From Policy Diagnosis, to Dialogue, to Design: Inside the Policy Mission Fellowship’s Inaugural Year

When we designed the Policy Mission Fellowship programme, we set out to build a space that didn’t yet exist in European politics: a mission-oriented, cross-party programme where elected parliamentarians from across the continent and the political spectrum could come together in a trusted space, engage in open dialogue, and work together to discuss solutions to a shared European challenge. 

With this, the Policy Mission Fellowship represents the Open European Dialogue’s most ambitious mission to create safe spaces for learning, critical thought, and open dialogue; where the trust and cross-party relationships the OED has spent a decade cultivating now get put to work on real policy outcomes. 

The 2026 Mission – Economic Security in Uncertain Times

The Fellowship’s inaugural cohort tackled “The Securitisation of Europe’s Economic Power” – a mission chosen by the broader Open European Dialogue network of parliamentarians for its relevance to Europe and Europeans. Europe’s economic security is an incredibly complex policy issue, touching everything from affordable and stable energy supply to effective defence capabilities. Addressing these challenges demands deep engagement with world-leading research, as well as the actors affected by these challenges.

The Policy Mission Fellowship was designed to give Fellows space to deepen their understanding of these challenges, engage in genuine and open policy dialogue across political and national lines, and ultimately build innovative policy solutions that can withstand scrutiny from multiple political perspectives. The Fellowship is also grounded in a two-pillar approach: first and foremost, generating unique solutions that address Europe’s complex challenges. But also, inspiring a new class of policymakers to place dialogue and cross-partisan problem-solving at the core of their policymaking approach.

Year One: The Policy Mission Fellowship Journey

Diagnostic Residency Week — London (11-15 March)

The Fellowship’s in-person work opened with an intensive, five-day immersion into Europe’s economic security landscape, held in partnership with the London School of Economics. Fellows spent the week building trust among themselves as a diverse cohort, hearing a variety of world-renowned expert opinions on the mission topic, and visiting institutions across London that specialise in economic security and associated topics.

In the final two days of the Residency Week, Fellows tackled Adaptive Leadership training, a Harvard-developed public leadership methodology. In these sessions, they were asked to examine the behaviours and assumptions that shape how they lead, and share candidly about their experiences and realities in holding political office with peers who truly understand each other’s work. 

By the end of the week, the cohort split into prototype teams: small groups of Fellows, often from entirely different political parties and countries, united by a shared interest in one specific problem area. 

“One of the most enriching and unique experiences that I’ve had as a politician.”
– 2026 Policy Mission Fellow

 

Thematic Deep-Dives — Online (April, 2026) 

After Fellows’ deep exploration of the challenge in London, they broadened their thinking across three Thematic Deep Dive sessions, which addressed thematic and skills-based topics designed to support them in their everyday political and policymaking work: 

• Boosting strategic political communication with Tom Hashemi, Cast from Clay 

• Strategies on how to work with people you don’t agree with, like, or trust, from Adam Kahane, Reos Partners 
• Dissecting the notoriously dense mechanics of the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) with Dr. Anna Heckhausen, Bertelsmann Foundation

We built leadership development into the Policy Mission Fellowship on purpose, with the belief that by strengthening our democratic leaders’ capacities, we can strengthen democracy itself. The added benefit: For Fellows working across such different national systems, these sessions became a shared reference point – a common technical vocabulary to draw on as they started to scout for solutions to the challenges they had identified.

The Policy Lab — Brandenburg (8-11 May, 2026)

Only after understanding the core challenges at hand, can policymakers begin to generate informed solutions: at the Policy Lab, held in Brandenburg, Germany, Fellows began to turn their deep knowledge into real policy prototypes.

Why the focus on prototypes? 

Policy prototypes mock up the potential theory of change and impact of a proposed policy solution to test its effectiveness in addressing a policy challenge. They can take many forms – a whitepaper outlining a potential policy, a mock application form, or a storyboard of a user journey. It’s like a policy dry run: a controlled, low-impact test in a safe space which allows policymakers to catch flaws early, build consensus around the policy mechanism, and improve the experience for affected stakeholders.

Across an intensive weekend, the teams were guided through a structured policy ideation and prototyping process, with peer and expert feedback built into every stage. 

By the end of the weekend, every team walked away with a working policy prototype, which could potentially be implemented in their home political contexts, spanning a range of Europe’s economic security topics – from technological innovation and defence procurement, to green energy security, to social cohesion. 

In the weeks after the Lab, the teams met with high-ranking civil servants from EU institutions, leading experts and peers from their parties to discuss their ideas further and iterate their solution prototype based on the feedback they received. The result was a refined prototype ready for potential implementation into the real world. 

“A truly enriching experience, which also provided me with a concrete policy to implement” 
– 2026 Policy Mission Fellow

 

Closing the Inaugural Year – Online (25 June, 2026) 

Fellows closed out the programme at the Closing Ceremony, where the teams presented their prototypes to a network of parliamentarians who, despite starting as strangers (and sometimes, even outright political opponents), were pushed to gradually find common ground, and eventually become constructive collaborators.

Now, we’re preparing to turn the work that the Fellows built into resources that the wider policy community can use. In collaboration with the London School of Economics, the first Policy Mission Fellowship Strategy Paper, coming in Autumn 2026, will capture the methodology, prototypes, and lessons learned from the inaugural cohort, both for other policymakers to help apply what worked and as a foundation for the editions to come.

Stay tuned for more!

The Policy Mission Fellowship’s first cohort. London, early 2026

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The Policy Mission Fellowship is Europe’s first mission-oriented Fellowship programme, run by the Open European Dialogue’s consortium of European foundations and think tanks, in academic collaboration with the London School of Economics.