EU Fit for the Future

The Jean Monnet Chair project “EU Fit for the Future” (EU FIT) strengthens EU expertise at the University of Tartu through an integrated package of teaching, policy dialogue and public outreach. The Chair involves 550 hours of EU-related teaching across the European Studies, Political Science and International Relations curricula, both at the MA and BA level, updating core courses and modules on EU institutions, decision-making, policy-making, enlargement and the EU’s role in world politics. The project also builds sustained dialogue with policy makers and practitioners, and delivers public outreach that translates research-based knowledge into practical formats: training sessions for civics teachers, open lectures and debates, and online courses designed for audiences based in EU candidate countries. Chaired by Professor Piret Ehin and supported by a team of academics as well as high-level policy practitioners, EU FIT addresses how the EU political system operates – and how it must adapt – in a rapidly changing and tense international environment shaped by great-power competition and pressures on the rules-based order. The core ambition is to help make the EU fit for the future by assessing the need for reform and identifying workable pathways for institutional and policy change. The Chair foregrounds the dual task of deepening and widening the Union while upholding its values, ideals and way of life. It explores reforms that can strengthen democratic governance, resilience and solidarity, and enable a more effective EU foreign, security and defence policy, so that the Union can protect its citizens, support partners, and act credibly in a more contested world. Particular attention is paid to reform debates on qualified majority voting and treaty change, rule-of-law conditionality, budgetary capacity, and coordination in sanctions, energy security and defence industrial policy, linking scholarly insights to real world reform agendas.