Burst the Bubble - a podcast on European Affairs

Quels sont actuellement les défis majeurs pour l’Union européenne? Quelle doit être l’approche de l’UE pour les aborder? Dans cet épisode nous nous pencherons sur les enjeux majeurs internes et externes auxquels l’Europe doit faire face et apporter des réponses unies. Par conséquent, nous arrivons à la question récurrente de la construction d’une identité europénne commune et de son élaboration.

Selon Enrico Letta, ancien premier m...

The EU institutions are battling over the level of the long-term budget, in jargon the MFF (Multi-annual Financial Framework), in the post-Brexit years. The European Council, convened in a special session on 20th and 21th February, failed to reach an agreement over the level of spending, being torn between so-called "Friends of Cohesion" and "Frugal Countries". While the Commission urges EU leaders to finalise a deal in quick time,...

Introducing to you the first episode of Pills of Knowledge, our new series dedicated to provide brief and accessible factual information on the most important political processes taking place in the EU institutions. Our first topic is the Conference on the Future of Europe, a high-flying, 2-year long, quasi-public consultation process about the direction the European Union should take in the coming years. The Conference hopes to pr...

This week on Burst the Bubble, we continue our conversation on communicating Europe and bridging the gap between citizens and institutions. This time we take the point of view of the European Commission, which, under Ursula von der Leyen, has committed to bring new impetus to the democratic process and citizens' involvement in EU affairs. Our guest is the former Chief Spokesperson of the Juncker Commission, now Vice-President of th...

This week on Burst the Bubble, we sit down with Politico Europe's former Political Editor, Ryan Heath (who is now Senior Editor at Politico in Washington), to discuss information in the EU. Politico Europe is one of the few news sources which centres entirely on the politics of the EU and its member states, giving them a unique perspective from which to divulge into the complexity of communicating the Europe. (19 November 2019)

Int...

This week on Burst the Bubble, we’re talking all things agriculture in the EU. Primarily, what are the challenges of the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP)? In today’s episode we will explore the EU’s increasing role in reforming agricultural policy to respond more closely to societal concerns. Following that, we will hear from Paolo De Castro MEP, Vice-Chair of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development under the (now conclud...

The European rules on economic governance and fiscal discipline are an endless source of tension between populist leaders and Brussels. But is relaxing those rules a feasible response for the European institutions to manage populists' claims?
Few weeks ago, during the run-up to the elections, we interviewed the Commissioner Pierre Moscovici to discuss about this, the state of the European democracy and possible ways towards its...

Climate breakdown: why has it become such an important topic? We will first discuss the current climate crisis and the EU’s role in tackling it. We’ll then hear from MEP Molly Scott Cato about how the way we spend our money can have an impact on the state of the environment. She’ll be telling us about how the EU can make a difference in the transition towards a green economy. (15 May 2019)

Presented by: Susanna Garside and Sébastia...

What is populism? Is it a societal illness to eradicate? Or is it the solution to our current economic, cultural and political crisis? In this first episode of our mini-series on populism, we try to define populism with the former Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni and the French political scientist Marc Lazar. (8 May 2019)

Presented by: Eugenia Brandimarte, Stefano Cabras and Giovanni Manzoni
Produced by: Giulio Gipsy Cres...

In this episode we talk about gender mainstreaming – in other words, how the EU takes gender equality into account across policy areas. We hear from Vera Jourova, the European Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, and Dr Toni Haastrup, a researcher on EU external policies. We also speak to Jeanne Ponte, parliamentary assistant at the European Parliament and founder of the MeTooEP movement.
This gender-themed ...

On 12th September 2018, the European Commission presented a regulation on preventing the dissemination of terrorist content online. Next Wednesday, 17th April 2019, the European Parliament will express its opinion on the regulation. NGOs are worried about the impact of this legislation on the rights of internet users and on the potential abuse of pre-emptive censorship. We discuss the main criticisms to the Terrorist Content Regula...

Today we introduce our mini-series on how the EU is influencing the use of the internet. In this episode we analyse the European regulation on data protection, the GDPR. With our guest Arthur Messaud, legal and political analyst at the French advocacy group "la Quadrature du Net", we explore the link between the GDPR and the GAFAM, the top 5 companies operating in the digital market. (11 April 2019)

Presented by: Anne Malavaud and ...

Today we talk about European elections. In the first section, we focus on the role of the European Parliament and the Spitzenkandidat process in the selection of the next President of the Commission. Later, you will hear an extract of our interview with the President of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani, produced in collaboration with the magazine La Voix du College. (27 December 2018)

Presented by: Alexandra Nouvel and Susy G...

For our first episode, we have been joined by Tony Connelly, Europe Editor at RTE, Ireland's national public broadcaster. On Tuesday 13 November 2018, Tony Connelly was the first journalist to report on the conclusion of a draft agreement between the EU and the UK. Throughout the episode we talk about Brexit, the Irish border and what it all really means. (15 November 2018)

Presented by: Erica Duffy
Produced by: Giulio Gipsy Cr...