A new survey gauges the Brussels community's views on the EU's handling of the pandemic and the future of Europe after COVID-19.
Despite a bumpy start, the Brussels community is, overall, satisfied with how the EU handled the coronavirus outbreak. And although respondents understand the Council's and Commission's reshuffling of their policy agendas for the sake of immediate crisis management, a majority believes the Green Deal should remain a top priority, including for the current German Council Presidency.
Those are some of the main findings of an online survey conducted by the
Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS), the European Policy Centre (EPC), and
ifok in July 2020.
Members of the Brussels policy community also indicated they have high hopes for the Conference on the Future of Europe but are at the same time sceptical about whether or not it will lead to actual change. Many agree that deeper integration is needed, but realise that it will be difficult to achieve.
The pool of respondents to the survey, which focused on the EU's handling of the pandemic and the future of Europe after COVID-19, included a high number of members of European institutions and think tanks in Brussels, as well as business representatives, plus a smaller proportion of diplomats, NGOs, journalists, and academics.
This report outlines the preliminary results of the survey and will be followed in late September by a more detailed analysis. Whereas the present report derives its data exclusively from the online survey, the final paper will also incorporate findings from semi-structured interviews.
Read the full paper here.