However, the Department of Political Science and Sociology (ranked top three in Eastern Europe and the best in Russia in 2002[4]) in 1998 launched a programme in Russian and Eurasian studies IMARES[5] for graduates of Western universities, which is delivered in English.

Such a university was also deemed to reverse the brain drain, a phenomenon that hit hard the Russian academia in the late Soviet - early post-Soviet period.

The suggestion of the name "European" belongs to Leo Klejn, professor of Archeology at Saint Petersburg State University, and a member of the group of enthusiasts who prompted the foundation of EUSP.

Leo Klejn thought that as soon as American funds had already been tapped into by Moscow, its historical rival Saint Petersburg, popularly known as Russia's "window on Europe",[10] should establish a "European University".

It started later that year, in September, when four departments - Economics, Ethnology, History, Political Science and Sociology - were licensed to admit students on the main academic course for the first time.

In winter-spring 2008, the university was living through the tumultuous "case of fire safety rules violation", which was deemed to be an example of political pressure exerted on academic freedom in Russia.

In 2016, the university lost its accreditation after the Federal Service for Supervision in Education and Science conducted an audit and revealed several violations in a series of documents accompanying the academic process.

Shortly after, however, following a fire safety inspection, the European University was closed down by a ruling of a Saint Petersburg court[13][14] for the six-week period from 7 February 2008 until 21 March 2008,[15] drawing protests by students, staff as well as the wider Russian and international academic community.

Today, EUSP maintains a good relationship with different levels of government and administration, as evidenced among other things by a visit and meeting of the Russian Minister for Education and Science Andrei Fursenko[16] with the faculty and students at EUSP on 4 June 2009 and by the address by deputy governor of Saint Petersburg Mikhail Oseevsky[17][18] at the opening of the academic year ceremony on 7 September 2009.

The Rector of European University is the day-to-day administrator of the institution, elected for a three-year term by the Academic Council, subject to the Board of Trustees' approval.

In addition to volumes of books and journals the library provides easy access to network resources, publications on optical discs, audio and video tapes, as well as full-text digital databases in Russian and foreign languages such as EBSCO, JSTOR, Science Direct, archives of the World Bank, Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) History E-Book Project, and others.

Other alumni followed on with a career in the Russian government, international companies and organisations such as the World Bank, the United Nations Secretariat New York, the US Department of State and the European Commission.

It was registered under German law to be able to collect income tax exempt donations from at least 14 European countries (Germany, UK, France, Switzerland, Netherlands, Ireland, Poland, Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Hungary; via the Transnational Giving Europe[30] network) for EUSP and its members.