Foundation Forum 2022: Recovery and resilience in the EU – Back to the future?

This background paper provides a context for the questions to be explored within the Foundation Forum 2022. Europe is emerging from the COVID-19 crisis having managed to protect its economy in the face of a major shock and prevent mass unemployment. However, challenges remain. While the Member States up to now appear to have diverged only moderately, at most, on key economic and social indicators, it seems that the pandemic has widened many social inequalities. The mass shift to telework has raised questions over how the world of work will look in the future. Achieving a climate-neutral society will have profound impacts on the lives and work of EU citizens. And the pandemic has shown how social protection systems are critical to protecting citizens from the worst repercussions of crises – can active protection against vulnerability become more firmly established in the European social model? These topics will form a starting point for the debates of the Forum.