Online courses directory (447)

Course Summary

The study of the EU as an international actor has become a key element in European and International Law, European Studies and International Relations. The EU represents the world’s largest trade power and aid donor, has a diplomatic service larger than that of most states, and has launched more than 20 civil-military operations. It has presented itself as a normative, global actor, and its emergence as a legal entity that is neither a state nor a classic international organization has both puzzled and fascinated legal scholars and political scientists alike. We represent a consortium consisting of the Global Governance Programme of the European University Institute in Florence, the Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies and the Chair for European and International Economic Law at the University of Passau. We have joined forces guided by the vision of providing cutting-edge expertise on the many facets of this fast-evolving topic to the greatest number of students.

What will I learn?

At the end of the course you will …

• be able to identify and understand the main challenges of the EU and its Member States in the world today, and how they affect us personally
• understand the means which the EU has at its disposal to tackle these challenges, and learn ways to critically evaluate its performance.
• understand and be able to apply the key legal principles and political realities governing EU external relations, its relationship with its Member States and citizens, and the outside world.
• situate the EU as an international actor into the main theoretical approaches to International Relations, and harness these approaches to analyse current topics in global politics.

What do I have to know?

Basic knowledge in one or more of the following subjects is highly recommended:

• The EU and its institutions / EU politics
• EU / International law
• International relations / politics, foreign policy.

Course Schedule

05 May 2015: Chapter 1 - Introduction: The EU in the New World Order

11 May 2015: Chapter 2 - The EU and Sustainable Development

18 May 2015: Chapter 3 - The EU as an International Security Actor

25 May 2015: Chapter 4 - The EU and its Neighbourhood

01 June 2015: Chapter 5 - Promoting Human Rights and the Rule of Law

08 June 2015: Chapter 6 - The EU in the Global Economic Order

23 June 2015/29 June 2015: Proctored exam week

Line-up of contributors

Geert De Baere

is Associate Professor of International Law and EU Law at the Institute for European Law and the Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies, KU Leuven. From 2007 to 2009, he worked as a référendaire at the Court of Justice of the EU. He is the author of Constitutional Principles of EU External Relations (Oxford University Press 2008).

Marise Cremona

is Professor of European Law at the European University Institute (EUI). She joined the EUI in 2006, was Head of the Law Department between October 2009 and June 2012, and President ad interim of the EUI between June 2012 and August 2013. She is a co-director of the Academy of European Law and a General Editor of the Collected Courses of the Academy (Oxford University Press); a member of the International Advisory Board of the Centre for European Research, University of Göteborg, Sweden; a member of the Advisory Board of the European Foreign Affairs Review; a member of the Editorial Board of the European Law Review, and a member of the Editorial Board, Studies in EU External Relations, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. 
Her areas of interest include EU external relations, trade and development policy, common foreign and security policy, European neighbourhood policy and enlargement, and the institutional and constitutional law of the EU.
Professor Cremona holds a BA honours degree from Somerville College, Oxford, and an LLM in International Law from Darwin College, Cambridge. Previously, she held the professorship of European Commercial Law at Queen Mary University of London.

Giorgia Giovannetti

Professor of Economics at the University of Florence and Visiting Fellow at the European University Institute. Scientific Director of the European Report on Development in 2009 and 2010 and former Director of the Research Centre of the Italian Trade Institute (2005-2007). Advising the Italian Treasury and Ministry of Foreign Trade (2002-2013).

Christoph Herrmann

Professor of European and International Economic Law at the University of Passau. His research focuses on the relationship between the EU and the international economic legal order, in particular EU trade policy as well as the Eurozone and its relations with the IMF and other international actors. Editor of the European Yearbook of International Economic Law (EYIEL), listed on the indicative list of panelists of the WTO and was the case author of the ELSA EMC2 WTO Law Moot Court (2012/13). Author of several monographs and textbooks on EU law and international trade law.

Joëlle Hivonnet

European External Acrion Service (EEAS), China Division, where she is contributing to the implementation of the EU-China strategic partnership. European Official since 1992. Worked previously in Brussels, New York and Geneva.

Frank Hoffmeister

Head of Unit at DG Trade in the European Commission. Formerly member of the Legal Service at the European Commission (2002-2009) and Deputy Head of Cabinet in Commissioner De Gucht’s Cabinet on International Trade (2010-2014). Part- time Professor at the Vrije Universiteit Brussels for International Economic Law.

Stephan Keukeleire

Jean Monnet Professor in European Integration and EU Foreign Policy, University of Leuven and Visiting Professor at the College of Europe (Bruges), Belgium. Director of the 'Master in European Studies: Transnational and Global Perspectives' and 'Master in European Politics and Policies' at the University of Leuven. His theoretical research focuses on the analysis of foreign policy in an era of globalisation, with the concept of 'structural foreign policy' being at the heart of his research. Coordinator of the Online Resource Guide 'Exploring EU Foreign Policy': www.eufp.eu. Co-author of ‘The BRICS and other Emerging Power Alliances in the Asia-Pacific and Global South: Challenges for the EU and its View on Multilateralism’ (Journal of Common Market Studies, 2014) and of the widely used textbook 'The Foreign Policy of the European Union' (Palgrave Macmillan 2014, 2nd ed.).

Joris Larik

is Senior Researcher at The Hague Institute for Global Justice and Associate Fellow at the Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies, KU Leuven. His work focuses on global governance reform, global normative frameworks, the legal and policy aspects of EU external relations, comparative and multilevel constitutional law and comparative regional integration. Dr. Larik initiated the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on The EU & Global Governance and served as its Academic Coordinator during the first edition in 2014. He continues to be a contributor and adviser to the second edition.

Lei Liu

is an associate professor at the School of Public Administration of Sichuan University, China . He holds a Doctor’s degree from Peking University in Environmental Science. He was a Jean-Monnet postdoctoral fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (Climate Governance research strand) of European University Institute (Sep. 2013- Sep. 2014), and also a visiting scholar of the Ostroms' Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University in the US (Sep. 2009- Sep. 2010). His research interests include Environmental Governance, Energy Policy and Global Climate Policy.

Sabrina Marchetti

is the Academic Coordinator of this MOOC. She is currently Jean Monnet post-doctoral fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre of the European University Institute in Florence. She received her PhD in Gender and Ethnicity from the University of Utrecht in 2010. As visiting fellow, she has been at the University of Linköping, at the University of Southern California, and at Delhi University. She has worked for Kassel University and the Metropolitan University in London, and with various non-academic research centres such as ISFOL in Italy, and IIED in the UK. She has mainly specialised on issues of gender and migration, with a specific focus on the question of migrant domestic work. From a comparative perspective, she has studied the case of Filipino, Eritrean and Afro-Surinamese migrants in Italy and the Netherlands. Her current project focuses on the case of Eastern European home-carers in Italy on the basis of interviews with workers and their employers.

Frederik Naert

Member of the Legal Service of the Council of the European Union (external relations directorate) and Affiliated Senior Researcher at the Institute for International Law, KU Leuven. Member of the editorial board of the Military Law & Law of War Review / Revue de droit militaire et de droit de la guerre and a member of the Board of Directors of the International Society for Military Law & Law of War. Author of International Law Aspects of the EU’s Security and Defence Policy, with a Particular Focus on the Law of Armed Conflict and Human Rights (Intersentia 2009).

Timea Pal

Jean Monnet postdoctoral fellow at the Global Governance Programme of the EUI. She is also part of the Global Economics research group within the EUI’s Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS). She is a political economist working on the governance of global production chains, and on their implications on sustainable economic development in emerging economies.

Roman Petrov

is Jean Monnet Chair in EU Law at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy since 2010 and Head of Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence in European Studies at the same university since 2011. Lectured the very first Jean Monnet Module in EU law in Ukraine at the Donetsk National University. Former Max Weber Fellow at the EUI 2006-2008. Author of one of the first Ukrainian textbooks on EU Law. Founder and first elected President of the Ukrainian European Studies Association. Frequently provides expertise on EU law to state institutions in Ukraine, including the Constitutional Court of Ukraine and Ministry of Justice.

Kolja Raube

Senior Researcher, Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies and Programme Coordinator, Centre for European Studies, KU Leuven. Heads the interdisciplinary research project The Rule of Law – A Strategic Priority of the European Union’s External Action. Author of Die Verfassungsauβenpolitik der Europäischen Union (The constitutional foreign policy of the Europrean Union) (Nomos 2007).

Anna Triandafyllidou

is Professor at the Global Governance Programme (GGP) of the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS), European University Institute. Within the GGP she coordinates the Research Area on Cultural Pluralism. Before joining the Programme, she was part time professor at the RSCAS (2010-2012). During the period 2004-2012, she was Senior Fellow at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP) in Athens where she headed a successful migration research team. She has been Visiting Professor at the College of Europe in Bruges since 2002, and is the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies. Her main areas of research and teaching are the governance of cultural diversity, migration, and nationalism from a European and international perspective. Over the past 15 years, she co-ordinated 30 international research projects in these research fields. Her publications include five authored books and 19 edited and co-edited volumes. For a full list see www.annatriandafyllidou.com.

Jan Wouters

Director of the Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies, Full Professor of International Law and International Organizations, and Jean Monnet Chair ad personam EU and Global Governance, KU Leuven. Visiting Professor at Sciences Po (Paris), Luiss University (Rome) and the College of Europe (Bruges). Inter alia, President of the United Nations Association Flanders Belgium, Of Counsel at Linklaters, Brussels, Member of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and Arts. Editor of the International Encyclopedia of Intergovernmental Organizations, Deputy Director of the Revue belge de droit international and an editorial board member in ten international journals. Widely published on international, EU, corporate and financial law (more than 50 books, 100 international journal articles and 150 international book chapters).