Independent analysis on European policy, integration, and democratic governance.
Applebaum mapped the threat. Draghi mapped the response. Krastev does something different and equally necessary — he maps the terrain itself. Before we can defend or build, we need to understand what kind of moment we are actually living through. This lecture is about understanding.…
The day after Anne Applebaum asked whether Europeans recognise their own moment, Mario Draghi told them exactly what to do about it. Accepting the Charlemagne Prize in Aachen on 14 May 2026, Draghi delivered not an acceptance address but a strategic blueprint: complete the single…
On 13 May 2026, historian Anne Applebaum took the floor at Vienna's Judenplatz to ask whether this is truly "the European Moment" — and whether Europeans themselves even recognise it. Her answer was neither comfortable nor defeatist: a precise, historically grounded challenge to understand what…
