History

What started between 2005 and 2010 as a series of Ph.D. summer schools sponsored by the FP6 GARNET research project, has since evolved into the internationally recognized GEM Ph.D. school.

Centred on research pertaining to Globalisation, Europe, and Multilateralism, the GEM Ph.D. school now involves: (i) an ever-evolving and shared multi-annual research agenda, (ii) a dedicated GEM book series published with Routledge, (iii) a dozen degree-awarding universities on three continents (Europe, Asia, and the Americas) linked through a web of multiple doctoral degree agreements, as well as (v) an alumni community of some 60 graduates representing over 40 nationalities. The GEM Ph.D. School has so far seen the production of an impressive inter-disciplinary body of work on a variety of challenges facing both the global system and the place of the EU therein.

Launched in 2010, the GEM Ph.D. school was promptly recognized as an Erasmus Mundus Joint Doctoral Programme on "Globalisation, the European Union and Multilateralism" (2010-2018).

A bottom-up effort geared towards supporting a wide range of research, this initial iteration of the Ph.D. school was able to foster first-rate doctoral research across the social sciences tackling a variety of challenges facing the European Union and other regional organizations. Ultimately, these early years saw the program successfully graduate over 40 Double Doctoral Degrees.

The GEM Ph.D. school was relaunched in 2016 as a European Joint Doctorate endorsed by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action’s Innovative Training Networks (2016-2020). This second iteration reflected the will of a number of institutions involved in GEM to renew and reinvigorate their shared doctoral research program by updating and focusing its research agenda.

This resulted in GEM-STONES (an acronym for “Globalisation, Europe and Multilateralism – Sophistication of the Transnational Order, Networks and European Strategies”), a project that saw 15 partner institutions supervise 15 doctoral fellows hired to study how well the European Union had managed the world’s growing institutional complexity. This collective effort produced four edited volumes and 14 successfully submitted doctoral manuscripts.

And now, with the GEM-DIAMOND project, the GEM Ph.D. School has launched its' third iteration and readies itself to welcome, train, and supervise a whole new generation of doctoral candidates.