Europe matters: from hopes to choices

Currently serving as Ireland’s Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, Jack Chambers is also Deputy Leader of Fianna Fáil and played a leading role in the party’s success in legislative elections held in November 2024. Previously, he was notably appointed as Ireland’s youngest Minister for Finance in over a century. A medical doctor, Chambers was first elected to Parliament in 2016 at 25, its youngest member. He has held ministerial positions in the departments of transport, defence, and environment, climate and communications, as well as serving in Government.

Gert Jan Koopman is the Director-General for Enlargement and Eastern Neighbourhood. Prior to this, he served as the director-general of the European Commission’s budget department. In this role, he contributed to putting in place the European Union’s €800bn NextGenerationEU recovery plan, as well as the €18bn MFA+ for Ukraine. He has worked to enable its financing on the capital markets through a sovereign-style funding system. Having served the EU for nearly three decades, Koopman was previously in charge of state aid control at the Commission’s Directorate-General for Competition. His earlier assignments included senior management posts in the department for economic and financial affairs, the Commission’s economic service, as well as enterprise and industry, which supervises the smooth running of the single market. 

Dmytro Kuleba served as Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2020 to 2024, leading the country’s diplomatic efforts during the Russian invasion. As the youngest foreign minister in Ukraine’s history, he played a central role in forging alliances, securing military and political support and advancing Ukraine’s European Union and NATO aspirations. Under his leadership, the ministry became a pioneer in wartime communications, introducing the world’s first AI-driven spokesperson. Kuleba is a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Center, an Associate Professor at Sciences Po, and a Distinguished Fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. He is the author of “The War for Reality: How to Win in the World of Fakes, Truths, and Communities”.

Domna Michailidou is a Greek politician and economist currently serving as Minister for Social Cohesion and Family Affairs. She has held several deputy ministerial roles in the Greek government and previously served as reforms advisor to Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis. Michailidou focuses on growth strategy, capital markets and public finance, and has worked with international institutions including the United Nations Development Programme, the British Council and the Food and Agriculture Organization. She has also served as an economist and competition expert at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in both Paris and Athens. Alongside her policy work, Michailidou teaches economics at the University of Cambridge and University College London, and has authored several publications and books. Her work bridges academic insight and public policy to promote inclusive economic development.

A distinguished economist, Mario Monti has cemented his reputation as a committed supporter of the single currency and a talented negotiator leading a government of technocrats in the wake of the Italian debt crisis in late 2011. Most recently, he chaired the High-Level Group on Own Resources, a consultative committee of the European Union, aimed at proposing new forms of revenue for the European Union’s budget, which resulted in the final report “Future Financing of the EU”, arguing for new tax sources.

Vasilisa Stepanenko is a Ukrainian video journalist and correspondent for the Associated Press (AP), based in Kyiv. Focused on human rights and social justice amid the war in Ukraine, she was one of the few international journalists to remain in Mariupol during its siege, capturing images that played a crucial role in urging international leaders to open a humanitarian corridor. Stepanenko and her team won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for the reporting from Mariupol and investigations of war crimes in the city committed by Russia, making her one of the youngest recipients of the award. She was also the field producer of “20 Days in Mariupol”, a documentary exposing the human cost of the war, which won both an Oscar and a BAFTA for Best Documentary.