Uploaded February 2024 | Updated September 2026, 11 hours ago

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This EPRS history and politics roundtable explores the key role played by the European Parliament in the establishment of the European Community’s social, environmental and consumer policies during the 1970s. Following an introduction by European Parliament Vice-President Martin Hojsík, three historians and political scientists will discuss the strategies used at the time by MEPs, groups, committees and the EP as a collective actor to promote social, environmental and consumer rights of citizens. Drawing on the EPRS studies, the speakers assess and evaluate how Parliament sought to shape European Community policy-making in these three fields at a time when it did not have any legislative powers.

EPRS publications related to this event:
The European Parliament and the origins of consumer policy https://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/document/EPRS_STU(2024)757647,
social policy https://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/document/EPRS_STU(2024)757646,
and environmental policy https://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/document/EPRS_STU(2024)757644

Speakers include:
Martin HOJSÍK, Vice-President of the European Parliament
Mechthild ROOS, Lecturer in Comparative Politics, University of Augsburg
Liesbeth VAN DE GRIFT, Professor of International History and the Environment, Utrecht University
Jan-Henrik MEYER, Researcher, Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory, Frankfurt
Koen VAN ZON, postdoctoral researcher at Studio Europa Maastricht
Moderator: Wolfram KAISER, Head of the European Parliament History Service, EPRS; Professor of European Studies, University of Portsmouth