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Research project

The European ambition: study on the EPP Group's contribution and its impact on the European integration process and on the directly elected European Parliament

The research project, coordinated by the Alcide De Gasperi Research Centre (ADGRC), traced the EPP Group’s institutional, organisational and political trajectory in the European Parliament, focusing on the period after the first direct elections in 1979.

This study was tendered by the European People’s Party Group to assess, with a multidisciplinary approach, the EPP Group’s contribution to and impact on European integration as well as on the European Parliament during the 40 years since its first direct elections. The project was coordinated by Luciano Bardi, part-time professor at the Alcide De Gasperi Research Centre (ADGRC), assisted by Silvia Sassano, Jacopo Cellini and Jan Karremans, research associates at the ADGRC.

The research built on existing literature about the EPP and emphasises recent developments within the European Union. The resulting book consists of five chapters. Departing from key elements of the EPP Group’s history before the first EP elections, the study continues with assessments of the Group’s role in the constitutionalisation of the EU, its approach to EU’s internal and external policies, as well as its positioning in the EU’s institutional and political framework. The five chapters are respectively authored by Wolfram Kaiser, Karl Magnus Johansson, Carine Germond, Wojciech Gagatek and Luciano Bardi. The research team drew on the extensive resources made available by the Historical Archives of the European Union and by the EPP Group’s Archives as well as on documentation provided by the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, together with interviews conducted with key protagonists of the last 40 years of the EPP Group’s existence.

Final conference

The team

Group members

  • Portrait picture of Jacopo Cellini

    Jacopo Cellini

    Research Fellow

    Historical Archives of the European Union

  • Wojciech Gagatek

    University of Warsaw

  • Carine Germond

    Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)

  • Karl Magnus Johansson

    Södertörn University

  • Wolfram Kaiser

    University of Portsmouth

  • Silvia Sassano

Book cover for: The European ambition: the Group of the European People's Party and European integration

The European ambition: the Group of the European People's Party and European integration

This book traces the EPP Group’s institutional, organisational and political trajectory in the European Parliament, focusing on the period after the first direct elections in 1979.

Read more The European ambition: the Group of the European People's Party and European integration
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