EURA Working Group on Mayors in Europe – News December 2025

The EURA Working Group on Mayors in Europe met at the Technical University of Darmstadt on 15–16 November 2025. With 30 participants on site and 16 colleagues online, this was the group’s largest workshop to date—evidence of both the group’s vitality and its growing geographical reach.

Having completed the second survey of municipal councillors in Europe—results to be published in two volumes by Palgrave Macmillan in early 2026—the working group has now begun preparations for a new survey of mayors. The questionnaire will be finalised at the next workshop.

Next workshop (questionnaire finalisation):

• 7–10 May 2026 in La Cristalera (north of Madrid)

In parallel, several members are contributing to a new initiative on “Professionalisation and Politicisation of Local Government in Europe” (PROFLOC). Building on a discussion paper by Filipe Teles and Hubert Heinelt, participants agreed to prepare country reports ahead of the La Cristalera workshop. These drafts will be used to develop a common structure for country contributions to a joint publication. Based on the country chapters, the actors operating in the intersecting fields of professionalisation and politicisation at the local government level will be identified as the target group for a subsequent survey.

As the working group has expanded—and as some long-standing members have stepped back due to retirement or other reasons—the members decided to formalise the informal rules that have guided activities for many years. These principles were compiled in a brief paper and adopted by the group in Darmstadt.