The Europa-Institut was founded at Saarland University in 1951, before the signing of the Treaties of Rome, and is the second oldest institution focused on European Integration (after the College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium).

As such, the former program description of the Europa-Institut stated that, "The moment at which Europe, driven by its historical development, becomes conscious of its unity and the reality surrounding it and where consequently new political, legal, economic and cultural organs are formed and unfold," would mark the point at which it was imperative to offer a corresponding, uniform European education.

The purpose of this department was to train students wishing to pursue a career in diplomacy or in the civil service of the, at that time, semi-autonomous Saarland region.

In 2012, Prof. Dr. Thomas Giegerich has been appointed the new co-director in succession to Prof. Dr. Torsten Stein and in 2015 Marc Bungenberg took over for Werner Meng, who has since passed away.

[2] It stands for high educational standards, close contact and regular exchange with institutions in the European Union, the Council of Europeas well as with the German Federal Foreign Office.

The Europa-Institut also received the "Certificate for Quality of Internationalisation (CeQuInt)" for the successful implementation of an internationalization strategy in its Master's program.

As a prerequisite completion of undergraduate study of at least 240 credits as well as 2 years of corresponding working experience are required (in addition to fluency in English).

Since 1972, the Europa-Institut holds one of 52 European Documentation and Information Centers (EDC) in Germany and forms part of a network of 600 EDZs worldwide.

Access to numerous databases of the EU as well as to an increasing amount of electronic documentation is also provided Since 1998, the Europa-Institut has published the legal journal “Zeitschrift für Europarechtliche Studien” (ZEuS).

ZEuS offers the opportunity to publish in German and English, thereby providing an internationally established forum for articles from the academic as well as the practical field.

The examination and selection of contributions occurs via an extensive and thorough evaluation procedure (peer review) and is done independently by two members of the editorial team.