The Historical Archives of the European Union (HAEU) is delighted to announce the recipients of the 2023 European Court of Auditors (ECA) Postgraduate Research Grants. The annual grant programme was established at the HAEU in 2007 to support primary research on the EU’s public finances and policies, as well as on the development of the EU's accountability.
Rosalba Famà, a PhD candidate at Bocconi University, will receive a grant for her project ‘The constitutional implications of the paradigm shift in the European budgetary galaxy after Covid-19 and the war in Ukraine’. Rosalba’s project hones in on the EU’s practice of issuing debt to finance economic works and recovery. She will consult, among other holdings, the preparatory works of the EEC Treaty, the EC Treaty, and the Maastricht Treaty relevant to European finance and budget and to European monetary union. She will also focus on the role played by the Court of Auditors in protecting the financial interests of the EU.
Dr Lukas Spielberger, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Luxembourg, was awarded a grant for his project ‘Auditing European Public Borrowing’. Lukas’ project is an in-depth inquiry into the institutional development and accountability of European-level public borrowing. He plans to use EU institutional holdings held at the HAEU to study the role and activities of the ECA in scrutinizing the borrowing activities of the European Commission since the 1970s, and the institutional relationship between the ECA and the European Investment Bank.
The historical archives of the Court, as well as those of its predecessor organisation the Audit Board, are held at the HAEU.