The Islam-in-Europe Programme was launched in September 2004 at a Europaeum Summer School, Europe and Islam: Building Bridges, at Leiden University.

The programme focuses on a variety of questions, including how Islamic communities have settled and integrated in different European countries; the meaning and impact of Political Islam in Europe; understanding and interpreting Islamaphobia in Europe; tracing past and current perspectives of The Other with regard to Muslims in Europe; the impact of terrorism, the Middle East crisis, and Balkans crisis on European foreign policies; and, not least, European relations with Turkey.

With the confirmation of Turkey’s candidate status as a member of the EU, interest in Turkey, especially academic and intellectual links, has grown enormously. Following a sucessful symposium on Turkey in 2004, followed by lectures on Turkey in Europe, the Europaeum has therefore launched an initiative in support of establishing an independent Institute for European Studies to be based in Turkey and attached to a leading Turkish university.

A Europaeum lecture is being delivered by Professor Tariq Ramadan, the eminent Islamic scholar, linked to a conference on Cultural Difference in Europe, in 2006.

Future projects will include a major international conference on Diversity and European Cities: the Challenge for Social Cohesion, a Euroapeum lecture series, a comparative European research project on Muslim integration in Europe, workshops on Islam and Migration, and work on creating an Islamic studies network.

Advisory Group: Professors Wim van den Doel (Leiden), Philip Robins (Oxford), Erik-Jan Zürcher (Leiden), Pier Cesare Bori (Bologna), Wolfram Kinzig (Bonn) and Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila (Helsinki).