BRIDGING BEYOND is a student-led policy taskforce at UC Berkeley's Goldman School of Public Policy. We bring together students, faculty, and practitioners from the United States and Europe to analyze, debate, and co-create policy responses to the challenges that define our shared future — with democracy and liberal values at the center.
We believe in the power of critical thinking to sustain the intellectual foundation on which democracy stands.
Modern bureaucracies face a crisis of purpose, not just capacity. There is no longer a working consensus on how to define the common good that public institutions are meant to serve — and waiting for that consensus to renew itself globally is not an effective strategy. In the meantime, welfare states risk becoming a footnote in history, and liberal democracy risks becoming the least preferred option on the menu.
BRIDGING BEYOND begins with an inquiry: what brings us together, and what should we bring beyond our borders and into the world? From that question grows a taskforce — and from the taskforce, something with a larger aim. A permanent platform connecting the Bay and Europe through sustained dialogue, shared experience, community, and institutional programs built to last.
Policy dialogues — AI governance, democratic resilience, security & global order.
Student-led course — co-producing policy frameworks with US & European voices at GSPP (Fall 2026).
Network building — Berkeley ↔ institutions, think tanks & civil society across continents.
Research & publications — actionable policy briefs that feed into real decisions wherever they matter.
How artificial intelligence is reshaping public administration, regulation, and democratic accountability — and the opportunities it opens for public management and governance systems if, through genuine dialogue, we can move past skepticism and toward frameworks that actually work.
Shared challenges that demand shared solutions — comparing approaches and co-developing policy responses across America and Europe.
Not final answers — starting points for dialogue.
Across the US and Europe, governments are running AI pilots without the institutional frameworks to govern them once they scale. The real question isn't whether to adopt AI in government, but how to build oversight, accountability, and public trust structures that travel with it.
Spain, much of Europe, and increasingly the US face the same pressure: aging populations and shrinking active workforces straining pay-as-you-go pension systems. The political responses vary widely — and each carries lessons for the others.
Across America and Europe, there is a silent epidemic of burnout and emotional distress affecting all age groups — but hitting young people and adolescents hardest. What social and labor structures can we build to alleviate suffering in today's world — and how can policy, not just therapy, lead the way?
Will we allow environmental protection policies to stagnate? Protecting the environment need not mean reducing the social and economic outputs of our societies. The current discourse is stuck on catastrophe, leaving a generation of young people disengaged from their natural surroundings. We need a new conversation.
A generation of democrats has grown up unfamiliar with armed conflict as a present option. Understanding what war is, the forms it takes today, and how democratic states can work to prevent it requires the kind of open, rigorous dialogue that is disappearing from public discourse.
Violence against women and girls remains the most prevalent form of violence in the world. What new approaches are America and Europe willing to adopt? Dialogue is necessary to overcome the conformism that economic comfort in Western societies has bred.
Former Government Chief Data Officer of Estonia, now with the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change — bringing a leading voice on digital government and data-driven public policy.
Government advisor on technology and Lead Author of The Agentic State. Founding Managing Director of the Global Government Technology Centre (WEF · Berlin). Former founder of GovMind, sold in 2024. MPhil in Public Policy, University of Cambridge.
Global advisor, tech entrepreneur, and former Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine. Co-creator of the Diia ecosystem. Yale Peace Fellow 2026 · Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council.
Co-creator of the Diia ecosystem. Global advisor on GovTech, AI, and democratic resilience under pressure. Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council.
Policy Dialogue · Jun 18, 2026Founding Managing Director of the Global Government Technology Centre (WEF). Former founder of GovMind. MPhil in Public Policy, University of Cambridge.
Policy Dialogue · Jun 24, 2026Leading voice on digital government, data-driven public policy, and the Estonian model of AI-powered state transformation.
Policy Dialogue · Aug 11, 2026Working notes and essays at the intersection of democracy, public administration, and the transatlantic relationship.
Those of us who went through political science and public administration schools in the 2010s still carry new public management and the managerial model in our heads. Who is running the machines — and which machines are we even using?
We're putting at risk a combination unique in the world's political history: having both peace and freedom at the same time. It's time to push beyond.
BRIDGING BEYOND doesn't have official partners yet — we're building those relationships deliberately, starting with conversations like this one. We're looking to connect with:
If your institution fits one of these, get in touch →
Laura Magallón Pérez is a Fulbright Scholar and Master of Public Affairs candidate at UC Berkeley's Goldman School of Public Policy. A Spanish civil servant working at the intersection of politics and public policy across Europe, she brings a practitioner's perspective to Berkeley's policy and innovation ecosystem.
This initiative grew out of a simple observation: the conversations happening in Berkeley about AI governance, democratic resilience, and the future of public policy are conversations Europe urgently needs too — and vice versa. BRIDGING BEYOND exists to make that exchange structural, not occasional.
magallon@berkeley.edu →Eric Lombardo is a Master's in Public Affairs candidate at the Goldman School of Public Policy. His professional background is in conservation of natural resources, working with government agencies and philanthropic institutions in California to finance projects that protect and restore habitats, conserve farmland, and expand access to the outdoors.
Eric's broader purpose is to improve how our society relates to land, water, and the natural world. He is interested in how European states are using policy solutions to protect biodiversity and connect people to nature, and how emerging technology offers opportunities and threats to the environment and natural systems.
elombardo@berkeley.edu →Do you want to be part of the project? Join the taskforce →