How Europe Wins

Europe’s ability to “win” in a rapidly changing world will depend on more than industrial strength or faster innovation cycles. It will depend on whether Europe can build the infrastructure of a sovereign society: one that is capable of shaping its own future. This focus topic explores what Europe must design, rebuild, and reimagine to remain master of its own fate: from energy systems that are resilient and interconnected, to data and compute infrastructures that underpin trust and autonomy, to technologies that reinforce rather than undermine the dignity of democratic life.

Developing Europe’s next infrastructure is therefore not only a technical question, but a civilizational one. What does a “good society” in 2026 require in order to thrive? Which technologies expand our collective freedom, creativity, and preparedness—and which ones constrain them? This focus topic challenges us to think beyond short-term fixes and instead to confront the long arc of European futurability: the capacity to anticipate challenges, build strategically, and equip the next generation with the tools needed to shape, not merely endure, the decades ahead.

Europe will not win the future if it cannot act together. The question is no longer whether reforms are needed, but whether Europe can renew the institutional foundations that enable action in the first place. This focus topic explores what it means for Europe to regain the power to decide in a world defined by speed, uncertainty, and geopolitical competition. It pushes beyond the familiar debate about qualified majority voting and examines deeper structural questions: Are we attempting to govern the 21st century with institutions designed for the 17th? What forms of agility, subsidiarity, and accountability must emerge if Europe is to be more than a reactive force in global affairs?

Mobilising Europe’s power to act is not a technical exercise in institutional engineering: It is a question of political imagination and civic courage. What does a renewed European capability look like? How do we build institutions that not only manage crises, but actively enable ambition? And how can Europe cultivate a culture of decision-making that is both democratic and decisive? This focus topic opens a conversation about Europe’s operating system; and what it must become if Europe wishes to lead, not follow.

Budget negotiations may appear technocratic, but they determine Europe’s ability to deliver on its promise. Behind every line of the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) lies a contest over priorities, values, and the meaning of European solidarity. This focus topic examines how Europe allocates its collective resources—and what these decisions reveal about our shared future. Funding Europe’s “new promise” means recognising that investment is not just about money: it is about trust between generations, between member states, and between citizens and their institutions.

At stake is nothing less than Europe’s capacity to act coherently in an era of climate transformation, technological acceleration, and geopolitical instability. How do we build financial architectures that enable long-term resilience rather than short-term compromise? How do we ensure that the allocation of resources strengthens social cohesion instead of eroding it? This focus topic invites a deeper reflection on what Europe chooses to fund, why it matters, and how these choices shape our collective trajectory. To finance Europe’s future is to define what Europe stands for.

This fourth focus topic remains intentionally open and responsive to real-world developments in 2026, allowing the Forum to address the most urgent and meaningful shifts shaping Europe’s position in the world. Yet at its core, it asks a simple, profound question: What does it mean to envision Europe today? Envisioning is not prediction – it is the ability to make sense of complexity, to open spaces for possibility, and to create meaning through collective action.

As Europe confronts new geopolitical realities, societal tensions, and technological disruptions, this focus topic explores how imagination becomes a strategic capability. How do we cultivate the foresight, creativity, and intellectual courage required to navigate uncertainty? And how can Europe move from envisioning to enabling, turning insight into initiative, and possibility into purpose? This focus topic provides the Forum with the flexibility to respond to new events while anchoring the programme in one of EFA’s enduring strengths: the capacity to bring generations together to reimagine the future of Europe.