Think Tanks in the European Union. Revisiting the EU-Think Tank Phenomenon.

A survey conducted by McGaan teaches us that 6618 so-called think tanks exist worldwide, and 413 in the European Union. Think tanks are gaining increased attention in the public debate. The term of “think tank” gained popularity in the 1960s in the US, and have been growing in popularity as central research object in the 1990s; this period represents the 'globalization’ of the notion of think tank.

Various researches conducted in political science seek to understand what are the think tanks (definition, typologies) and what they do (researches and “impact” in decision-making, role as expert, (in)dependence of their researches). Scholars have tried to understand the complex nature of those organizations and their effort in order to shape decision makers ‘preferences/choices.

While the European integration is in constant evolution, more and more think tanks are working on the EU as actor in the global governance or in public policy-making area; few scholars have worked on “EU think tanks” (think tanks located in Brussels and focusing their research on European issues).

The purpose of this paper is to reopen the debate on the definition of a think tank; especially on EU think tank. What is a EU think tank? What are the different types of EU think tanks ? How are these different from north-american think tanks?

This conceptual paper aims to shed light on the development of think tanks in the European Union and on the definition and classification of think tanks present in the European Union, and especially in Brussels.