Scene@EUC - Newsletter of the European Union Centre in Singapore.
Issue No. 13, June 2012
EU Centre in Singapore is a partnership of
Europe Day/ASEF Exhibition
EUSA-AP Conference
(Above, Left: Dr Yeo, Director, EUC showing ESM Goh Chok Tong around the exhibition on opening day & Above, Right: Tan Qiuyi,
Journalist, MediaCorp speaking with Philipp Aldrup on Europe Day)
The month of May was an eventful one for the EUC, with Europe Day celebrations and the launch
of the Travelling Exhibition on Connected Histories, Shared Future, of which the EUC is an
organising partner. The exhibition, planned to coincide with ASEF’s 15th anniversary, was opened
by Singapore’s Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong at the National Library Building on 17
May. The exhibition is running till 25 June, after which it will move to regional libraries and NUS
and NTU libraries before finishing its run in Vientiane, Laos, during the Asia-Europe Meeting
(ASEM) Summit in November. Members of the public are invited to visit and ‘make a wish’ for the
future of Europe-Asia relations by contributing to a ‘wishing pole’. This can also be done online.
The anniversary of Robert Schuman’s vision for a united Europe is celebrated on 9 May, now
known as Europe Day. The EUC commemorated the occasion with a public dialogue held at the
National Library Building, where about 80 guests showed up despite the early start at 9am. In his
opening speech, EU Ambassador Marc Ungeheuer spoke about the continued and future
significance of the EU to Europe and globally, despite its current economic woes, and highlighted
its importance as a peace project. He noted that the Union’s social dimension has been
instrumental in raising living and welfare standards in its member states. This was followed with a
dialogue between Singapore-based German photographer Philipp Aldrup and Tan Qiuyi (Journalist,
MediaCorp) on the topic of “Photography, memory and cultural diversity”, a topic that also tied in
with EUC’s photography competition which was launched that morning (see below for more
information).
Highlights
Stephanie Anderson
Workshop: Nuclear Safety and
Nuclear Security
EUC Photography
Competition
The EUC hosted the
European Union Studies
Association (Asia-Pacific)
Conference on 4-5 June on
the theme EU’s Unknown
Asia: New Horizon & New
Beginning. A graduates’
workshop followed the
conference on 6-7 June.
The conference
programme is here .
Upcoming Events
For more information and
to sign up for our events,
please click here.
The ASEF-EUC Travelling
Exhibition Connected
Histories. Shared Future at
National Library Building
(9th Floor) to 25 June, and
various locations after
(click here for the
schedule).
Staff Activities
Dr Yeo Lay Hwee, Director
The EU Centre’s Visiting Fellow
from the University of
Wyoming, Assoc Prof Stephanie
Anderson, gave two public
lectures during her time in
Singapore. The first explored
the future of the EU’s Common
Security and Defence Policy
(CSDP) in light of the Lisbon
Treaty, while the second
examined why the EU’s
successful monitoring mission
to Aceh has been so underreported. A teacher’s resource
package was launched by the
EU Centre in conjunction with
these lectures (see below).
The Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung
and the EUC jointly organised a
workshop on 20 April where
nuclear experts from industry,
international and regional
agencies, policy makers and
researchers looked at the
development and debates on
nuclear energy in Asia and
Europe. The discussions and
conclusions highlighted the
importance of regional
cooperation for the right
regulatory framework and
safety regime in the pursuit of
nuclear energy. 2012 (see
report below).
The EUC photography
competition for Southeast
Asian students and youth,
"Imagining the Future: Europe
and Southeast Asia," was
launched on Europe Day.
There are two categories,
open and photo essay, with
prizes totalling approx. $3000.
The judging panel is chaired
by the EU Ambassador to
Singapore, Marc Ungeheuer.
Submissions will be accepted
till 9 August. Information on
the competition can be found
here.
Full reports of all our past events can be found here.
Publications (Click to download)
Panelist at Roundtable on
“EU Foreign Policy After
Lisbon”, organised by LSE,
1 May 2012, London. Dr
Yeo spoke on the subject
EU Foreign Policy: The
View from ASEAN.
The 2nd Macao Int’l Forum
on “Issues of International
Order in East & Southeast
Asia”, 25-29 May 2012. Dr
Yeo presented a paper on
“The European Union and
East Asian Regionalism”.
Loke Hoe Yeong, Policy &
Programme Executive
Researcher, Final
Workshop - ‘After Lisbon:
The EU as an exporter of
values and norms through
ASEM’, 10-14 Apr 2012,
National Center for
Research on Europe,
Christchurch, New Zealand
1. Electricity market integration: EU & ASEAN (working paper)
2. Regional organizations and conflict management (Resource package for teachers)
3. Nuclear Security and Nuclear Safety (workshop report)
4. Regional Health Governance (policy brief)
Event Review
Norman Davies: ‘What non-Europeans don’t always know about European history’
On 23 April, the renowned historian Prof Norman
Davies gave a lecture at NUS organised by the EUC
and the History Department of the Faculty of Arts and
Social Sciences, speaking on the lesser known facets
of European history in a session chaired by the History
Dept.’s A/P Malcolm Murfett. As an authority on
Polish and Eastern European history par excellence,
Prof Davies sought to nuance the prevalent view that
Europeans had been a monolithic band of colonizers
and imperialists abroad. Europeans have themselves
been subjected to colonial rule.
It has indeed been hard for historians to agree on a unified narrative of the history of Europe, Prof
Davies reminded the audience. The project of the Museum of European History in Brussels, for
instance, has consistently run into controversies concerning its contents, threatening to derail the
entire endeavour.
The March 2012 issue of
Asia Europe Journal is a
special issue on
“Leadership, DecisionMaking and Governance in
EU and East Asia”. The
papers in this special issue
were presented at a
workshop in Singapore coorganized by EUC in Nov
2011. You can download
the workshop report here.
Visitors
Dr Thomas Christiansen
EU Centre Visiting Fellow, May-June 2012; Professor of European
Institutional Politics, Maastricht University
Thomas Christiansen teaches predominantly on the Research Masters in
European Studies and the European Public Affairs Masters. He joined the
Department of Political Science in 2010. He is Executive Editor of the Journal
of European Integration and academic coordinator of the Observatory of
Parliaments after Lisbon (OPAL). During his time at the EUC, he will teach
part of the EUC-RSIS summer program.
You can stay in touch and be
informed of the EUC’s
events and activities on
twitter @EUCentreSG or on
Facebook.
Assoc Prof Stephanie Anderson
EU Centre Visiting Fellow, from Apr 2012; Associate Professor of Political
Science at the University of Wyoming
Assoc Prof Anderson was recently a senior fellow at the Free University of
Berlin researching EU security and defence policy, identity-formation, and
crisis management. Her book, Crafting EU Security Policy: In Pursuit of a
European Identity, is based on research undertaken as a Senior Fulbright
Research Scholar at the German Institute for International and Security
Affairs (SWP). She has also published in several journals and edited volumes
including Armed Forces and Society and European Foreign Affairs Review.
Imke Pente
EU Centre Visiting Scholar, Mar 2012
EUC hosted Imke during her stay in Singapore where she conducted
interviews and research for her PhD that she is currently pursuing at the
Berlin Graduate School for Transnational Studies where she is part of the
College Research Group “The Transformative Power of Europe”. She
analyses the regional economic integration process in Southeast Asia, with a
focus on the role of the European Union and the United States in ASEAN’s
policy-making.
European Union Centre in Singapore
11 Slim Barracks Rise, #06-01 Executive Centre, NTU@one-north campus, Singapore 138664.
Phone: (65) 6513 2007, Fax: (65) 6774 1445. Online: www.eucentre.sg