The European Green Deal provides a high level strategy for sustainable growth across EU member States and beyond, in alignment with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. It combines targets for combating climate change, protecting biodiversity and boosting economic growth with a set of enabler policy initiatives. This panel aims at discussing progress on some of these targets and policies since 2019, finding clear distinctions between those related to the energy transition (Kurze and Davidescu) and those which allegedly should support said transition, namely education for sustainable development and skills for a green economy and green transition (Benjamin and Fernandez Martin). While energy transition measures have taken a relatively high speed, compared to the difficulty of reaching agreements in the past, allowed by the EU competencies in this area, education initiatives seem to become more an afterthought, conditioned by the lack of competencies of the EU and relying heavily on member States cooperation and coordination will. This dichotomy is compounded by the influence of external and internal crises, such as the conflict in Ukraine or the Middle East and their effects on oil and gas prices, or the internal uncertainty in ensuring continuation of policies across electoral periods and national or regional governance levels. This panel continues the efforts of previously funded UACES Networks and builds on the works of the governance of sustainability in Europe and the role of Europe in global challenges, contributing to the debate of European environmental (and related) policy influence in achieving long term sustainability goals.

The energy crisis in the European Union (EU) escalated with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. In addition to rising energy prices, the almost forgotten concern about energy security came into focus, potentially displacing other challenges such as the climate crisis. Against this background, the paper asks to what extent the EU continues with the implementa6on of the European Green Deal (EGD) in this changing geopolitical context. The paper provides a differentiated answer by analysing reactions to the energy crisis across the EU’s multi-level governance system, i.e. the EU level and the national level. It is shown that the energy crisis led to more ambitious climate policies and targets at the EU level, but not necessarily at the national level. The latter will be illustrated empirically by comparing the updated National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs) to be submitted by member states. The following question guides the analysis: To what extent do the NECPs point to an acceleration of the energy transition at the national level? Do member states take into due account the upgraded “Fit for 55” targets? In addition, a specific emphasis will be given to the analysis of so-called “climate laggards” (e.g. Hungary, Poland). Do they still drag their feet? Or does the crisis lead to an alignment of their policies with EU energy and climate policy? Overall, the paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the state of EGD in times of crises.

After championing a green economy agenda aligned with that of the EU (Davidescu, 2021), Romania has recently backtracked on policy developments that were supposed to deliver cheaper electricity prices at times of crisis and contribute to sustainable development commitments. This puts into question its ability to implement commitments under the European Green Deal (EGD) and engage firmly on the path of an energy transition.

This research focuses on the trade-offs between energy security and sustainable energy in the context of the war in Ukraine, while considering the importance of 2024 as an electoral year. We will be looking at the political discourse of the main candidates and using legislative process tracing for energy policy decisions related to renewable energy, to expose the gap between discourse and policy practice. The focus of this research is the recent legislation on the ‘Green House Photovoltaics’ prosumer programme and the offshore wind legislation, which are the most promising policy initiatives for the promotion of renewable energy in Romania since the launch of the EGD.

We will consider the barriers to the implementation of the National Energy and Climate Plan (NECP) and strategic documents such as the Long Term Strategy on offshore development or the Maritime Spatial Planning. We will look at how key political and private sector players have been at odds on these policies, while state owned operators have benefited from record increases in EU funding despite low levels of ambition and poor track record of implementation. At a time when the EU is taking stock of the effectiveness of the EGD after five years, exposing inconsistencies in its implementation in the member states, will allow to understand to what extent its potential as a ‘building block to the European economic model’ (Bongardt and Torres, 2021) can materialise in the energy sector.

For most of the Twenty-First Century, a “material turn” in the humanities and the social sciences has helped to foreground the significance and relevance of the skills, abilities, and motivations to make designed objects well, for the survival of societies and for our abilities for self-understanding and cultural analysis. Other economic and cultural trends in Europe, such as the renewed interest in urban, landscape and building conservation has furthermore brought to light both the lack of well-trained craftspersons in certain countries, e.g., in the Nordics, while at the same highlighting the depth and legacy of the craft training programs useful for national and local conservation efforts, as in the United Kingdom and Italy. The New European Bauhaus (NEB) policy narrative is an exciting attempt to gather together experts and other policymakers into a kind of collegium to advance a new vision of green, sustainable and healthy buildings, place-making and urban planning, announced by Commissioner von der Leyen in 2020 in the context of the European Green Deal. Since the November 2023 decision by member states to not approve the New European Bauhaus Mission, the entire policy is once again called into question and doubts arise as to whether Europe, as a political union, can collaborate in their efforts to formulate and implement a European-wide vision for the sustainable, just and inclusive future of the built and designed world. This paper will review what are the challenges and positive prospects within the New European Bauhaus, and related initiatives, in relation to how the NEB can be a key part of the narrative structures and policy actions to engage with a key, economically marginalized constituency: Craftspersons and their central role in design making and the construction and conservation of the material world.

The European Green Deal (EGD) set as part of its second pillar (Mainstreaming sustainability in all EU policies), two main targets related to education: Mobilising research and fostering innovation (2.2.3) and Activating education and training (2.2.4). The latter and its subsequent policy developments are the focus of this paper. These include the ‘European sustainability competence framework’ and the 'Council Recommendation on learning for environmental sustainability’, both approved in 2022. The EU does not held competencies in education and relies instead on the collaboration between member States. The competency framework aims at achieving harmonisation in the approach to increasing the awareness of citizens on climate change and biodiversity in the hope that it would facilitate the transition to a low carbon economy. But the non-binding nature of the Recommendation and the differing approaches of member States, with gaps and differences among schools and higher education institutions vision for their respective roles, hinder progress towards what is supposed to be a common goal - equipping the citizens of the future with the relevant competencies and sustainable transition skills. EU policies also diverge from the UNESCO approach to Education for Sustainable Development, which poses questions about the pillar of sustainability at the heart of education policy initiatives. With the aid of case studies and discourse analysis, this paper aims to clarify to which extent the EGD provides a sufficiently strong framework to enable harmonisation of member States policies in this area, and hence the progress of the EU as a whole into the sustainable transition path.