The Brussels Programme on European Foreign Policy aims at bringing together students to learn and critically discuss issues and challenges related to European foreign and external policies. This multidisciplinary summer programme draws on the consolidated partnership between the Centre for Security, Diplomacy, and Strategy (CSDS) of the Brussels School of Governance (VUB) and the University of Southern California (USC), and has been successfully running for fifteen years. While the student body has been so far mainly American, over the past few years we developed the ambition of bringing together a more diversified student body.

The Brussels School of Governance offers various international summer schools, a fact that contributes to the revitalization of the VUB campus outside the traditional teaching period. Bringing together these students has been a strong ambition of this programme. From the welcome reception to the design of the internships, we ensure that this summer programme and our student body mingle and learn from one another. The faculty blends renowed Flemish and international experts in European foreign policy. Capitalizing on its Brussels location and on its consolidated partnership, CSDS has so far offered a strong teaching team, which include academic and policy-pundits alike. By offering lectures and presentations by well-established scholars, think-tankers and civil servants from the European Commission, the European External Action Service and NATO, the programme offers a true immersion in the process of EU foreign and external policy-making.

In the course of this intensive 5-week summer school – which runs from the end of May to the end of June – students have the chance of visiting and attending lectures at the European Parliament, the European External Action Service and NATO.

In addition to attending lectures in the mornings, the students will attend internships during the afternoons at top think tanks and organizations from the socio-economic sector gravitating around the work of the EU. Over the years, students have attended internships at Carnegie Europe, Egmont, GOPA.com, the European Policy Centre (EPC), Politico, Anna Lindh Foundation, the International Cooperative Alliance, Young and Global Partners, UNICA (Network of Universities from the Capitals of Europe), European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE), the Atlantic Treaty Association, the Belgian Royal Military Academy, Dentons Global Advisors, Profila, Solar Power Europe, EU-Cord, The Right Street, and more.