Selection of Recent Challenge Events

 Lunch-time meeting, «The Hague Programme: a partnership for a European renewal in the field of Freedom Security and Justice» with Mr. Franco Frattini, Vice-President of the European Commission and European Commissioner for Freedom, Security and Justice, 14 July 2005, Centre for European Policy Studies, CEPS, Brussels.

 Workshop «Critical Infrastructure Protection» in September 12, 2005 at the University of Copenhagen. The aim of the workshop was to investigate the concept and to engage the practice of critical infrastructure protection both critically and from various perspectives.

 Conference «Enlargement of the EU - A Challenge for What?» in 29 and 30 September 2005 in Budapest (Hungary). The event covered the work carried out by Workpackage 7 of the project, which includes scholars of research institutes from Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria and Malta covering the short-term and long-term impact of enlargement on regional and neighbourhood contacts, public order, security issues, as well as national identity aspects. The event provided a direct exchange of views on methods and analysis of effects, selection of data or a debate on existing research results.

 Conference «Migration, Asylum and Security - Border Challenges in an Enlarged EU» in 9th and 10th December 2005, University of Malta. This event represented a unique opportunity to discuss the relationships between the Accession Countries and their Neighbours in the Changing Landscape of Liberty and Security.

 The First Training School and Expert Roundtable on«European Neighbourhood Policy» took place on the 21 and 22 April 2006 at CEPS in Brussels. The two-day Training School examined various aspects of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) in the domains of visa policy, illegal migration and readmission agreements, asylum and cooperation over international security issues. It involved experts from both academia and policy making world.

 Seminars Seriesorganized by the Centre for Migration Law (Radboud University of Nijmegen) and the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) in Brussels:

1. «Immigration, Integration and Citizenship: The Nexus in the EU»on 25 January 2006, CEPS. This seminar discussed the nexus between immigration, integration and citizenship. The objective was to look at how the three policy issues have recently come together under a common EU policy on immigration, and to evaluate this development with regard to intrinsic criteria such as effectiveness and proportionality as well as extrinsic criteria such as legitimacy, non-discrimination, fundamental rights and social cohesion.

2. «Constitutional Challenges to the European Arrest Warrant»on 13 February 2006, CEPS. The seminar looked at the decisions of constitutional courts in Germany, Poland, and Cyprus challenging the compatibility of national provisions transposing the EAW Framework Decision with the constitutional law of these Member States.

3. «War or Crime? Military Action in Peace Keeping and Legal Responsibility» on 3 April 2006, CEPS. The seminar was designed to examine some of the issues and problems which the intersection of military action and criminal law present and to enable an informed debate and discussion among experts on the subject.

4. «Enhancing EU Cooperation in Security: The Treaty of Prüm and the Principle of Availability», 21 June 2006, CEPS. The seminar examined the Treaty of Prum in the context of the EU measures and proposals.

 Seminar «Mapping the Field of Security in Europe III» on 22 February 2006, and «Mapping the Field of Security in Europe IV» (Sociology of Europe: methods and proposals), the 9th May 2006 in Paris.

 Conference «Law, politics and the challenge of exceptionalism post-9/11» in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London on 5 and 6 May 2006. This conference attempted to question the separation of law and politics that leads to a critique of exceptional practices in the name of the ‘rule of law’ or to a critique of law in the name of politics. It brought together (legal) practitioners and academics to discuss the theoretical and practical stakes of the limits of law and the limits of politics under a ‘state of exception’.

 Workshop »Thinking wars: Armed conflicts and contemporary cultures» in 28th and 29th April 2006 in Genoa. The event proposed an interpretative and analytical perspective on wars and armed conflicts from the point of view of the sociology of culture.

 Workshop on «Trends and Developments in European Union External Border Control» in the 2nd June 2006, University of Utrecht, the Netherlands. In the field of European external border control new laws and institutions are being planned and implemented with constant fervor. The purpose of this round table was to discuss the recent trends and developments both on an institutional and substantive level.

 Annual Conference «Illiberal Practices of Liberal Regimes» at the Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales (CERI), Paris, the 9 June 2006.