Time To Decide Europe Summit 2025

#TimeToDecide25

We are delighted to announce the »Time to Decide Europe Summit 2025«, a one-day conference organised by ERSTE Foundation in cooperation with the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM) that will address some of Europe’s most pressing challenges.

»The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born, now is the time of monsters« – A. Gramsci, 1930 (paraphrase by S. Zizek)

We are living in a time of profound global change. Old certainties are increasingly being turned upside down. Interstate conflicts once consigned to history are flaring up in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and South Asia. Democracy is in retreat, with autocracies now outnumbering democracies for the first time in two decades. The United States, once considered a beacon of democracy and a champion of the rules-based international order, has upended global trade and sought to export its illiberal revolution to Europe. The EU, once a project of peace, is having to find its war footing to deter a Russian aggression without being able to rely on US security guarantees. Europeans are beginning to rethink and rearm, but progress is too slow. As one strategist put it: Europe must muscle up »at the speed of fear.«

Format: There will be three 90-minute panel discussions on concrete questions concerning Europe’s future. Each discussion features eight experts and will be moderated by high-level politicians, who will come together for a concluding panel to discuss key take aways.

Full agenda available on the ERSTE Foundation website.

The event will be held in English only.

If you have any questions, please contact us at events@erstestiftung.org.

Photographs and videos will be taken by ERSTE Foundation during this event and published, inter alia, on the websites and social media channels (Facebook, Instagram, etc.) of ERSTE Foundation and other parties. By participating in the event on 2 December 2025 or entering the event location, you consent to the publication of such photographs and videos, without remuneration and without expressly granting such permission.