Global Europe – Global Expectations

The European Union promotes stability, democracy, and economic development in Southeast- and East Europe for a long time. As part of this policy, the EU has granted the candidate status to countries in the region that are committed to European values and are making progress towards the Copenhagen criteria for EU membership. Exactly one year ago, Ukraine and Moldova were granted the EU candidate status, while Georgia only received the potential candidate status. Other countries, for instance the Western Balkans, had received their (potential) candidate status already years ago. The crucial question for all these countries is what a realistic EU perspective might look like: What can the EU offer these countries, also in order to push back Russian and Chinese interests and influence in the region? What are the key challenges for the potential EU members to meet the Copenhagen criteria and how can the EU support them?

The Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom and the Thomas Dehler Foundation invite you to discuss these and other issues together with our experts.

This event is part of a wider event series on the EU’s role in other world regions. The EU’s role in Southeast and East Europe is also discussed in the publication “Global Europe – Global Expectations. Assessing the EU's role in the world” which was co-authored by our guest speaker Tamar Kekenadze. You can find the publication here: https://shop.freiheit.org/#!/Publikation/1400

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Tamar Kekenadze
is the Head of Advanced Research and Policy Development Institute at British University in Georgia, as well as a chair of the opposition party Free Democrats. Before joining the party in February 2015, she served as Head of the Civilian Office of the Ministry of Defence of Georgia at the Georgian Mission to NATO. Prior to that, she served as Head of the Euro-Atlantic Integration Division at the Ministry of Defence of Georgia. Tamar Kekenadze also worked for five years in civil society organizations at national and international levels. Since 2019, she has been Chair of the CAMCA Network. Tamar Kekenadze is currently pursuing her PhD in Economics, and holds an MA in Computer Engineering, Information Science and Control Systems (2006) as well as a BA in Computer Systems and Networks (2003), all from Georgian Technical University. In 2022, she published the article on Southeast and East Europe in the FNF publication “Global Europe – Global Expectations. Assessing the EU's role in the world”

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Christian Hagemann
is Executive Director of the Southeast Europe Association (Südosteuropa-Gesellschaft, SOG). In this capacity, he is regularly involved in the conceptualization and organization of international conferences and workshops dealing with developments in Southeast Europe on numerous issues. Christian Hagemann has studied Political Science, Communication Science, and Law in Munich, Münster, and Cluj-Napoca. He holds a PhD in Political Science from the LMU Munich for his research on EU funds in the post-communist space, and has worked before as a Post-Doctoral Researcher and Substitute Professor for Policy Analysis at the Bavarian School of Public Policy in Munich. His areas of interest are post-communist politics, EU enlargement, and renewable energies.

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Wolf Achim Wiegand
is a freelance journalist and publishes in THE EUROPEAN, FORUM – the weekly magazine, EURACTIV, among others. His main themes are international politics, in particular all processes related to the European Union, and liberalism. Wolf Achim Wiegand is politically active himself. He is the elected Country Coordinator for the ALDE Individual Members (AIM) at the liberal pan-European party umbrella organization ALDE Party, was AIM delegate for the ALDE Party European Party Conferences 2017 in Amsterdam and 2018 in Madrid and FDP delegate at the ALDE Party conferences in Athens in 2019 and in Stockholm in 2023.