Background Information / press

MAASTRICHT REDEFINES EUROPE AGAIN
By Stafford Wadsworth

Forum Maastricht puts the city and its university center-stage once more. Lisbon talked about improving investment in knowledge and networks, with growth and an educational focus. It talked about making European business more competitive and about promoting active aging and keeping the gray tigers at work. The Maastricht Forum is going to define and redefine what has remained inchoate. It will look at Europe’s social model and at the drive towards political and economic integration inherent in enlargement. It will also reflect on the dangers of fortress Europe and the need for a new constitutional base.

These issues, deriving from original proposals launched in Lisbon and Bologna, form the basis of a major conference to be held in Maastricht, July 1. Here we look both at Forum Maastricht, at the key conference players and touch on some of the issues to be raised and their putative solution. [more >]

A new Davos in the making?
By Tsveti Nacheva
 
An ambitious new initiative of Maastricht University - Forum Maastricht - will work for a better understanding of key European issues. Through annual conferences the Forum is hoping to spark a public debate on the future of Europe. The first event scheduled for 1 July 2004 will give the official start to the Dutch Presidency of the EU. The conference Europe 25: A New Chance? will debate the future of the Union and the choices Europe must make to define itself as a leading global player. Crossroads met with the man behind Forum Maastricht, the President of Maastricht University Prof. Dr. Jo Ritzen...[more >]