Profile of the Center for European Studies, Shandong University

The history of the Center for European Studies, Shandong University, can date back to the mid-1980s when teaching and research on politics of some European states and graduates education in these programmes begun to be conducted in Department of Political Science. The Center for European Studies was officially established in September, 1994 (originally named as West European Institute; changed to its present name in September, 1997). Its aims is to initiate, coordinate and promote European studies as a whole in Shandong University, so as to knowledge, understand and teach the European integration through the perspectives of multiple disciplines and inter-disciplines, as well as by integrating university’s human resources in the research and teaching on European politics, foreign policy, economy, society, law, public administration, history etc.

With ten years of constant efforts, the Center has developed into a quite large research institute which impresses academic circle and enjoys a comparatively high status in European studies in China. In 1997--2001 the Center was selected as one of the eleven research institutes to receive financial support from the EU-China Higher Education Cooperation Programme. Under the newly initiated the EU-China “Center for European Studies Programme”, the Center has become one of the sixteen research centers which are to receive exclusive financial support for the construction and development. Meanwhile, through participating in university-level research programmes, serving for governments and enterprises and cooperating with European institutes, our Centre has stronger capacity to operate more research and teaching activities.

       Organizational Structure  The Center is an institution at university level co-supervised by School of Political Science and Public Administration, Foreign Affair Office and Social Science Office. The director of Center is Dr. Wang Xueyu.

Apart from its own office and library the Center possesses six research sections, including the EU Law Research Center (with Law School), Germany Issue Research Center (at Ocean University of China), European Politics Research Section and European Safety and Foreign Policy Research Section (both are with Political Science and Public Administration School), European Economy Research Section (with Economics School), European Social Policy Research Section (with Political Science and Public Administration School and Philosophy and Social Development School), and European History, Thinking and Culture Research Section (with History and Culture School and Philosophy and Social Development School)

       Personnel and the Dependent Disciplines  The Center is composed of more than thirty research and teaching members mainly from Political Science and Public Administration School, Economics School, History and Culture School and Law School.

The composition of research members within Shandong University is as follows: ten persons researching on European Politics----political system, integration theories, relations between member states, safety and foreign policy and party politics, three on the EU’s public governance, three on the EU’s law, five on the European economy, three on the European integration history, and four on the European thinking and culture. The last group is with specialized subjects of the European philosophy, politics, sociology and religion studies.

The Center possesses twelve part-timers outside the University. Two of them are in other province who research on European politics and economy, while five of them are in Shandong Province (three are at China Ocean University and two are at Shandong Normal University).

Academic Focus  The Center is involved in various research areas of the European integration, focusing on basic theory studies, comparative studies and applied research contributing to China’s development and China-EU cooperation. It is mainly characterized by research on European politics and integration theories.

       Firstly, the research on the European integration and the EU itself focuses on such areas as the changing political order of Europe, European integration theories, European foreign policies and the international impacts, the EU’s public policy and governance, European political parties and thinking, history of European integration, the EU’s law, constitution drafting and the European integration, as well as the European economic integration.

       Secondly, the comparative research between the EU and China, it explores the European experience in the development and indicates its referential significance for Chinese modernization process. The research focuses on drawing on the experience of the European social security system to promote Chinese government’s policies of the social development, studying European macro-economic development policies and its industrial policies so as to promote Chinese economic development, studying comparatively the EU and China in administration and public administration to contribute to the construction of law system in China, and indicating the referential significance of the EU’s practice in sustainable development for the Chinese strategy for development.

       Thirdly, the research on the European integration in the framework of international politics and economy, aims at having a good knowledge of the interaction between developments of the EU and the world. It includes the relations between the European integration and the new changes in international politics, the relations of European integration and recent development of international relations theories, comparative study on regional cooperation, and understanding the relations between globalization and the European integration.

European Issues Teaching and Courses Offered  In Shandong University, European issues teaching is important in the teaching system. Many courses on European issues fall into compulsive subjects of related undergraduates and graduates. As for undergraduate courses, European Politics and International Relations is offered for international politics major; Introduction to EU Law for law major: European Economy for world economy major; Modern and Contemporary European History for history major; and European Civilization History for philosophy major. At the graduate level the courses have been offered in above specialties and European studies have become the main research programmes. In recent years, the Center has organized to offer to students all over the University a selective course of World Politics and Great Powers Relations, some contents of which are the European integration and the EU’s foreign policies.

Academic Achievements and Publications  Since its establishment, the Center has undertaken and completed many research programmes on European studies, which are not only basic theories and comparative study, but also the research serving to economic and social development. These programmes include the EU’s political system, European welfare system and social policies, European integration theories, European environment politics, the EU’s industrial policies, European social democratic parties, comparative study on Shandong Province,China, and Bavaria, German, as well as on Shandong Province and European medium and small-sized enterprises.

Between 1998 and 2002 the Center completed European Studies series which were published by Shandong Publishing House. The title of each volume is as follows: The Developing European Union, A Study of Theories and Practice in the Early Period of European Integration, A Study of European Integration Theories and Practice in Contemporary Times, Selected Readings on European Integration and History, A Study of European Green Parties, etc. Recently the members of the Center has also had a lot of articles published in some famous journals home and abroad, including Future (in English), European Studies, World Economy and Politics, Modern International Relations, Industrial Economics, Economics Studies, World History, Philosophy Studies, Literature, History and Philosophy. Just in the last two years the members had six articles published in European Studies alone, dealing with European politics and integration theories.

Each year the Center prints 2 to 3 issue of European Studies Forum, which mainly publishes working papers and digests of research programmes of the members.

Academic Activities  The Center’s research sections mainly undertake daily academic research and other academic activities related to various aspects of European integration. An annual meeting of the Center is held regularly, making interdisciplinary explanations of contemporary developments in politics, economy, culture and society as well as primary theoretical issues of European integration, and making research plans for the next year. At the same time, the Center’s previous academic activities are summarized and the future academic activities are also arranged in advance on the Center’s annual meeting.

Besides its annual meeting, the Center runs a variety of events year round including workshops, conferences, seminars, and lectures. For example, the academic conference of Chinese Society for EU Studies (CSEUS) in 1999, a seminar on the Europe and international relations in 2001, a seminar on Europe and Middle East in 2002, and a seminar on the status quo and future of the relationship between Europe and United States, all of the above academic activities were held by the Center.

The Center invites and receives professors from both home and abroad in the fields of Europe studies every year, providing opportunities for the faculties of the Center to have discussion meetings with them and for the students to attend lectures given by them.

The Center often sponsors seminars on important Europe issues and the relations between Europe and the world in collaboration with related schools and forums at Shandong University, often well attended and welcomed by research fellows, teachers, and graduate students.

International Cooperation  Academic connections with some schools, departments and European Studies institutions at Tilburg University, Holland, Auhus University, Demark, Manchester University, Britain, Stockholm University and Umea University, Sweden, University of Vassa, Finland, including the programmes of personnel exchange.

Three researchers are doing research works on EU’s foreign policy, EU’s governance and its enlargement to central and eastern European countries respectively at Manchester University, Cambridge University, Britain and Free University Berlin, Germany.

The Center is cooperating with Tilburg University of Holland and currently four graduate students from the Center is cross-registering for courses at Tilburg University, and under the directions of faculty advisors at Tilburg. The Center is also conducting a collaborative research program with Tilburg University on the policies of industry and taxes.

Blueprints for Future Activities  The general aim of the Center’s is to become one of excellent European studies institutions in China with its character and a sustainable developing capability, and develop the curriculums in European topics into best courses at Shandong University. To realize this, the Center plans to expand its teaching and research teams through training, cooperative research, curriculum development etc; beginning from the next academic year it will hold each year four courses of lectures on “EU and the world”, publish a series of works of “European Politics and EU’s Governance”; it will improve and develop new courses on European Studies, and establish the standard teaching model.