Annie Niessen, winner of the Julie Dehay Prize 2021-2022
Annie Niessen is a researcher at the Cité Research Unit and the Political Science Department of the Faculty of Law, Political Science and Criminology of the University of Liège. She is the winner of the Julie Dehay Prize, one of the prizes awarded by the University of Liège Foundation. This prize is awarded for her research in European politics.
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fter completing her thesis in the European Studies Unit of the Department of Political Science at the University of Liège, Annie Niessen began a post-doctoral fellowship at the prestigious University of Pennsylvania in the United States last September, thanks to a research grant from the Belgian American Educational Foundation (B.A.E.F.). Her research project, which focuses on the crisis communication of the European Union (EU), has just been awarded the Julie Dehay Prize by the eponymous Foundation, which is part of the University of Liège Foundation.
His research focuses on the legitimising discourse of the EU in times of crisis through four case studies: the economic and financial crisis of the Eurozone, the Brexit, the decline of the rule of law in some Member States, and the covid-19 pandemic. Its main objective is to analyse the ideas and ideologies that are conveyed through EU communication in order to legitimise the measures adopted during these crises, as well as the relevance of further European integration, at a time when nationalist and Eurosceptic discourses are gaining momentum. The in-depth understanding of the discursive dynamics, communicative patterns and learning processes that operate within the EU's institutional communication over the course of the crises provides avenues for improving the democratic legitimacy and transparency of the institutions towards European citizens.
About the Julie Dehay Foundation
The Julie Dehay Foundation, one of the ULiège Heritage Foundations, awards a prize each year either to a young researcher under 35 years of age in order to finance research work abroad or within ULiège, or to a young ULiège university student under 35 years of age in order to finance studies or an internship abroad.
