Authorized by Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of China, Graduate Institute of European Studies (GIES) held the forum “A Review of European Union’s Development in the Financial Tsunami in 2009” at B302A on Dec. 29. Forty-five scholars, teachers and students from TKU and other schools participated the forum to discuss the EU’s policy reformation and its strategies to deal with the financial tsunami.

Dr. Chen Li-jiuan, Associate Professor, GIES, pointed out in the meeting that Taiwan should establish a think tank on Europe to gather related research papers in French, German, and English and analyze the current situation and future development of UN after the Treaty of Lisbon was signed by the EU member states. Dr. Chang Fu-chang, Assistant Professor, GIES, emphasized that the money that was ladled out to the market in the financial crisis this time is much more than that in Asian financial crisis, but the consequence brought by EU’s policies is still need to be observed. Dr. Cheng Ter-hsing, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Sociology, Soochow University, analyzed the current situation of the Czech Republic, and suggested that its first goal in 2010 should be settling down the domestic affairs.

Dr. Kuo Chiu-ching, Chair, GIES, indicated that their forum could give an overall review on EU in 2009 from every perspective, and then academic field could provide some professional opinions to the government during its policy-making process. Meng Pei-yao, a first-year Master student of GIES, said, “I am really impressed by the presentation by Dr. Yuan Yi-mond. She gives us a complete picture of Europe’s policies on China from old days to now, which offers a good direction for my thesis.” ( ~Shu-chun Yen )