Between European Values, Contestation and Survival: the Changing Law and Politics of a Geopolitical European Union (CHANGE) (CHANGE)

The present research project “Between European Values, Contestation and Survival: the Changing Law and Politics of Geo-Political Europe” (CHANGE) investigates the relationship between the ever stronger geostrategic and geopolitical orientation of the European Union (EU or Union) on the one hand, and the effects thereof on law and politics in the multi-level governance of the EU on the other hand. The project starts from the assumption that a move towards a more geostrategically and geopolitically oriented EU strengthens the Union’s capacity to defend its own interests. However, as a Union founded on fundamental values, the EU faces the challenge to defend its interests while upholding its foundational values, and this in a context of both domestic and international contestation as well as the looming threat of disintegration (‘survival’). To this end, the project examines and explains the effects of a more geostrategic and geopolitical EU on the law and politics of the Union in three particular research work packages (“Values”, “Institutions” and “Policies”) that offer an integrated, comprehensive and interdisciplinary perspective on multi-level governance.