EUA calls on EC to revive directive on cross-border associations to facilitate cooperation across the EU

The European Commission has recently withdrawn a proposal for a directive on European cross-border associations, which the European University Association would like to see revived and which had also received support from the European Parliament. The potential directive, proposed in 2023, would have enabled the establishment of non-profit associations that could work freely across all EU member states, regardless of where they are registered.

The EUA points out that cross-border cooperation is at the heart of Europe’s universities, and that cross-border cooperation enhances the quality of learning and teaching and is often a prerequisite for excellence in research. The EUA highlights the role of the European Universities Initiative and the higher education institutions participating in it in this context. The association states that the possibility of establishing associations operating at a European level would reflect and facilitate this increasingly deep cooperation between Europe’s universities. Concretely, cross-border associations could be a route to creating legal entities for European Universities alliances, as promoted by the European Commission, the EUA says.

The EUA regards sees cross-border associations as holding significant potential for European higher education and research, as well as for strengthening the resilience of Europe’s democracy, and therefore calls on the Council of the EU, the European Parliament and the European Commission to continue their work to make this option a reality.

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