In her policy paper, Benedetta Milani discusses the trade agreement between the EU and the South American trade bloc Mercosur. Trade between the EU and Mercosur will have to wait some time before it is approved, because the agreement must be backed by the national parliaments of the 27 EU Member States and the 4 Mercosur partner countries (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay).

As part of the Café Evropa debate cycle, one of the discussions took place on the relationship and approach between the European Union and China. Among those invited were Magdaléna Slezáková, Ondřej Wagner, David Gardáš and Zdeněk Beránek. You can read a summary of the outputs of individual guests in the report written by our intern Eliška Prostřední.

Lucia Rybnikárová writes in her paper on effective EU foreign and security policy about the need to have a strategic vision of the EU to the world and the political will and commitment of the member-states.

Tomasz Żornaczuk writes that Russia's aggression in Ukraine has led to major changes in EU enlargement in 2022. The most significant of these was the change in the Union's geographical position after Ukraine and Moldova were granted EU candidate status and Georgia was granted the prospect of accession. The move seemed almost impossible a few weeks before it became the new political reality in June 2022.

Orsolya Ráczová writes that it is difficult to predict the long-term effects of war with certainty, yet it is essential to be aware of the fact that the longer a war continues, the more dire its long-term impact becomes. The era of relative peace and stability in Europe is over, security should no longer be taken for granted. Europe needs to rethink its security at EU, NATO and Member State level. It is also essential to strike the right balance to ensure security at home while providing much-needed support to Ukraine.

Miroslava Pisklová writes about a discussion on potential broadening of the qualified majority voting (QMV) system to more of the remaining policy areas in the Council of the EU in which it is not yet used, namely the EU´s Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) that has recently gained momentum. This publication aims to analyse the advantages and disadvantages of introduction of the QMV in CFSP of the EU with a focus on the potential impact on smaller member states.

Ivana Uličná writes about the fact that even though some progress has been made towards gender equality in diplomacy, women remain underrepresented in ambassadorial positions worldwide. Quotas have been effective in boosting nominal representation of women but critiques focused on quotas being tokenistic and harming meritocracy place a double burden on women. However, even the current system is not meritocratic, as men benefit from a historical advantage and assumed competence, while women must justify their presence, prove their worth and disprove gender stereotypes.

Rozálie Wünschová writes in her blog that the Czech Republic is one of only two EU countries where corporal punishment of children is still legally permitted. Together with Slovakia, this puts the Czech Republic behind not only the Nordic countries, where corporal punishment was banned in the last century but also countries such as Turkmenistan, which adopted protective legislation in 2007.

In September 2022, the European Commission put forward a proposal for a new media regulator - the European Media Freedom Act. Slovenia is one of the most struggling EU countries in terms of media freedom and independence. In the summer of 2020, the Janša government proposed a media-focused law that would increase the state's influence over Slovenia's national press agency and limit its funding of the public broadcaster RTV. Has Slovenia's new law put the European Commission ahead of the game? That is what our intern Klára Landová discusses in her blog.

A policy paper by our research intern Silke Maes entitled "EU Platform workers' directive: A test for regulating the future of work" takes a closer look at the aforementioned Directive on improving working conditions at work through platforms. The paper details the impact of the development of platforms on working conditions and then argues that the Directive is the first EU attempt to respond to this development.

Ferenc Németh, a researcher on the politics, security and integration of the Western Balkans, has written a policy paper under the project Think Visegrad in Brussels. In it he examines Serbia's foreign policy towards the European Union after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

How has the Covid-19 pandemic affected the Czechs' relationship with the European Union? This topic is addressed in a policy paper by visiting fellow Mare Ushkovska.