Conference Guidelines and FAQs

The UACES 55th Annual Conference welcomes contributions on all areas of contemporary European Studies from across academic disciplines including (but not limited to) law, economics, geography, history, sociology, public policy and politics. We accept proposals from established academics, practitioners and well-prepared doctoral students.

UACES particularly welcomes proposals from BIPOC academics, scholars from under-represented geographies (e.g. the Global South) and scholars from disciplines that have lower representation at UACES conferences including anthropology, cultural studies and history.

At last year's conference, panel topics included European security, race and decolonisation, gender issues, environment, and integration. See last year's research programme to get a full idea of the diversity of topics covered at UACES conferences.

Once again, UACES delegates can choose to submit their proposals via Themed Tracks. If your work does not fit within the parameters of the themed tracks, please select the open track. You can read about all the Themed Tracks on our website here. 

You can then choose to submit to either an individual paper, panel or non-traditional panel (see below for information about these different types of submission). Submission types are divided into in-person and virtual. The one-day virtual event will take place entirely online on Friday 12 September 2025. Please ensure you select the correct attendance mode when selecting a submission type. If you select an in-person submission but later wish to present on the virtual day, you must advise us of this by 30 May 2025. Those seeking to create or fill out a panel can use the UACES members' email list or use #UACES2025 on social media. 

NB:

• We accept no more than two paper proposals per person: whether they are individual or part of a pre-organised panel, or a co-author.
• UACES as an organisation actively promotes gender balance in the formation of panels at its Annual Conference and at UACES sponsored events. As such, it does not permit all-male panels. Please take this into account when submitting panel suggestions.
• Please read all the submission guidelines below before submitting your proposal(s).
• All panel participants must register for the event in order to participate in the conference.

We use ConfTool to manage paper submissions and registrations. To submit your paper, panel or non-traditional proposal, you will need to create a user account on ConfTool.

The deadline for submitting proposals is midnight on Sunday 26 January 2025.

Individual Paper Proposals

You will need to provide:

• Your Full Name
• University/Institution
• Postal Address
• Email Address
• The names and email addresses of any co-authors (if your paper has more than one author, the paper proposal should be submitted by the person who is most likely to present the paper at the conference, and you need to indicate the presenting author(s). Any co-author(s) will be recognised on the conference programme.)
• The Title of Your Paper
• Keyword(s)
• Research Discipline
• Research Theme
• A 250-Word Abstract

Please note: If you are part of a pre-organised panel you do not need to fill in the Individual Proposal Form.

Coherent panel proposals have a better chance of being accepted than an individual paper. This is because whilst an individual paper may be excellent, it is not always possible to group it with other papers to form a panel.

Panel Proposals

The panel proposal form should be filled out by the panel organiser. Please follow this link for full details of the format of panel sessions at UACES conferences.

The panel organiser must gather the details of all the participants in the panel including:

• Full Name
• University/Institution
• Postal Address
• Email Address
• The name of any co-authors
• The Title of the Paper
• Keyword(s)
• Research Discipline
• A 250-Word Abstract

Panels usually consist of 3-4 paper-givers and a chair (who cannot also be a papergiver). A discussant can be included but is not mandatory. For panels without a discussant, chairs are expected to fulfil this role.

*UACES actively promotes gender balance in the formation of panels at its Annual Conference and at UACES sponsored events. As such, it does not permit all-male panels (i.e. presenters must not all be male). Please take this into account when submitting panel suggestions.

Panels should be balanced: not too narrow in their theme, preferably involving a mix of speakers from different institutions and if you have some inexperienced paper-givers, these should be balanced with some more experienced colleagues.

Please note: For our purposes the panel organiser is simply a contact person for queries relating to the panel. They will not be acknowledged directly in the conference literature, unless they are also a paper-giver, discussant or chair.

Non-Traditional Panels

We have recently introduced the option to propose a non-traditional panel for the UACES Annual Conference.

These are panels that differ from the usual format of 3-4 research papers moderated by a Chair. Within the non-traditional panel section we accept proposals for innovative and non-traditional sessions (book panels, roundtables, mini-symposium, etc).  Like the traditional research panels, they will need to fit into a 90-minute timeslot – so please bear this in mind when planning your session. If you have a non-traditional session proposal that has not been mentioned and wish to discuss it further, please contact admin@uaces.org.

The organiser of the panel should submit the proposal and they will need to provide:

• Name
• Email Address
• Organisation
• A short description of the session
• A list of people who will participate (this can be provisional)

Some of the non-traditional panels at the 2023 conference in Belfast included an EU decision-making board game, workshops on Teaching and Learning, and panels on research and interdisciplinarity.

Please ensure that all members of your panel are made aware on invitation that they will be expected to pay to register for the event. If panel members do not do this, they will not be able to participate in the event. UACES has a small pot of funding available to assist non-traditional panellists in attending. More information about this funding is available here. If your panel forms part of a UACES Research Network, you could consider using the RN budget to cover registration of panel speakers. 

Policy on Gender Balance at UACES Events

UACES as an organisation actively promotes gender balance in the formation of panels at its Annual Conference and at UACES supported events.

As such, UACES does not permit all-male panels (manels). Presenters must not all be male (even if the Chair is not). Please take this into account when submitting panel suggestions. A panel is designated as constituting more than two participants. 

Due to last minute cancellations, non-registration and unexpected non-attendance at the conference, there could be a scenario, in exceptional circumstances, where UACES is faced with an all-male line-up for a panel at the Annual Conference. If it is impossible to re-arrange the presentations of the registered participants, UACES would proceed with the panel, rather than cancel these presentations, in this exceptional and unlikely scenario.

Substitutions may be made free of charge. Note: The registration fees are in GBP. This means that if you use a non-GBP credit or debit card, the amount you pay will depend on the prevailing exchange rate. However, any refunds that we process will also be in GBP and will also depend on the prevailing exchange rate. When exchange rates are relatively stable, the discrepancies in the amounts are usually trivial; when exchange rates are fluctuating the amounts can be more significant (i.e. the amount you are refunded may be less than the amount you paid).

• The registration of participation is binding.
• The registration will be refunded in full if you cancel before conference registration closes (i.e., by 25 July 2025). After this date, the registration will not be refunded.
• The participation fees are owed upon registration and are payable within 30 days following submission of the registration (but not later than 7 days before the starting day of the event).
• Participation is not guaranteed until full payment of the registration fee is received.
• The conference programme may be subject to changes.
• Payments will be refunded if the conference will be cancelled by the organiser. In that case, the organiser will have no further liability to the client. Registrations remain valid if the conference has to be postponed.