Contributor(s): Herman Van Rompuy | Herman Van Rompuy is a Belgian politician who formerly served as Prime Minister of Belgium and then as the first President of the European Council in the European Union. A politician from Belgium's Christian Democratic and Flemish party, Van Rompuy served as the 66th prime minister of Belgium from December 2008 until November 2009. In November 2009 he was selected by the members of the European Council as its first full-time President under the Treaty of Lisbon. He was appointed for the period from December 2009 until May 2012. On 1 March 2012 he was re-elected for a second (and last) term, which lasted from June 2012 until November 2014. Paul De Grauwe (@pdegrauwe) is John Paulson Chair in European Political Economy in the European Institute at LSE. The LSE European Institute (@LSEEI) was established in 1991 as a dedicated centre for the interdisciplinary study of processes of integration and fragmentation within Europe. In the most recent national Research Assessment Exercise, the Institute was ranked first for research in European Studies in the United Kingdom. The LSE European Institute has been a Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence since 2009.