Abstract
This book takes a look at the recent history of the European Commission’s Erasmus programme, charting its development in terms of participation, geographical scope and levels of financial investment. In the opening chapter, we look at different theoretical perspectives relating to this form of intra-European circulation, including the role of Erasmus in establishing a culture of free movement between European Union member states and neighbouring countries. We also consider recent developments, such as changes in the programme's ethos during the current 'Erasmus+' phase of the intitiative, including responses to the youth unemployment crisis and the recent influx of refugees from outside Europe into the EU.
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Notes
- 1.
Feyen (2013, p. 21) provides an alternate explanation of the programme’s title, explaining that the term was coined by the coordinator of the Joint Study Programmes , Adam Smith, from the phrase ‘European Community Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students’.
- 2.
Other notable early achievements include the establishment of the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) and the Bologna process, which have helped ensure a degree of harmonization between tertiary educational level institutions in different countries, and accounts for the codification of Erasmus mobility by the EC as ‘credit mobility’ (European Commission 2015).
- 3.
All EU member states fully participate in all the actions of the Erasmus+ programme, along with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Turkey. Other partner countries can participate in specific actions such as the Erasmus Mundus postgraduate degree programme, subject to specific criteria or conditions, including nations in the Western Balkans, Eastern Partnership, South-Mediterranean and the Russian Federation.
- 4.
Another area of interest for Erasmus+ is sport (see, e.g. European Commission 2017, p. 12), however discussion of this issue did not feature in any of our research projects on various aspects of the programme.
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Cairns, D., Krzaklewska, E., Cuzzocrea, V., Allaste, AA. (2018). Introducing Erasmus. In: Mobility, Education and Employability in the European Union. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76926-4_1
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