Project Implementation

The Go-EuroMed project is designed to be implemented in 3 stages over a period of 36 months.

Stage 1: The Political Economy of Governance in the Euro- Mediterranean Partnership

Stage 1 will be directed towards improving academic and policy literature concerning the political economy of governance in the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, with the intention of identifying the key areas in which the Barcelona Process can better serve the interests of governments and the needs of citizens. Research will focus on theoretical and empirical analysis of governance issues concerning trade, investment and labour relationships between the EU and south Mediterranean countries. The relationships between these economic institutions and the EMP’s security and sociopolitical goals will be investigated, as will the negotiation processes through which outcomes are reached.

Stage 2: New Challenges

What are the key challenges that the Euro-Mediterranean partnership will face during the next decade? How can the EU and Mediterranean Partner Countries deal with these challenges in order that the Barcelona Process achieves more success in its second decade than in its first? These are the main questions that GO-EuroMed partners will address in the project’s second phase. Five working packages have been designed which deal with the most important challenges ahead: ‘EU Enlargement’, ‘Domestic Reform in Mediterranean Partner Countries’, ‘Regional Integration in the MENA’, ‘Demography, Migration and Culture’ and ‘Geopolitical Change’.

Stage 3: Institutional Strategies

The project’s main objective is to improve scientific and policy level understanding of institutional governance strategies under the Euro-Med Partnership. This entails conducting detailed analysis of institution building and management mechanisms, and testing these models against various legitimacy and efficiency standards. The goal is to identify strategies capable of providing concrete benefits to governments and peoples on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea. For analytical as well as policy reasons, working packages are built around three interlinked institutional settings: domestic, bilateral and multilateral institutions.