The study of national interests of the European Union Member States and their advocacy in the EU institutions is the main theme of the six-year-long project "Czech Republic in the European Union: Position and advocacy of national interests", financed by the Ministry of Education and Physical Education of the Czech Republic. The project involves two teams, one from the Department of Political Social Science, Faculty of Law, Palacký University in Olomouc, headed by Doc. PhDr. Vlastimil Fiala, PhD., and one from the Department of Political Science and European Studies, Philosophical Faculty, Palacký University, headed by Doc. PhDr. Pavel Šaradín, PhD.
The principal goal of the international conference is the presentation of partial outcomes of the project and their confrontation with similar foreign research projects. The conference sections will deal especially with theoretical approaches to the study of national interests in the EU and the development and advocacy of national interests of the Visegrad Group and other Member States in the EU institutions.
The organizers would like to invite mainly leading specialists from Central and Western Europe, who address the theoretical approaches to national interests in the EU, while a special panel with several Members of the European Parliament from the Visegrad countries is designed to provide a more practical insight into the promotion of national interests in the European Parliament and other EU institutions.
The international conference is comprised of two main parts. During the first two days, we will be discussing the key issues of national interests and their advocacy in the Visegrad and other EU Member States in pre-specified panels (please see below). The last day of the conference will be dedicated to young scholars in order to enable them to present their professional views. Their proposals will be divided into several open panels.
All contributions will be published in a conference volume.