MI Masterclass Prize Winner Shares His Experience

The 2012 MI Masterclass organised a best paper competition among its students, which offered one of them a reward for hard work and innovative thinking in the form of a prize. The best performer in this competition – Vasileios Karakasis – was given the opportunity to present his research paper at a conference of the topic: ‘Getting Out of the Crisis: Time for New Initiatives’. The interdisciplinary workshop, organised by the group Inter-Research, was held at the Economics Faculty of Universidad Complutense de Madrid on 4-5 June 2012.

The conference was an unforgettable and challenging experience for the young researcher. As the only student among the participants, he was warmly welcomed by the conference organisers, Dr. Fatima de la Fuente and Dr. Rosa Maria Fernadez, as well as the other participants. The international composition of the workshop contributors, with a predominantly Mediterranean origin, gave a specific flavor to the discussions and allowed a focus on common problems in the crisis and exchange of benchmarking ideas for solutions. The conference discussed four overarching themes related to the crisis: the EU integration process, country-specific reactions and perceptions, business behaviour, and regulatory changes and the effects over citizenship.

Vasileios presented his paper with a title ‘The Eurozone Crisis: Framing and Policy Paradigm’. The research project analyses the framing of the current crisis at the summits of the Eurozone leaders and compares it with the official framing of the crisis by the German government. It attempts to find out to what extent Germany managed to dominate the views on problems and solutions in the Eurozone. The analysis goes a step further providing insights on the reasons behind the framing impact applying the concept of a policy paradigm. Vasileios’s presentation was featured in the first conference theme – Crisis of the EU integration process. Constructive and critical comments from the audience allowed him to see in what ways his research paper can be improved and strengthened.

The academic experience was complemented by an insightful walk around Madrid with professional guides and a dinner for all the participants. Vasileios has been happy to conclude that he had ‘three great days in Madrid’, where he learned a lot, met interesting and knowledgeable new people, and gained ideas on how to develop further his research paper.