Abstract
Dear Readers,
The EU and the peoples of Europe are faced with the challenge of adapting to and engaging with an ever-demanding international economic environment. Our societies find themselves under severe pressure due to the ongoing financial crisis, which is causing economic activity to shrink and is testing the abilities of states to deliver on public services that Europeans have taken for granted. In such trying times, European societies can still look at the one thing that has allowed Europe to develop into an area of high economic prosperity and social cohesion since the Second World War: the European Union. Indeed, one need only stop and think what the repercussions could have been for the Mediterranean countries if they were still using their weak currencies and were forced to face the turbulent financial markets on their own. What would the outlook for the industrial countries of Northern Europe have been if protectionism had kept them from exporting their products? How would the new liberal democracies in Central Europe have faced the crisis without the political and economic support that came with their EU membership? The answers to these questions are clear: the only way to weather this crisis, mitigate the costs of needed reforms and create opportunities for sustainable and long-lasting recovery is through unhindered trade and increased coordination of national policies.
The EU provides the undisputed framework for such cooperation, but EU institutions themselves are indispensable actors in providing the impetus for important political and strategic decisions. This is the case with the European Commission's ‘Europe 2020: a European strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth’. European Commission President Barroso rightly sensed that the current crisis is more than a cyclical downturn in economic activity. What is more, he understands that European citizens expect, indeed demand, much more from Europe, especially today when economic challenges require concerted international action. Europe 2020 seeks to offer concrete proposals for countering the crisis by focusing on the goals of sustained growth, environmental protection and social cohesion. Furthermore, President Barroso has sought to engage as many European stakeholders as possible. The European Council has been given primacy in the political guidance of the project and in carving out broad common positions among European states. Member States will translate the strategy's broad objectives into concrete policies that relate to their needs and capabilities. The European Parliament is recognised as an important partner due to its significant legislative powers and regional and local actors are expected to contribute their expertise in carving out more specific policies. As the report itself states, the secret of success lies in ‘ownership’ of the project by national and local leaders.
Nevertheless, important questions remain, and the urgency of the current situation makes it imperative that we raise and deal with them sooner rather than later. First, Europe 2020 should not be plagued by the same lax implementation framework which condemned the Lisbon Strategy. A strategy so dependent on individual Member States’ initiative requires a stronger monitoring mechanism and more accountability among national governments. This is an essential component of the strategy's ‘ownership’ by Member States. Second, the important and necessary consultation process should not water down the initiative's concentration on a few significant and measurable priorities. The strength of Europe 2020 lies in its concerted focus and the links it creates between important policies. To dilute this mix through the inclusion of more particularistic demands would make the plan lose its orientation. Third, and related to this, Europe 2020 still leaves open essential operational questions, such as the link between the evaluation of states’ performance under this strategy and the monitoring done under the Stability and Growth Pact, or the creation of more concrete mechanisms of economic governance that will complement national efforts. Indeed, the necessity of European economic governance arises as the decisive question of the coming years. Unfortunately, until such issues have been resolved, there may be shortcomings in the delivery of Europe 2020's promises.
Despite all these, perhaps inevitable, early weak points, Europe 2020 still articulates the conscious choice of Europeans to defend, update and extend the main features of our economic governance. According to the report, the strategy's goals can only build upon the successful model of the social market economy, that distinctly European economic model on which post-war economic recovery was based. In this, Europe 2020 is not only an economic policy, but also expresses a political commitment that has been decisively shaped by the Centre-Right and the EPP's guiding principles. The EPP takes particular pride in the fact that the social market economy is a concept that originated within its ranks and still defines our movement's economic principles. But the social market economy is more than a set of political and economic policies—it also reflects a particular understanding of the role of the individual and society, an understanding shaped by the Christian and the humanist traditions and reflected in Europe's commitment to democracy, freedom, individual responsibility and social cohesion. By reaffirming Europe's commitment to the social market economy, Europe 2020 does indeed imply that the road to recovery also goes through a reassertion of the values that have made the European model so unique and successful in the past. But more emphasis is needed in this regard, and the EPP will continue to issue reminders that countering today's crisis depends on how much we are able to inspire economic and societal actors with a distinctly European set of common values.
The EPP's role and responsibility vis-à-vis Europe 2020 and all efforts to raise Europe out of the crisis are great. Most of the members and leaders of the European Council belong to the EPP, so the general political outlines that will guide Europe out of the crisis are expected to bear the imprint of the Centre-Right. The EPP forms the largest group in the European Parliament, so its input will be decisive when the Commission's proposals start being translated into concrete EU legislation. But with positions of responsibility also comes the expectation of visionary, but practical, proposals. The EPP has already raised the issue of stronger economic governance for Europe 2020 and the EU in general. We will continue to enrich the ongoing debate in Europe about how better to strengthen our economies, our societies, the project of European integration and the values that underpin it. Europeans can expect the EPP to be at the forefront of all initiatives that aim to make the European economy strong and inclusive again, based on the principles of the social market economy, economic openness and social cohesion. This issue of European View is one more contribution in this regard. In it you will find articles and analyses that express a spectrum of the Centre-Right's particular point of view on policies and solutions for these troubled but exciting times.