identify potential ways for reforms, we bring together German and French experts at one table. We thereby gather valuable ideas on how to strengthen our common European project.
Anna Lührmann
The mission of the working group is to elaborate, within the next months, concrete recommendations on how to strengthen the EU’s capacity to act, to protect its fundamental values, to strengthen its resilience, especially in light of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, and bring it closer to European citizens.
Laurence Boone
The conclusions, elaborated by the group, will be handed over to Ms. Lührmann and Boone by autumn 2023. The members of the working group are committed to include perspectives from other European countries in their analysis.
The members of this joint working group of experts are:
- Pervenche Beres, Fondation Jaurès
- Olivier Costa, CNRS CEVIPOF
- Gilles Gressani, Grand Continent
- Gaëlle Marti, Université de Lyon III
- Franz Mayer, Universität Bielefeld
- Thu Nguyen, Jacques Delors Centre
- Nicolai von Ondarza, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik
- Sophia Russack, Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS)
- Daniela Schwarzer, Open Society Foundations
- Funda Tekin, Institut für Europäische Politik (IEP)
- Shahin Vallée, DGAP
- Christine Verger, Institut Jacques Delors