Another Brussels think-tank

By Stewart Fleming

Date: 20/01/05

Brussels has a new economic policy think-tank, Bruegel, which stands for Brussels European and Global Economic Laboratory. It comes with an impressive pedigree.

Not too many think-tanks are financed by a dozen governments - including in Bruegel's case France, Germany and the UK - together with a score of multi-national corporations. It starts life with a €2 million budget.

Nor do they have chairmen of the calibre of former commissioner Mario Monti, but also director Jean Pisani-Ferry, a man described by Charles Grant, head of the Centre for European Reform in London, as "one of the most original and creative thinkers in France".

But is another think-tank something Brussels actually needs? The answer according to one close observer of the Brussels scene is "Yes", because the existing ones, the European Policy Centre, the Centre for European Policy Studies and Friends of Europe "do some good work, but they are not particularly original in their thinking or influential".

The current Brussels think-tanks suffer in part from being introverted, focused on EU institutional issues and, perhaps because of their pro-European and federalist proclivities, they are reluctant to stir things up. "They all get money from the Commission so it's difficult for them to think independently; they can't bite the hand that feeds them," says one experienced Brussels observer.

But can Bruegel break the Brussels mould? Pisani-Ferry makes clear that to do this is his ambition. Bruegel is not going to take a Brussels institutional approach to policy, he says. "Our priority is not to jump into the Stability and Growth Pact debate," he says, although the subject might come up as part of a wider analysis of global economic imbalances.

"Europe needs to redress its inward looking bias. Trying to help do this will be the trademark of Bruegel," he adds. "We will seek to bring a European perspective to global issues and a global perspective to EU issues."

To do that, Pisani-Ferry is determined to battle for the independence he needs.

Article reports on the creation of 'Bruegel' (Brussels European and Global Economic Laboratory) a new Brussels based think-tank, financed by a dozen governments (Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, Spain and the UK) and a number of multi-national corporations (DaimlerChrysler, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Siemens and Telecom Italia), 18 January 2005. Headed by Frenchman Jean Pisani-Ferry, Bruegel's initial budget was €2 million.

Bruegel: Homepage http://www.bruegel-lab.org/index.php?pid=1

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