Public Policy Currents

Desmond Dinan, a professor in the School of Public Policy, has been appointed a Visiting Professor at the Natolin (Warsaw) campus of the College of Europe, a prestigious graduate school that offers a highly-prized master’s degree in European Studies. Students at the Natolin campus, and at the College of Europe’s other campus, in Bruges (Belgium), come from every European country. They reside in the College for a year before continuing their graduate studies in their home institutions or moving into the workplace, often in the European Union’s institutions in Brussels, Luxembourg, or Strasbourg. The College does not have any full time professors of its own. Instead, it has Visiting Professors who come to the College for short periods from their home institutions. Dinan, who holds a Jean Monnet Chair at George Mason, which was awarded to him by the European Commission in Brussels, is one of only two professors in the U.S. to have an appointment at the College. He will teach a core course, “Politics and Policies of the European Union,” at the Natolin campus each fall semester, while continuing to teach in SPP.

Dinan is no stranger to Poland, having lived there in 1985-1986 before moving permanently to the United States from his native Ireland. He taught at the Bruges campus of the College for two years, from 1998-2000, while living in The Netherlands, during a leave from SPP. A leading authority on transatlantic relations, the European Union, and international commerce, Dinan is also the author of nine books on European affairs. He has been widely published in leading academic journals and regularly makes presentations at major conferences on the social, economic, and political ramifications of Europe’s evolution into a unified bloc. Dinan is also the director of the International Commerce Program at SPP. In 1987, he received the first European Community curriculum development grant ever awarded in the United States, which helped establish SPP as an important clearinghouse for European Union affairs. He has received the George Mason University Student Government “Professor of the Year” Award for Excellence in Instruction.

For further information about the College, visit www.coleurop.be.