The European Institute of Romania (EIR) is a public institution whose mission is to provide expertise in the field of European Affairs to the public administration, the business community, the social partners and the civil society.
Studies, training, translation and communication are EIR’s key areas:
- conducting studies and policies and strategy analyses to support Romania’s development within the European Union, and exercising its attributes as a Member State;
- organizing training activities in the domain of European Affairs;
- coordinating the translation and the linguistic and legal revision of the pre-accession acquis, of the ECHR case-law, of Romanian documents of legal nature, and setting up a consistent terminology;
- stimulating public debates on European issues.
Brief history
The European Institute of Romania (EIR) started its activity in January 2000 as an organization established with the purpose to provide support to the decision-makers during Romania’s EU accession negotiation process. From the moment of its establishment, the Institute aimed at becoming an influential forum, involved in the process of raising the awareness of the Romanian society, in particular the political environment and the academia, regarding the main evolutions in the extremely complex and dynamic framework of the European Union.
After 1 January 2007, following Romania’s accession to the EU, the EIR shifted its strategic focus on the new priorities arising from Romania’s EU membership. These priorities refer mainly to the role, positions and possible alliances Romania might assume on the European scene, emphasizing the need for a deep examination at national level of the evolutions of the EU institutional framework and of the community policy-making framework.
Nowadays, the EIR functions as a public institution under the coordination of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The projects coordinated by EIR are focused on strengthening institutional capacity, and on developing specific expertise in the field of European affairs. The views presented by EIR are independent from the orientations of any public or private bodies and from the visions promoted by the political parties, interest groups or ideological movements.
EIR started out as a PHARE project and fully benefited from the financial and technical support of the program in the first three years of activity. The PHARE assistance was gradually reduced over the next two years, and from 2006 EIR’s specific activities were financed from the state budget. Under the current legal framework, the financing of EIR’s operating and capital expenditure is covered from public budget allocations and own revenue. The Institute’s team is currently made up of approximately 36 employees: experts in European studies, in training and communication, translators, revisers and administrative personnel.
The specific activities of EIR lead to the following achievements (end of the year 2024):
Research in European Affairs:
- 47 pre-accession impact studies (PAIS) conducted with the purpose to formulate policy recommendations for the decision-makers involved in the negotiation process;
- 69 strategy and policy studies (SPOS) focused on the European agenda, with the aim to examine in depth topics of European interest and their implications for Romania;
- 52 Working Papers and 16 Policy Briefs on European topics, written by Romanian or guest foreign experts;
- 74 issues of the Romanian Journal of European Affairs, the first review in Romania focused on European affairs;
- 120 bilingual editions of EIR’s Newsletter;
- 3 pan-European networks (TEPSA, EPIN, and Schuman Network) that EIR is part of and wherein it periodically communicates its insights and national views on European topics.
Training in European Affairs:
- approx. 480 in-person or online training programmes and courses, designed to develop the capacity of the public administration to adequately respond to the challenges of the European integration;
- approx. 11 744 trainees (civil servants and other employees of the central and local administration, as well as other interested socio-professional categories).
Communication in European Affairs:
- 322 conferences, round tables, debates and seminars organised with a view to stimulate – at the national level – a substantive public debate on European issues;
- 10 editions of the EIR Excellence Awards;
- approx. 3 500 specialised publications accessible to the wide public through EIR’s Documentation Centre.
Translations:
- More than 158 000 pages of the Official Journal – primary and secondary legislation and more than 21 400 standard pages of case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Union;
- More than 40 000 standard pages of the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR);
- More than 3 250 standard pages in the domain of human rights at the UN level;
- More than 2 million translation units in the Translation Memories;
- More than 56 publications and syntheses in the field of linguistics and/or to make known the EU’s acquis and the ECHR’s case-law;
- More than 34 800 validated terminological entries, available to the broad public on EIR’s website.