ALT 🇪🇺🇦🇲 COP17 opens today in Yerevan, with Europe showcasing its biodiversity leadership. But is the EU practicing what it preaches? In 2025 it downgraded the wolf’s protection 🐺 despite better solutions being available. What does this reveal?

ALT Regional integration isn't built by treaties alone.🌍 Beneath the summits and diplomatic negotiations, public officials across borders are building something just as important: trust, shared practices and common ways of seeing problems. On the EU-VALUES blog now, Prof. Jacint Jordana explores how transgovernmental networks shape regional governance, and why they matter more in a multipolar world where global rules are weakening. 🎥 This piece connects directly to the wider conversation on comparative regionalism that we explored at our conference last month. If you want to understand how these ideas play out across disciplines and regions, including Jordana's own presentation on transgovernmental networks, you can revisit the roundtable session. And let us your thoughts! 👇 As world leaders wrapped up this year's UN General Assembly, are we paying enough attention to the networks of public officials who turn regi

ALT Can the EU stay true to its values while playing geopolitical hardball on interests? That is the question at the heart of our latest piece by Dr Ivana Damjanovic and Dr. Katarzyna Kwapisz Williams of the ANU Centre for European Studies, and it is not an easy one to answer! From trade policy's shift away from "Trade for All" idealism toward competitiveness and economic security, to migration's fraught balancing act between human rights obligations and mounting domestic pressure for border control, the EU is being forced to make trade-offs it once tried to avoid - outsourcing responsibility, striking transactional deals and prioritising security in ways that test its identity as a normative power. So is this pragmatism, or a quiet retreat from what the EU claims to stand for? Read the full analysis on trade, migration, and the EU's identity as a geopolitical actor 👇 https://www.eu-values.eu/blog/balancing-eu-values-and-interests-in-a-geopolitical-world #EU #Geopoliti

ALT How far does free speech travel, and who decides where it stops? From Socrates to the Digital Services Act, Europe has built a distinctive model of free expression: one that protects dissent while also shaping the platforms, laws, and institutions that determine what we see and hear. In our latest blog, Prof. Ramin Jahanbegloo and Prof. Rahul Desarda trace this tradition from ancient philosophy to today's most pressing digital governance battles. The "Brussels Effect," the EU's response to wartime propaganda, and the fine line between resisting manipulation and silencing unpopular views...is the EU setting a global standard for balancing liberty and responsibility online, or exporting its own compromises to the rest of the world? What do you think? 👉 Head to our website to read the full piece:

ALT 🏛️Is the EU's Multilateral Investment Court still alive? Dr. Ivana Damjanovic of @LawCanberra unpacks the EU's push to replace ISDS arbitration with a permanent court, and why it's stuck between aspiration and reality. 👉 Read more: https://www.eu-values.eu/blog/the-european-unions-reform-of-international-investment-law-still-unfeasible-and-relevant #EU #ISDS @IBEI

ALT Congratulations to our esteemed colleague and longtime EU-VALUES Network partner, Prof. Dr. Ramin Jahanbegloo, on being named the 2027 Spinozalens Prize laureate! 👏 The prestigious award, often called the "Dutch Nobel Prize," recognises Ramin's outstanding contributions to the theme of "Free Thinking." The jury praised his work, stating that for Ramin, free thinking goes beyond the individual right to think and speak freely, calling it "the art of non-conformity" and "an indictment of mediocrity, orthodoxy and populism." Despite facing imprisonment in his homeland, Ramin has become one of the world's most prolific contemporary thinkers, teaching philosophy in Canada and India (O.P. Jindal Global University (JGU) while remaining devoted to reflection, idea generation and developing new ways of thinking. Ramin's tireless dedication to promoting free thinking, non-violence, and intercultural dialogue embodies the core mission of our network. We are so pleased to see his transformati