In this fortnight's Vienna Coffee House Conversation, Ivan Vejvoda speaks to EU diplomat and academic Julia De Clerck-Sachsse about the power of narratives to shape policy and the future of the European project. Was Barack Obama right to say that "perhaps [Europe needs] an outsider, somebody who is not European, to remind [it] of the magnitude of what [it has] achieved"? As enlargement proceeds and threats to the democratic order arise, is Europe able to tell itself the stories that it needs to face up to new challenges?

A diplomat and an academic, Julia De Clerck-Sachsse served as the speechwriter and communications adviser to EU High Representatives for Foreign and Security Policy, Lady Catherine Ashton and Federica Mogherini. She is leading a research project at Oxford University on the EU’s geopolitical narrative and works on transatlantic relations, EU foreign and security policy; also a foreign-policy Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. She is a 2020/21 “Europe's Futures” fellow of the Institute for Human Sciences and ERSTE Foundation.

Julia De Clerck-Sachsse is on Linkedin. find her writing at GMF and a list of her academic papers at researchgate. Read her recent paper on how the EU can win the battle of narratives here.

Ivan Vejvoda  is Head of the Europe's Futures program at IWM where, in cooperation with leading European organisations and think tanks IWM and ERSTE Foundation have joined forces to tackle some of the most crucial topics: nexus of borders and migration, deterioration in rule of law and democracy and European Union’s enlargement prospects.

The Institute for Human Sciences (IWM) is an independent institute for advanced study in the humanities and social sciences. Since its foundation in 1982, it has promoted intellectual exchange between East and West, between academia and society, and between a variety of disciplines and schools of thought. In this way, the IWM has become a vibrant center of intellectual life in Vienna.

The IWM is a community of scholars pursuing advanced research in the humanities and social sciences. For nearly four decades, the Institute has promoted intellectual exchange across disciplines, between academia and society, and among regions of the world. It hosts more than a hundred fellows each year, organizes public exchanges, and publishes books, articles, and digital fora. 

you can find IWM's website at:

https://www.iwm.at/
 

Ivan Vejvoda  is Head of the Europe's Futures program at the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM Vienna) implemented in partnership with ERSTE Foundation. The program is dedicated to the cultivation of knowledge and the generation of ideas addressing pivotal challenges confronting Europe and the European Union: nexus of borders and migration, deterioration in rule of law and democracy and European Union’s enlargement prospects.

The Institute for Human Sciences is an institute of advanced studies in the humanities and social sciences. Founded as a place of encounter in 1982 by a young Polish philosopher, Krzysztof Michalski, and two German colleagues in neutral Austria, its initial mission was to create a meeting place for dissenting thinkers of Eastern Europe and prominent scholars from the West.

Since then it has promoted intellectual exchange across disciplines, between academia and society, and among regions that now embrace the Global South and North. The IWM is an independent and non-partisan institution, and proudly so. All of our fellows, visiting and permanent, pursue their own research in an environment designed to enrich their work and to render it more accessible within and beyond academia.

For further information about the Institute:

https://www.iwm.at/