Convinced that understanding Europe’s past helps us to imagine and shape Europe’s future, the European Civilization Chair contributes actively to the academic programme of the European Interdisciplinary Studies at the College of Europe in Natolin.

In the first semester, the Chair provides a regionally grounded historical foundation for all students through the complementary courses taught by Professor Georges MINK on "L’Europe centrale aux XXe et XXIe siècles", and by Professors Richard BUTTERWICK-PAWLIKOWSKI and Tomasz PUDŁOCKI on the "History of Central and Eastern Europe in the 19th and 20th Centuries". The former explores the transformations of the region since the division of Europe in 1945, while the latter covers the changes that began with the destruction of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and ended with the Second World War. 

All students have the opportunity to choose a workshop led by Professor MINK, "Les politiques historiques et mémorielles", organized in cooperation with two innovative Warsaw Museums: the Warsaw Rising Museum and POLIN - Museum of History of Polish Jews.

They can also choose up to two of the three masterclasses offered by Professor MINK on "Histoire, mémoire et négationnisme historique", Professor Marek CICHOCKI on "From the Greek Agora to the Ukrainian Euromaidan: the History of Ideas of Democracy in Europe" and Professor BUTTERWICK-PAWLIKOWSKI on "The Enlightenment: Theory and Practice".

The Chair also leads two simulation games in which students practise the art of diplomacy in historical contexts. Professor BUTTERWICK-PAWLIKOWSKI offers "The Paris Peace Conference of 1919-1920", while Professor MINK and Professor CICHOCKI offer "Drafting a Peace Treaty for the End of the Cold War".

The European Civilization Chair is at the heart of the second semester major "European History and Civilization", whose courses are available to all students. Among the assessed core courses is Professor BUTTERWICK-PAWLIKOWSKI’s "History of European Civilization". He also offers a simulation game "The Congress of Vienna, 1814-1815".

Among the visiting professors are some of the world’s leading historians. Assessed core courses and specialist courses are complimented by masterclasses, compact seminars and workshops. The latter, led by postdoctoral fellows of the Max Weber Programme at the European University Institute in Florence, are new each year. The Chair also contributes to the planning and delivery of study visits.

Alongside other members of the Faculty, the Chair’s professors supervise Master’s theses in diverse aspects of European History and Civilization. These are supported through the "History Research Colloquium" convened jointly by Professors MINK, BUTTERWICK-PAWLIKOWSKI and CICHOCKI. Each year the Chair honours the outstanding student in its field.

To date these have been:

• 2014-2015: Mr Przemysław PAZIK, Radicalism, Revolution and Romanticism: The Ideological Response of Polish Catholic Intellectuals to Communist Rule in Poland 1945–1948
• 2015-2016: Mr Benjamin CROME, Towards a New Canaan? European Identity in the Light of the Zionist Right, 1929-1931
• 2016-2017: Mr Radosław SZYMAŃSKI, Rousseau’s Unitary Federal State in the Eyes of Michał Wielhorski
• 2017-2018: Ms Laura WHETHERLY, 'It’s Their Bloody Country': Opportunities and Obstacles for Cooperation between SOE and Insurgent Armies in Yugoslavia and Greece, 1941-1945
• 2018-2019 (ex-aequo): Mr Thomas BARKER, Development through Social Movements: To what Extent did Ukraine’s Euromaidan Succeed, where the Orange Revolution Failed? Based on an Examination of Thirty-Nine Published Interviews of the College of Europe’s Three Revolutions Project (Natolin), and Ms Louise VALLEDOR, Les insurrections de l’été 1944 : Paris et Varsovie, une perspective sociohistorique
• 2019-2020: Mr Grzegorz SZYMBORSKI, The Duchy of Courland and Semigallia between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Russian Empire. Legal Aspects of Charles Christian Wettin’s Reign and the Succession to the Throne in Courland in the Eighteenth Century
• 2020-2021 (ex-aequo): Mr Wicke Joseph VAN DEN BROEK, Impossible Reconciliation? Memory, ideology and diplomacy in Polish – Russian relations, Ms Émeline Myriam Marie-Guillaume OGEREAU, La représentation de Solidarność en Allemagne. De l’émergence du mouvement aux commémorations de la fin des régimes communistes en Europe, and Mr Joshua Giovanni HONEYCUTT, Sustainability and the History of Liberal Thought
• 2021-2022 (ex-aequo): Ms Jade IAFRATE, Les relations entre la Société Civile Polonaise et les institutions européennes face à la tentative d'une harmonisation du cadre légal de l'avortement à l'échelle de l'Union, and Mr Lorenzo CORNETTONE, The Trial of the prophet: the problematic relationship between Hegel and Nazism 
• 2022-2023: Mr Zoltán ILLÉS, Economic Policy Debate in Kadar’s Hungary