The European Union Center is generously funded in part by the European Commission.
About the EUCE
The UW-Madison first won a grant from the European Commission to establish a European Union Center in 1998.
In 2005 the center was among 10 in the U.S. that were awarded new grants as European Union Centers of Excellence for the period 2005-2008. In 2008 the European Commission renewed the Center's funding through 2011 with a grant of 300,000 Euro. In 2011, the Center's funding of 300,000 Euro was once again renewed through 2014.
With the second renewal Wisconsin remains within a select group of only ten U.S. universities which can claim the designation EU “Center of Excellence.” Faculty, graduate students, visiting scholars, the regional Midwestern media, the K-14 community and public policymakers will focus on a unique series of research projects on Europe from a Trans-Atlantic perspective. Participation cuts across disciplinary lines, involving UW-Madison faculty ranging from Law, Life Sciences Communication, Population Health Sciences, Engineering, and Public Policy and Educational Policy Studies, who will research topics as diverse as bioethics and technology, and financial governance. The three core themes for 2011-2014 are “The EU as a Global Actor: Health, Education & Research” led by Professor Kris Olds of Geography, “EU Legislation, Policy-Making and Regulation,” led by Assistant Professor Nils Ringe of Political Science, and “Diversity and Accountability, Rights and Responsibilities: Managing Challenges of Multi-Level Social Policy in Advanced Democracies," led by Myra Marx Ferree, Professor of Sociology and Gender & Women's Studies.
On the UW-Madison campus, the EUCE is a member center of the International Institute and collaborates closely with and complements the activities of the other members of the European Studies Alliance (ESA):
The EUCE organizes well-integrated, multi-disciplinary programs centered around three themes. Activities organized under these themes collectively aim to:
First attributed to UW President Charles Van Hise in 1904, the Wisconsin Idea is the principle that education should influence and improve people’s lives beyond the university classroom. For more than 100 years, this idea has guided the university’s work. Read more about the Wisconsin Idea and its history.
The EUCE brings together a strong core of specialists on European integration from over a dozen UW-Madison departments representing the social sciences, humanities, business, and law and works to bring UW resources and expertise on the European Union to the Wisconsin Idea.
Specifically, the EUCE promotes and supports scholarship, teaching, and outreach activities aimed at:
(1) improving understanding of the European Union as a complex, evolving governance system and international actor;
(2) enhancing awareness of the growing importance and widening scope of EU-U.S. relations; and
(3) promoting intensified “people-to-people” links among EU and U.S. students, academics, policymakers, and citizens.
The EUCE coordinates activities with individuals in a number of centers and institutions in both the U.S. and Europe.