On the occasion of Europe Day, the Dialogues on Europe forum is taking place in Ukraine. This is the 3rd forum organised by the Institute for Central European Strategy together with partners on the occasion of Europe Day, and is dedicated to rethinking the ideas of a united Europe and a new Central Europe.
The forum is symbolically taking place in the westernmost region of Ukraine, Zakarpattia, where one of the geographical centres of Europe is located. Public intellectuals and political experts from Ukraine, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Germany, Armenia and Croatia have come here to participate in a series of open and closed discussions.
This year’s forum was opened by writer and philosopher Oksana Zabuzhko with a keynote speech entitled ‘Today, all of Europe is Central Europe’.
The forum was opened by Oksana Zabuzhko / Photo: Natalia Radchenko
Other participants of the discussions are Maksym Butkevych, human rights activist and serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Thomas Birringer, Director of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in Ukraine, Krzysztof Chyzewski, Founder of the Borderland Foundation (Poland), Claudiu Comartin, writer and translator, Vice President of the Romanian PEN (Romania), Csilla Fedinets, Senior Researcher at the Institute for Minority Studies, Centre for Social Sciences (Hungary), Armen Aghanyan, writer, President of PEN Armenia, Ihor Koliushko, Head of the Board of the Centre of Policy and Legal Reform (Ukraine), Attila Demko, Head of the Strategic Foresight Programme, John Lukacs Institute (Hungary), Andras Rath, Senior Research Fellow at the German Society on Foreign Relations, Andriy Lyubka, Director of the Institute for Central European Strategy (Ukraine).
Forum Dialogues on Europe takes place in Zakarpattia / Photo: Natalia Radchenko
The focus topics of this year’s Dialogues on Europe forum are:
- Europe between Russia, China and the United States: A new geopolitical reality for the old continent. What should the new Europe look like in the new geopolitical reality
- We are all Central Europe now: rethinking Kundera’s concepts of Mitteleuropa and Central Europe in the context of Russian aggression and the US desire to withdraw from Europe
- How to explain Ukraine to the polarised societies of Central Europe – Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Poland and the Czech Republic
- Ukraine’s path to the EU lies through Central Europe and the good neighbourhood: What to do with the Hungarian veto, how to prevent vetoes from Slovakia and Romania
- Democratic sustainability during EU accession: Risks, guarantees and strategic coordination
You can follow the updates of the forum on the website of the Institute for Central European Strategy and on the Facebook page of the event.
On 9 May, the European Union officially celebrates Europe Day. This is the date of the signing of the Schuman Declaration (1950), which launched the creation of the EU. Paradoxically, Ukraine only began celebrating Europe Day in 2023 in sync with the EU, although it has long been aspiring to the EU, and after the Russian invasion, European integration is a matter of preserving Ukrainian statehood.
At the same time, the date of 9 May still has a post-Soviet context in Ukraine, linked to the Soviet concept of a victory day. The year 2025 marks the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, and Russia is already instrumentalising this date.
In order to counter Russian imperial narratives and synchronise the understanding of Europe between Ukraine and the EU at the level of narratives, the Institute for Central European Strategy launched a new initiative in 2023 called Dialogues on Europe.
The specific mission of this initiative is to conceptualise and advocate the doctrine of good neighbourliness in Central Europe as an important element of Ukraine’s European integration and the security of Europe as a whole.
The Dialogues on Europe 2025 forum is supported by the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, the Federal Foreign Office of Germany, the European Union and the International Renaissance Foundation within the framework of the joint initiative ‘Joining the EU together’, MATRA programme, Dilemma project and in partnership with the Centre of Policy and Legal Reform, the Reanimation Package of Reforms Coalition and Democracy Reporting International (DRI).
Source: New Voice
