The idea of creating the European Historical Sciences Journal belongs to the team of the Modern and Contemporary History of Foreign Countries sub-department of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. During the last 50 years, the latter became a cradle of bold scholars of the European history. The need to create a respective issue has been long at hand for the social studies community of Ukraine. The European studies have been a major theme to work on for the Ukrainian academia for a long time. The latter has always been characterized by the subject oriented complexity. Moreover, beside the University of Kyiv, a number of respective institutions in Odessa, Kharkiv and Lviv have been devoted to the service of science.

It won’t be an exaggeration to say that the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv has always been and remains a metropolitan European studies alma mater. Vast majority of Kyiv European scholars (historians, political sciences and international relations researchers, as well as philosophers, philologists and lawyers) acquired education and worked intra muros here. Among the prominent Kyiv European historical studies and political sciences, one should mention the distinguished Ivan Lychytskiy, Ievgen Tarle, Viktor Zhebokrytskyi, Mykola Kirsenko, Anatoliy Martynenko, Andriy Dzhedzhula, Carpus Dzhedzhula and Borys Honchar. Today, their numerous apprentices continue the traditions of the Kyiv European school of thought, working in the academia and within the system of higher education. Therefore it is not unexpected that the issue proposed has been established by the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv.

Lately, the European studies have been more focused on the problems of the European integration, which is of high importance for Ukraine. To this end, the basic themes of the journal go as follows: the European integration processes in late XXth – early XXIst centuries; the European Integration of Ukraine; ethnic and migration processes in the EU; social studies and the history of life in the EU member states; the evolution of mass culture in the EU; the contemporary Ukrainian and the European foreign policy.