Since 1989, the cultural integration of Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries into the European cultural space has been widely understood as a process of reconnection and mutual rediscovery. Yet this process has been uneven, shaped by the relative marginalization of culture within the broader trajectories of democratization and Europeanization, which often prioritized political and economic reforms over cultural agendas. As a result, cultural narratives and modes of representation in the CEE region have frequently remained underexplored. This paper examines cultural representation in Central and Eastern Europe through three interrelated dimensions: (1) the Europeanization of internal and external cultural agendas, (2) the democratization of the cultural sector, and (3) the politicization of cultural discourse in the context of emerging post-1989 cultural narratives. Particular attention is paid to the notion of just cultural representation within the European Union and to the evolution of cultural governance mechanisms in the post-1989 period. By analysing the interaction between cultural policy frameworks and narrative construction, the paper seeks to illuminate how cultural representation in the CEE region has been shaped, contested, and institutionalized. It argues that these dynamics are central to understanding both the opportunities and limitations of broader European cultural integration and contribute to ongoing debates on cultural governance, representation, and inclusion within the EU.

A growing number of subregional groups influence EU policymaking as platforms of information exchange, expertise pooling, or compromise-building. Yet, our understanding of how they function at both political and working levels across policy fields remains limited, despite some recent advances regarding the impact of crises on them. This paper seeks to alleviate this knowledge gap by proposing a new typology of subregional actorness based on the presence of political will to cooperate and the similarity of national policy interests. It uses the Visegrad Group’s activities across different policy fields such as agriculture, enlargement, economic policy, foreign affairs, migration, as well as security and defence, to show how subregional cooperation looks like in each of the four proposed modes of actorness. The analysis suggests that the quality of top politicians’ personal relationships with each other and the presence of horizontal political differences of strategic importance are the most influential factors shaping subregional actorness, but the impact of policy crises and the history of close cooperation in a given policy field are also important.

Economic considerations have long played a central role in explanations of Euroscepticism, yet much of the literature emphasises structural economic conditions or individual-level material interests. This article examines economic Euroscepticism as a politically constructed phenomenon shaped by elite communication and party competition. Focusing on Hungary – an EU member state that has remained a net beneficiary of EU funds while experiencing increasingly confrontational government rhetoric toward the European Union – the study analyses how economic evaluations of EU membership have evolved during the first half of the 2020s. The empirical analysis draws on four waves of nationally representative public opinion surveys conducted between 2021 and 2025, combining longitudinal descriptive analysis with multivariate regression models. The findings reveal a substantial increase in economic Euroscepticism over time, driven primarily by attitudinal change among government supporters. Party preference emerges as the strongest and most stable predictor, while sociodemographic factors display weaker and inconsistent effects. The results suggest that economic Euroscepticism in Hungary is shaped less by economic fundamentals than by sustained political framing and elite cueing, highlighting how economic arguments can contribute to the politicisation of EU membership even in beneficiary member states.

The problem of foreign interference is of the most discussed issues in European security, together with often interchangeable concepts like foreign influence, misinformation, or hybrid warfare. It has found its firm place in security strategies documents of EU, NATO, and their individual member states, and has been discussed, often critically, in academic literatures. This panel will analyse how different European actors – EU institutions as well as multiple Member States, respond to the problem of foreign interference. Adopting different versions of constructivist approaches and narrative methodologies, the papers will provide for an interesting comparison in terms of: (a) how the very notion of foreign interference is understood and used in political discourse, (b) how this translates into the portrayal of particular actors or policies, as well as (c) what implications does this have for the construction of self-identity in official narratives. Together, the papers will add to the understanding of foreign interference at two levels. First, as a contested concept with multiple variations across different European contexts. Second, as a useful foil for a broader theoretical debate about the relationship between narrative, identity, and threats in contemporary European studies.