“The majority of European Constitutions enshrine the principle of separation between Church and State” says a 2013 report from the Directorate-General for Internal Policies, but the degree to which this is implemented differs enormously. With some European nations committing deeply to separation of powers, others enshrining their commitment to the separation of church and state implicitly, and others having only a notional commitment and a de facto partnership between church and state, how should European governments act in a world where religious diversity (including atheism) are at an all-time high?
The launch of the Sahel Alliance in 2017 marked renewed investment in the relationship between the EU with its partners and the governments of the Sahel, reinforcing existing work towards the stability of the region. With humanitarian crisis and irregular migration often cited as the greatest of the region's problems, what steps should the EU prioritise in order to address the root causes of destabilisation and provide sustainable support to the region?
Recent work by the OECD investigating socio-economic divides in Europe recognised that “Education systems can be a force for social mobility. However, they can also reproduce and reinforce existing social divides”. Given this place of schools and universities in maintaining, reinforcing and in some cases increasing social stratification in European nations, what should governments do to ensure that quality of education is as great as possible, while ensuring that educational institutions do not create or perpetuate the concept of “class” as a social divider?
Concerns over Member States’ sovereignty and populist backlash have set back attempts to reform the Dublin Regulation, the EU’s framework for handling and distributing asylum applications. With many refugees stuck in legal limbo, and currently responsible agencies and Member States overwhelmed by the demands of the current system, how should the EU’s policy be reformed and enforced to ensure a functional and fair distribution of responsibilities in this space?
Debt relief negotiations for Greece concluded in June of this year, following months of deliberation. Given the responsibility to balance the stability of the Euro, obligations to creditors and the welfare of European citizens, how should future debt relief be implemented to both provide confidence to the market without creating perverse incentives for governments?
Following revelations of large-scale tax abuse in the Panama Papers, the European Union released a blacklist of tax haven jurisdictions it will impose dissuasive sanctions on. However, critics point out that Member States such as Malta and Luxembourg benefit from policies that would be grounds for blacklisting in third countries. Considering this criticism and the ethical ramifications of large-scale tax avoidance, how should the EU mitigate the economic cost of tax havens both within and outside of the union?
With around 40% of EU citizens part of the irregular labour market, including the self-employed and those on part-time contracts, the impact of the “gig economy” in Europe has increased. With employees often subject to a weaker protection, and employers facing less certainty about their workforce, how can European countries ensure a balanced level of rights for both sides?
Fiscal policy and regulation have traditionally been the primary instruments governments can use to motivate environmentally responsible behaviour. In regard to personal transportation and individual mobility, how should governments balance different policy instruments to stimulate an environmentally conscious society?
Cross-border travel for medical treatment has become an attractive option for European citizens to access better quality or lower cost healthcare under the current EU framework for health tourism, but medical tourism in general poses many unanswered ethical and societal questions: some medical tourists travel abroad for treatment that contravene regulation in their countries of origin, such as abortion; others travel for procedures, such as organ transplants, that can exploit the poor and vulnerable of the destination countries. Given the diverse needs and socioeconomic effects involved, how should the EU regulate medical tourism from, to, and between its Member States?
EUROSTAT, the Directorate-General of the EU created to provide statistical information, regularly publishes statistics on sexual violence. As a footnote to these statistics, they include the disclaimer “It should be borne in mind that the figures do not necessarily reflect the actual number of violent sexual crimes. Rather they show to what extent such crimes are reported to and recorded by police. Therefore, the variation between countries is also influenced by general awareness and attitudes to sexual violence offences”. With reporting, recording and prosecution rates of sexual offences substantially below the real rates of occurrence, what can governments and civil society do to close that gap?
European policies on the digital economy, including the recently-introduced General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the recent proposal for “fair taxation of the digital economy”, offer users control over their personal data and European nations compensation for the use of their citizens’ data. At the same time, this poses a high cost to companies in the space and risks the competitiveness and growth of Europe’s tech sector, especially with legislation so open to interpretation. How should countries continue to safeguard citizens’ rights to privacy, security, and consumer choice while remaining committed to the growth of its digital economy?
With the growing tensions between the EU and the US caused by failure of TTIP negotiations and introduction of trade tariffs, the EU seems to be planning to open free trade talks with Australia and New Zealand due to higher level of political understanding at the moment. To what extent should values, principles and political understanding play a role in making decisions on trade policies?
The first subsidy-free wind farms have now been announced in three European countries - Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom - reflecting the increasing profitability of certain renewable energy sources. Given the possibility that some future renewables schemes will be able to self-fund, how should European countries and the EU structure future project finance to continue to provide funding to schemes that require it, without discouraging private funding or state capitalisation for those schemes that will not?
In 2017, the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia ended their term after 24 years assisting involved parties in the Western Balkans struggling to find a common understanding of the events of the war. With the Tribunal president arguing they had offered truth and not reconciliation, and more war crime cases for the region to come under the new Kosovo Specialist Chambers and Specialist Prosecutor’s Office, what steps should be taken in the aftermath of these trials in order to achieve both accountability for international crimes and stability in the region?
Attitudes toward private housing are diverse across all of Europe, with home ownership rates, average age of first time buyers, average house size and a variety of other metrics showing large disparities. With these differences come contrasts in landlord and tenants’ rights, state provided incentives to downsize, and market interventions of various shapes. With home ownership therefore having environmental, economic and social impacts, what should governments do to balance fair treatment of the individual with fair treatment of society as a collective?