Online Course

The elections of 2024 and the future of the transatlantic relationship

Teacher:

- John A. Scherpereel

Professor of Political Science

James Madison University

Date:

- December 04 - 08, 2023 - 10:00 - 12:00

Platform.: Zoom

Working language: English

Small course description:

Important elections will take place in Europe and the US in 2024. In June, Romanian and other EU citizens will participate in European Parliament elections. In November, US citizens will elect a president and a new Congress. These elections will have significant implications for the future of the transatlantic political and economic relationship. Since 2020, the transatlantic relationship has been politically strong but economically strained. EU and US incumbents have established complementary Russian sanctions regimes. They have pursued a common (if still quite general) strategy to anchor Ukraine, Moldova, and Western Balkan countries within European and transatlantic structures (e.g., EU, NATO). But the transatlantic economic relationship—which has been the backbone of the global economy for decades—has experienced real strains over the same period. EU and US politicians have approached big tech regulation differently, for example. European and American incumbents have also moved away from neoliberal orthodoxy and established new blueprints for promoting specific sectors of their respective domestic economies. The course module encourages students to think systematically, dispassionately, and openly about (a) the likely results of the 2024 European Parliament elections, (b) the likely results of the 2024 US presidential and congressional elections, and (c) the ways that the results of these elections will and will not affect the “politically strong but economically strained” transatlantic status quo.