The EUSAAP Conference will be held on Monday, June 1st and Tuesday, June 2nd, 2026, at the Hitotsubashi Kodo(Auditorium) in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo. The conference is co-hosted by the EUSAAP, the EUSA-JAPAN, and Hitotsubashi University. For details, please see the following website:
EUSAAP Conference Tokyo 2026 | EUSAAP

Deadline for call for papers: January 16, 2026

In addition, to encourage presentations at this conference, graduate student members and young general members will be provided with a ¥10,000 grant as a presentation incentive. Graduate student members and young general members who present from outside the Tokyo metropolitan area (Tokyo, Kanagawa, Saitama, and Chiba prefectures) will also be provided with a ¥10,000 grant for travel expenses. Please submit your grant application to Kokubo, the International Exchange Committee Chair, between April 1 and 30, 2026.

If you have any questions, please contact Kokubo, the International Exchange Committee Chair.

The 46th Annual Conference Programme

November 8-9, 2024, Shizuoka University
Plenary Session: A Critical Analysis of the von der Leyen Commission II
Plenary Session I Japanese Session
Plenary Session II English Session
Symposium: The EU, AI, and the Digital Age

A Critical Analysis of the von der Leyen Commission II

Ursula von der Leyen was reappointed as President of the European Commission and started her second mandate with a new team of Commissioners on 1 December 2024.
However, through the election year 2024 and the generation of new power and gravity on the globe, Europe seems to face more challenges than those in her first Commission 2019-2024.
On the day of her election to be President, she presented the seven key priorities of the next European Commission, “Europe’s Choice: Political Guidelines for the next European Commission 2024-2029”, to the European Parliament, corresponding to Europe’s many agendas: i.e., prosperity and competitiveness, defence and security, social fairness, quality of life, democracy, and globalization. As Defense Readiness Roadmap 2030 agreed upon in October 2025 by the leaders of 27 Member States has shown, the von der Leyen Commission II seems to have already moved Europe’s policy strategies forward along with the key priorities.  

At the point of time when nearly one year has passed since the von der Leyen Commission started, we stop to examine at the 2025 Conference the results and outcomes her second Commission has brought about with the aim of comparing them with those of her first Commission.
We are pleased to invite Professor Urlich Haltern from the University of Munich, as well as Deputy Minister Thomas Gnocci from the Delegation of the EU to Japan, to the latter part of the plenary session, exclusively conducted in English.

The EU, AI, and the Digital Age

In the era of digitalization, not only the EU but also the rest of the world has pursued digital policies from various perspectives, including researching and inventing new technologies towards a competitive economy, while protecting human rights. The EU has adopted its unique approach towards a digital single market since 2015, encompassing 16 strategies through which it has adopted 28 relevant regulatory tools during the Juncker European Commission.

In 2024, it adopted the AI Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, adopted 13 June 2024), in the context of EU’s unique regulatory tools towards establishing a digital single market.
However, in November 2025, soon after the Conference is closed, the EU released Digital Omnibus Regulation Proposal to make technical amendments to a voluminous set of digital legislation, including the AI Act, for the purpose of bringing relief to businesses etc. as well as stimulating competitiveness. It is observed that this EU’s move has been made in the reflection of deliberations on the issue of digital regulatory framework in the UK and Japan. Each jurisdiction may have offered a legislative model to the others.

The 2025 public symposium of the Conference focuses on the EU’s digital strategies. Some panellists particularly focus on AI regulation from a comparative perspective while the others take some of the digital issues of the EU from broader perspectives.

The 45th Annual Conference Programme

November 2024, Asia University: Days and time will be announced in the first week of April.

Plenary Session: Exploring the role of the EU as a global standard-setter

Plenary Session I    Japanese Session

Plenary Session II  English Session

• EUSAJP invites Mr. Jim Cloos, the Secretary-General of TEPSA (Trans European Policy Studies Association) and a Senior Associate Fellow at the Egmont Institute.   See the following: Post-retirement productions (Starting 1 February 2021)

Symposium: The EU and the economic security

Exploring the role of the EU as a global standard-setter

Recent events such as Brexit and the Russian invasion of Ukraine seem to have revealed the EU’s weaknesses shown by economic populism and Euroskepticism in its Member States. Notwithstanding the above, the EU retains an influential, rule-making power over the global market. Its reach over rule-making has been observed to cover broad areas, including competition policy, environmental protection, food safety, privacy protection, and hate speech regulation. The mechanism of shaping this EU’s influential superpower in rule-making is such that it is naturally developed through the extraterritorial application of EU standards to multinational or foreign enterprises, or EU standards themselves mandate a country where such multinational or foreign enterprises are established to have the same level of EU standards. This can be symbolized by the term “the Brussels Effect.”

In the 2024 plenary session, we will discuss a wide range of issues around the EU’s global regulatory power, including the policy areas that are not sensitive enough to the Brussels Effect.

Symposium: The EU and the economic security

Against the backdrop of the US-China struggle for hegemony, strengthening economic security has become one of the most important agendas in many countries. The European Commission, following the COVID-19 pandemic and Russian invasion of Ukraine, released the EU’s economic security strategy on 20 June 2023, which highlights that the setting up of a common strategic framework for the EU’s economic security is in pressing need, and this should be achieved by the maximization of the EU’s benefits of its economic openness as well as the minimization of the risks from economic interdependence. While some values are shared with G7 member countries, its unique strategy, such as regulating outbound investment by EU enterprises to a certain extent, is justified in ensuring its “strategic autonomy.” Undoubtedly, the future direction and development of the EU’s strategic framework for economic security will significantly impact the third countries, including Japan.

In this regard, the 2024 symposium will pursue various issues relevant to economic security in the EU and other areas of the world.

The 44th Annual Conference Programme

November 25-26, 2023, Aichi University

Plenary Session: Ukraine Issues and the EU

Plenary Session I 13:00-14:50    Japanese Session

Plenary Session II 15:30-17:45   English Session

Symposium: The Fiscal and Monetary Policies of EU and the Euro under the Energy Crisis

Ukraine Issues and the EU

Since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, and as of the end of October 2022, there has been no sign of an end to the Ukrainian conflict and the future is uncertain. During this period, the EU has adopted various measures and published relevant documents. For example, the EU adopted economic sanctions, which were adopted during the Crimean conflict in 2014, and modified them to apply to the current conflict, adopting new measures as necessary. In addition, EU Member States provide assistance to Ukraine in the form of arms transfers, which, by Council decision, takes place under aid measures under the European Peace Facility (EPF). This means that the arms transfers are now an EU budgetary measure and not a constituent country measure. In addition, Sweden and Finland, which had adopted a policy of neutrality, have announced their intention to join NATO and have been accepted. This may lead to a significant advance in the EU’s Common Defense policy in the future. In addition, on April 8, 2022, Ukraine and Moldova were formally recognized as candidate countries for EU membership. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has also had a major impact on energy issues. The European Commission announced in its REPower Plan that it will move forward with its previous policy roadmap to move away from energy dependence on Russia. Even before the invasion of Ukraine began, the EU had been pursuing a wide range of “strategic autonomy” initiatives, from security strategy to digital and cyber, to the Green Deal, and their importance has been increasingly highlighted in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine. Therefore, we would like to discuss the Ukraine issue and the EU, taking into account such a strategic autonomy.

The Fiscal and Monetary Policies of EU and the Euro under the Energy Crisis

The EU economy, which was on the path to recovery from the recession by the COVID-19 pandemic, is facing energy crisis caused by Russian invasion of Ukraine. In response to the economic sanctions by the EU, Russia takes to restrict energy exports. This has led to a sharp increase in energy prices. Therefore, EU member states are experiencing so-called supply shocks. In fact, the inflation rate in EU has jumped nearly 10%. The European Central Bank has made a significant shift from monetary easing to tightening. On the fiscal policy side, targeted support is being sought to prevent inflation. However, there is also a high risk that this could suppress the economy and exacerbate inequality among member states.

EUSA ASIA PACIFIC CONFERENCE 2023

BANGKOK, THAILAND

Thursday 29 & Friday 30 June 2023

Twenty-five Years of EU Studies in the Indo-Pacific: challenges, changes, prospects.

The 2023 EUSAAP annual conference and postgraduate workshop hosted by Chulalongkorn University and EUSA Thailand will celebrate and revisit the state of EU Studies within our region. This past quarter century has seen a number of frameworks introduced spanning from the ASEM format initiated in 1996 to the 2021 EU Indo-Pacific Strategy, and interspersed with the designation of four Indo-Pacific countries as EU Strategic Partners (Japan, Korea, China, India). This conference invites papers that explore these innovations and changing priorities embracing interdisciplinary perspectives – International Relations, Political Science, Law, Economics and History.

Here is the Conference Site