EUROPE

European University Institute, Florence

:: Overview
:: Research
:: Practical information

Overview

The European University Institute (EUI), which was founded by the European Community member states in 1972, is one of the largest graduate training programs in Europe in the areas of Economics, Law, Political and Social Sciences, and History and Civilization. EUI employs about 50 faculty, 60 post-doctoral fellows, and 330 Ph.D. students in these areas of specialization.

The research areas represented by the Department of Political and Social Sciences are

- Comparative political sociology
- Comparative politics
- Comparative social institutions and inequality
- European integration
- International relations
- Public policy, and
- Social and political theory

The Economics Department specializes in labor economics, econometrics, microeconomic theory and analysis, and macroeconomics and economic policy. The Department of Law specializes in the impact of globalization on international law and human rights, the impact of constitutionalization and enlargement of the EU, and the Europeanization of private law.

The Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, a research center at EUI founded in 1992, conducts interdisciplinary research on contemporary challenges faced by the European Union. Some of the research questions the Center addresses are:

-What are the major political, social and economic challenges in contemporary Europe?
- How do developments in different European countries compare and contrast with each other?
- How do European countries interact with
each other?
EUI faculty research

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Research

Research areas at a glance

RESEARCH AREA
Comparative and domestic institutional evolution	Colin Crouch, Donatella Della Porta, Adrienne Heritier, Martin Rhodes, Philippe Schmitter, Marie-Ange Moreau, Helen Wallace
Education	Jaap Dronkers
| Family structure	Jaap Dronkers
Historical evolution of inequality
Immigration	Andrea Ichino
Labor market inequality	Andrea Ichino, Rick van der Ploeg, Martin Rhodes, Philippe Schmitter, Marie-Ange Moreau
Political and civic participation	Donatella Della Porta, Adrienne Heritier
Racial/ethnic disparities and race relations
Urban poverty and spatial segregation

Economics Department

Andrea Ichino
Research areas: economic impact of migration; flexibility and rigidity of labor markets; intergenerational social mobility

Rick van der Ploeg
Research areas: the economics of the welfare state, labor markets and the environment

Department of Political and Social Sciences

Colin Crouch
Research areas: comparative European sociology and industrial relations; economic sociology; contemporary issues in British and European politics; processes of institutional innovation in the economy and in public policy

Donatella Della Porta
Research areas: Social movements; political violence; terrorism; corruption; police, and policies of public order

Jaap Dronkers
Research areas: issues in stratification and social mobility; causes and consequences of unequal educational and occupational attainment; the effect of divorce on children; comparison of public and religious schools based on PISA data

Adrienne Héritier
Research areas: new types of governance in Europe; the deregulation and re-regulation of the utilities sector; changing legislative processes in the European Union.

Martin Rhodes
Research areas: European Union social and labor market policy; industrial, employment and welfare policies in European countries; Italian politics

Philippe Schmitter
Research areas: comparative politics; regional integration in Western Europe and Latin America; the transition from authoritarian rule in Southern Europe and Latin America; the intermediation of class, sectoral and professional interests; the political characteristics of the emerging Euro-polity; the consolidation of democracy in Southern and Eastern countries; the possibility of post-liberal democracy in Western Europe and North America

Department of Law

Marie-Ange Moreau
Research areas: evolution of social actors (union organizations, collective bargaining at European level, coordination with national level); the construction of citizenship (anti-discrimination legislation; mobility of people within the EU); development of transnational rules within the EU

Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies

Helen Wallace
Research areas: evolution of European Union institutions and the ongoing process of European integration

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Datasets and library access

Information on statistics available through the EUI library can be found at the library’s virtual Reference Desks and the reference librarians.

Inequality Fellows will need to be registered with EUI so they receive the library barcode number necessary to access these datasets. The Inequality program will assist Fellows in registering as visiting students with EUI’s Academic Services.

Tegelaars Michiel (michiel.tegelaars@iue.it), the librarian who can register Inequality Fellows for access to datasets, will be informed of our Fellows’ visit by the Inequality program. He may then connect Fellows with the library secretary Beatrice Mohrlok at Beatrice.mohrlok@iue.it, who can prepare a library card before our Fellows start their research at EUI.

Research seminars

The departmental websites provide information on their events schedules. For information on writing groups, email Neal Walker, Dean of Studies, at Neal@iue.it.

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Practical information

Accommodation

The EUI’s Housing Office, managed by Lucia Matteucci (lucia.matteucci@iue.it), is the best resource for Inequality Fellows to find accommodation in Florence. The Housing Office maintains a web page that Fellows can consult for housing offers. Inequality Fellows can get the password to this database from Lucia Matteucci.

The Housing Office advises students to search the housing database first and then ask them to set up appointments to look at the accommodation they found on the web before taking a decision. The monthly cost of a room was between 300 to 400 euros in 2004. Students are advised to ask landlords for a written note confirming rental period and cost.

Health insurance

The U.S. Department of State provides extensive information on health insurance for Americans traveling abroad.

Office space and computer access

EUI cannot provide Inequality Fellows with office space. Students will need to bring their own laptop, which they can plug into the library’s network connection.

Timing

The EUI fall term starts at the beginning of October and ends in mid December. The spring term runs from January to mid-June. The best time for Inequality Fellows to do research at EUI is between October and early July. EUI is closed for the Italian August holidays (“ferie d’agosto”).

Transportation

A monthly bus pass for Florence was 31 euros in 2004. The fastest train to Rome takes about one and a half hours. For a list of low-cost airlines operating in Europe, visit http://www.discountairfares.com/lcosteur.htm . To print out a location on a map, go to http://www.mappy.com./

Visa information

US citizens who stay in Italy as tourists for less than 90 days do not need a visa to enter Italy. For the latest visa-related information, visit the websites of the U.S. Department of State and the Italian Embassy in Washington, DC.

(Sources: EUI’s website summer 2004 and Katherine Newman and Katrin Križ’ site visit in spring 2004)

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