To commemorate Malta’s 20th anniversary of EU membership, the Institute for European Studies at the University of Malta is organising a series of events to run throughout 2024. In 2004, 10 countries joined the European Union, the single largest enlargement in the history of the European Union with Malta and Cyprus constituting the Mediterranean dimension of that enlargement. Over the last twenty years, Malta, and the countries which joined alongside Malta, have experienced membership in different ways, a reflection of the oft-quoted ‘adaptation through national colours’. This conference, and the events linked to it, will take stock of the last twenty years of EU membership and discuss the next twenty years, in terms of Malta as well as the other EU Mediterranean States.

At the centre of the conference will be the launch of the Institute’s Paper Series, a paper series which analyses and discusses various elements of the 20th anniversary, as well as the inauguration of the exhibition to mark this event. The conference will include panels which discuss the Mediterranean member states and their place in the Union, the 2004 enlargement as well as focusing more specifically on Malta and its twenty years of EU membership. Panels will include current and former EU Commissioners, leading academics as well as a special presentation on the voice of young people and what they hope for European integration in the future.

As stated above, the conference will include the launch of the Institute’s Paper Series to mark 20 years of EU membership. Many of the papers focus on Malta’s membership of the EU but papers also discuss the wider issue of EU enlargement as well as the experience of other states that joined in 2004. The intension is to continue adding to this paper series to ensure a consolidated body of work marking this important anniversary. Running in parallel with the conference will be a roaming exhibition which will be on display at the conference and will then move around various schools, libraries and public spaces in Malta and Gozo until the end of the year.

The Registration form and more information are available online.