DAVID ELLIS for TIME
	WHERE TO FROM HERE? The Bridging Europe delegates in Copenhagen, December 2002 Top from left: Hanan el Khatib, Rasmus Grue Christensen, Petre Stamatescu, Alexander Hoefmans, Hakan Ener; Bottom row, from left: Ruth Aniansson, Ken Mifsud Bonnici, Jan Aaps

There's no danger of these young people running out of things to talk about. The four themes that emerged from Time's conversations with them — trust, making connections, European identity and Europe in the world — aren't going away. In Davos, they'll present their work and toss their ideas around with leaders. "It's an incredible opportunity — but also a responsibility," says Mifsud Bonnici. "We'll have a voice where it matters. How can you plan the world's future when you don't know what its citizens will want from it?"

TRUST
Thirteen years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, "there's a mental wall between East and West," says Hoefmans. "People in the East say, 'Does the West really want us?' And people in the West have stereotypes of the East." As he crisscrossed Poland during the past year, talking with voters and giving lectures on the E.U., he saw the divide firsthand. Most Western politicians "have no clue what enlargement is really about for the people here," he says. Many Poles, like their counterparts in other candidate countries, have too-high hopes of rapid economic progress — as well as fear of change to their way of life, no doubt exacerbated by anti-E.U. groups who play on such worries. In truth, Hoefmans found that they have little idea about what will happen when they join. They just have to trust that the leaders — of Poland and the E.U. — know what they're doing as the country heads for a vote on membership. But how can you trust when some of those leaders are in Brussels, and you don't know them and they don't know you?

Trust was a hot topic as the Bridging Europe delegates prepped for Davos. Faith in political, business and religious institutions is eroding. The Bridging Europe Scorecard, a survey of the 1,000 youth that will be released at the Forum, found that multinational corporations and religious groups are the ones young people trust least — no surprise given scandals at Enron and in the Catholic Church. More than 40% also have little trust in their own governments, a startling number since 87% of these same youth say they trust the E.U..

Brussels shouldn't start popping the corks yet. The Bridging Europe group members don't believe the E.U. is living up to expectations. They give it middling marks — not even five out of 10 — on transparency, effective use of resources and attention to citizens' views. The trust they feel is based less on what the E.U. has done than on what they hope it will do in the future. Today's challenges are too big for individual states, Mifsud Bonnici says. "Global problems require global solutions, hence the role of the E.U." Yet, says Hoefmans, "I don't trust the way it's run. I have more trust in the concept of the E.U." But what exactly is that concept? The E.U. is what the E.U. does; without concrete initiatives, talk of things like solidarity inspires little trust. "There's a lot of fluffiness when it comes to the E.U.," says Jaan Aps. "We still can't define precisely what Europe is."

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