Almost a year after the publication of the Draghi report and the formation of a new European Commission, the 2025 Bruegel Annual Meetings are taking place in an international context that has radically changed. The need for much higher defence spending has swept away Germany’s “debt brake” and led most EU members to request exemptions under the new fiscal rules. The second Trump administration has ended US participation in international climate action and rules-based trade, imposing “deals” that have humiliated the EU and many of its allies and trading partners. In the meantime, the development of AI has accelerated, and the impact of climate change is becoming ever more acute.
The 2025 Annual Meetings also mark Bruegel’s 20th Anniversary. While we would have wished to celebrate at a better moment for Europe and international cooperation, the 20-year horizon seems fitting to ask if and how Europe can adapt to a world that may have turned more nationalist for decades to come, and in which the US may refuse to act as a benevolent hegemon.
Much of the BAM will be devoted to these questions, starting with a spectacular opening panel on Europe and the World in 2045 and followed by landmark sessions on the future of Europe’s defence, its relations with Asia, coalitions for global green action and the future of the international economic order. We will also examine the most pertinent EU reform challenges through sessions devoted to the next EU Multi-Annual Financial Framework, digital productivity growth and EU energy union.
We need as many good minds as we can fit. Please join us, in person or online!