Leader
Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI), Italy
https://www.iai.it/it

Participants
Istituto Affari Internazionali, European Policy Centre, Centre for European Reform

Objectives
Based on the criteria developed through the analysis of differentiation – compatibility with narratives on EU constitutionalism and identity, sustainability in terms of governance, and acceptance by EU Member States, citizens and partner countries – on the practice of differentiation in key policy areas (WPs 4-5-6), of the prospects for Brexit (WP7) and of the preferences expressed via interviews and polls (WP 8) the WP 9 will:

  1. flesh out potential developments of differentiation in the EU with reference to normative consistency, practical efficiency and output and political legitimacy and portray the challenges, opportunities and risks of various forms and degrees of differentiation for the future of Europe;
  2. identify the best practices to mitigate the risks and exploit the opportunities of differentiation, with a view to impact on both policy design and implementation of differentiated integration in the EU;
  3. offer an innovative approach to differentiation in EU governance that goes beyond the current state-of-the-art by taking into account the constitutional, social, local and external dimensions of differentiation.