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> Stiglitz points his finger squarely at “the fatal decision to adopt a single currency, without first providing the institutions to make it work”. The second

> Stiglitz points his finger squarely at “the fatal decision to adopt a single currency, without first providing the institutions to make it work”. The second part of this quote means something quite different from what the headline implies. He isn't advocating an end to the single currency, he wants stronger institutions, which the Eurosceptics have undermined at every opportunity.

vixen99 10y ago
Yes because the EU bureaucratic organization is deeply undemocratic. I won't go over that again here but we have seen its dictatorial behaviour in action: to quote Dan Hannan "Elected prime ministers of Italy and Greece were toppled in Brussels-backed coups. Eurocrats were brought in to head what were, in effect, civilian juntas, whose purpose was to pursue a series of economic policies that would have been rejected at the ballot box. Or consider the EU’s response whenever a referendum goes against closer integration, as in Denmark, France, Ireland or the Netherlands. Public opinion is treated as an obstacle to overcome, not a reason to change direction."
- VodkaHaze 10y ago
  The old joke goes: "If the EU tried to join the EU it would be refused for being too undemocratic"
- sevenless 10y ago
  The EU is 'undemocratic' - as opposed to Britain's unelected Prime Minister, Queen and House of Lords, of course. A more serious response is that democracy can only be justified by its outcomes, and isn't a good thing in itself. A racist democracy that votes to harm minorities is worse than a dictatorship that upholds human rights and prevents the majority harming the rest. With the rise of explicitly anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim parties in Europe, this is not a theoretical consideration.
  - anexprogrammer 10y ago
    I imagine I'll be thoroughly downvoted, but I like the unelected House of Lords. There's a heck of a lot wrong with it - not least the ease of pushing ex party members up there in vast numbers, but all alternatives thus far proposed are far worse. All proposed alternatives will give us more elected politicians adhering to party lines. None of the alternatives will give us better government. Lords are pretty good at being difficult in the face of bad legislation - yet every time a notable instance takes place there are more calls to abolish the place. Their party allegiance mellows as they age - so you get Tory peers ridiculing some aspect of the current Tory government. Last there are enough independents (usually with long non-political careers) to bring domain knowledge and independent thought to the place. Most instances of Lords reform have been as a result of them doing their job well, inconveniencing or embarrassing the elected government of the day. It's not democratic, but it works.
    - spoonie 10y ago
      I mostly like it too, it's a similar model to Canada Senate. Who needs to go are the current hereditary peers: they weren't elected or even appointed by someone elected. At least they abolished the hereditary system.
    - kps 10y ago
      The current role of the House of Lords (like the Canadian Senate) is to introduce hysteresis into Parliament. It's a smoothing function over the last n elections to limit damage from noisy inputs.
  - Wildgoose 10y ago
    (1) Britain's Prime Minister is the elected MP for the Maidenhead constituency in Berkshire. (2) The Queen is the Head of State but does not control our Democracy - she doesn't even have a vote. (3) The House of Lords is actually a revising Chamber, but in this last case I am largely in agreement with you with regards to its democratic credentials. The EU on the other hand has a so-called "Parliament" which cannot propose legislation, cannot amend legislation and cannot repeal legislation. It has neither "Government" nor "Opposition", being essentially a rubber-stamping body for the unelected EU Commission. You seem to prefer this to the idea of allowing people a democratic choice simply because a minority of those people are voting for parties of whom you do not approve. However what happens when that unelected group (which is lacking in democratic restraints) starts to act in ways even more harmful than its current actions? You might not like Democracy, but at least it allows the possibility of correcting its mistakes.
sremani 10y ago
May be there is something to do with multiple sovereigns and diverse economies, that form the Centrifugal forces on EU. It is too simplistic to blame Euroskeptics. The bigger question is how did Greece even made it into the Common currency, when the writing was on the wall.
- VodkaHaze 10y ago
  Yes, because things are going so well in Italy and Spain and forcing them to use the same monetary policy as Germany and France is a superb idea
  - madaxe_again 10y ago
    It depends on whether you choose to take a short or long term view. Part of the purpose of the EU and its instruments, such as the euro, is normalisation of European economies into a single framework, with the ultimate goal of parity, which would not only bring about a more efficient and frictionless market (I.e. Simple cross-border trade for services and products), but also ultimately elevate the standard of living for all citizens. This is why some states which are less developed are currently net beneficiaries of European funds, and others are net donors. Currently. Wealthier nations beget wealth in their neighbours. To look at monetary policy in a vacuum is a mistake, as it ignores the substantial eu development funds which Italy and Spain are beneficiaries of. If you look at things in the short term, then poor Britain is being ripped off, the Spaniards are starving, the Greeks are broke - but if you take a longer term view, you'll take into consideration that all normalisation processes inevitably have over and undershoots, which can result in an imperfect present - but only define the future if you choose to let them do so.
    - mirekrusin 10y ago
      You don't need to use euro currency to take advantage of unified trade/no borders etc. ie. currently Poland.
    - thatfrenchguy 10y ago
      "which would not only bring about a more efficient and frictionless market (I.e. Simple cross-border trade for services and products), but also ultimately elevate the standard of living for all citizens." But you would have to have a working culture that is similar, which is not the case in the EU. People in Spain don't work like people in France or Germany, their government are different and wanting to have a single fiscal policy is doomed to fail. Also, the 1 to 5 salary for entry level workers is killing entry level workers in Western Europe, and that's one of the reasons behind so much euroskepticism
Noseshine 10y ago
Neither do I understand the word "admits" in the title. AFAIK he's been consistent in his message about the Euro over the years and has nothing to "admit". At least I remember reading him saying pretty much the same thing at previous (non-recent) occasions. For example, here he is in July 2014: "Stiglitz: How to save a broken euro" (https://www.euractiv.com/section/euro-finance/opinion/stiglitz-how-to-save-a-broken-euro/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/euro-finance/opinion/stigli...), or here is an opinion piece from him in the Guardian from May 2010 "Reform the euro or bin it" (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/may/05/reform-euro-or-bin-it-greece-germany https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/may/05/reform...)
- tptacek 10y ago
  Isn't the Telegraph a Euroskeptic paper? Not the worst of them during Brexit, but notable for it before Brexit?
  - Noseshine 10y ago
    What is your point? I don't see a connection to what I wrote. He did write that article and over 6 years ago, so he has nothing to "admit" since he's said the same things all along.
    - tptacek 10y ago
      I agree with your complaint about the headline and was trying to add some context.
      - tim333 10y ago
        The Telegraph tends eurosceptic but the Guardian which trends pro europe has a similar review https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/22/the-euro-and-its-threat-to-the-future-of-europe-joseph-stiglitz-review https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/22/the-euro-and-i...
  - et-al 10y ago
MichaelGG 10y ago
Isn't that what Eurosceptics have been saying though? They don't want a political union? I've only seen a few videos but I'm pretty sure Farage has been saying something like that. That things cannot work without going all the way, and they don't want to go all the way. "Undermined" seems like the wrong word for opposing.
- kwhitefoot 10y ago
  Eurosceptics and europhiles are not necessarily on opposite sides when it comes to closer political union. Many of us who are of the opinion that the European Union has done a lot of good are nonetheless of the opinion that tighter integration and standardization are not necessarily a good idea.
- tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  I'm not sure what Farage wants apart from attention, it's been obvious for a number of years that political union was very unlikely and that the UK isn't going to join the Euro zone yet he continued to campaign. My feeling is most of the brexit campaigners didn't like the EU because they saw it as left leaning, this is why the opposition mainly came from the right.
spriggan3 10y ago
> the Eurosceptics have undermined at every opportunity The Eurosceptics don't want a political union for good reasons. It would devolve into a soviet style dictatorship. People that different just can't live under the same government. Europe is not USA. The Eurosceptics are the ones that are grounded in reality here, the other camp is trying to push an utopia that already had horrible consequences.
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  1) EU 2) ....? 3) Soviet union! There's a gap somewhere in your logic. Europe is far more likely to end up a set of Soviet vassal states if it disintegrates, as that big hegemonic power called Russia is still very much a thing.
  - spriggan3 10y ago
    There is absolutely no gap in my logic. Tyrannies are often born from virtuous ideas and well intended people. The problem with concentration of power is that the people holding that power only care about insuring their own survival, not the good of the people they govern. This is already true at the national level and even more true at the supra-national level in EU. I don't want to give more power to corrupt bureaucrates that are completely disconnected from national concerns.
  - zigzigzag 10y ago
    The EU and latter day Soviet Union share more similarities than people would like to admit. The EU tries to prevent countries breaking away from its dictats using economic war as a threat (i.e. you obey us or we stop trading with you), rather than "hot war" - at present. But elements of the EU are pushing to get its own army, and the EU already has a system in place to effectively eliminate or take over governments that are deemed to not be reflecting EU "values": http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/05/24/eu-vows-use-new-powers-block-elected-far-right-populists-power/ http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/05/24/eu-vows-use-new-p... Fast forward 20 years and you get zealots like Juncker who already want to "punish" countries where voters disagree with him, put them in charge of their own army with a puppet parliament, and presto - the USSR is back.
bane 10y ago
Something I don't understand, as somebody who's not a European, is that stronger institutions, more centralization of power in some European-wide political body, more executive control in crisis situations, etc. all points very clearly to a European-wide Federal System a la the U.S., or maybe Australia or Canada, with a centralized Federal government, and some executive position -- all able to overrule local state autonomy. But even many of my European friends who favor these things seem to not agree that that's the inevitable vector that these institutions point to. I'm certainly not saying that the system will mirror the U.S. system, but it certainly will end being a system like this if Europe continues on the present unification course. Is there some nuance of the direction that I don't understand? It seems like as every crisis comes to Europe, advocates of pro-Europe seem to continue to point to centralization and empowerment of a single over-arching European government.
- tim333 10y ago
  Voters are often not keen on being governed by another nationality or culture. The US only managed to keep their federal system by fighting a war to prevent the south doing their own thing and the Brexit vote is another sign the voters are not keen. Much of the European project has been pushed through without voter consent but there are limits.
  - cynusx 10y ago
    Voters are not keen on being governed by a government they didn't elect, if you look at it that way then you can see the civil war as the final step in the consolidation of the democratic authority that was vested in the US president as the only directly elected official in the federal government. The south didn't vote for Lincoln and attempted to secede with the US president initiating the war to overturn the local state's right to do so. I think a lot of europe's problems would be fixed by making the office of the EU presidency a directly elected office in a similar fashion to the US presidency. The EU would still require further centralization to maintain the eurozone and to further deepen the EU single market. They are just required to maintain our current levels of wealth and to fix the banking crisis that has never really been solved in the EU. A single individual with a policy platform that has gained legitimacy through campaigning in all EU member states would settle questions related to the future of the union and will be best placed to implement and direct policies that benefit the majority of the EU population.
mseebach 10y ago
You can't really lay this at the feet of eurosceptics. No, they don't want the institutions (and they also didn't want the currency), so they fought against them, which is exactly what you are supposed to do in a democracy. But it was not eurosceptics who ignored Stiglitz and other economists and pushed forward with the implementation of a common currency anyway.
- sevenless 10y ago
  As you say, having done everything in their power to undermine the institutional effectiveness of the EU, the Eurosceptics cannot reasonably turn around and blame the results of their own actions on the EU. Nonetheless, that's exactly what they do. It's very similar to the Republicans in the US making sure the federal government can't pass any bills, then blaming 'big government' for being ineffective. Case in point: The migrant crisis, caused by large numbers of refugees coming to Greece and Italy's wide open coasts. How did they get there? No unified European border or coast guard and no integrated defense, which Britain ensured would never happen. No government should tolerate this kind of behavior, as it is a hostile action against the state, holding the population hostage. It should be treated as a form of criminal extortion or terrorism.
  - zigzigzag 10y ago
    lol ... let me get this straight, the UK is a terrorist state because the EU doesn't defend its southern border? It was President Juncker who said he thought borders were the worst invention of politicians ever, not the Brits who we learned recently are rather fond of borders. Your argument is backwards.
    - sevenless 10y ago
      You have Juncker backwards. He was saying internal EU borders are a bad idea. Rejecting all borders is a tenable ethical claim - indeed it's hard to justify why states should exist in most ethical frameworks that value human equality - but Juncker didn't go there. But yes, Britain sabotaged the EU, including its having a joined-up defense and border strategy. Indeed, you might expect the departure of the most Eurosceptic nation to strengthen the EU.
rayiner 10y ago
It's not quite so simple as that, right? The single currency was never billed as something that required individual countries to give up their autonomy to centralized EU institutions. If it had been sold as a package deal from the start, the Euro never would have happened to begin with. The lesson Europe seems to have failed to take from the US is that federalism is a Trojan horse. The U.S. federal government was billed as being sort of like what the EU government is pitched as today, but ultimately destroyed the sovereignty of the States and reduced them to administrative divisions that have to take orders not just from Congress, but unelected bureaucrats at random federal regulatory agencies. And it wasn't some slippery slope process, but necessity. States in a federal union have none of the tools of international relations. California can't embargo imports from Michigan that, e.g. don't meet its environmental standards. It can't threaten economic sanctions against Alabama for its treatment of minorities. It can't bomb anybody. The only way to avoid race to the bottom problems becomes pushing more authority up to the federal government.
- pfranz 10y ago
  If that's the case, how can California have auto safety standards or standards for gasoline that are more strict than other states?
  - initram 10y ago
    Exactly! And living in California, I can't tell you what a pain in the ass it is to try to send a friend in another state a bottle of wine. Whenever you visit a vineyard or even a wine specialty shop, they have a list of states they can't send anything to, and states they can stuff to with restrictions. It's kind of a mess!
  - rayiner 10y ago
    California has special standards for gasoline and fuel efficiency under a special exemption to the Clean Air Act granted to California and only California.
    - Mz 10y ago
gaius 10y ago
There are some people for whom the solution to any problem with the EU is always "more EU". And there are some who say, when you're in a hole, stop digging.
- tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  Is there evidence the EU has been expanding it's activities? Has it been creating more or less laws? Beyond the accession of new members. I'm asking because I really don't know the facts although I do know what some people who have me believe.
  - gaius 10y ago
    The treaty text the UK failed to get removed that basically forced the referendum to happen was the bit about the goal of the EU being "ever closer union".
    - tonyedgecombe 10y ago
      The referendum came about because of agitation from UKIP and the right of the Tory party, Cameron's rather lame attempt at renegotiation came after the referendum was called. But despite all that and the words in the treaty I am still not sure if the EU has expanded it's activities, has there been "more EU"?

vixen99 10y ago

Yes because the EU bureaucratic organization is deeply undemocratic. I won't go over that again here but we have seen its dictatorial behaviour in action: to quote Dan Hannan "Elected prime ministers of Italy and Greece were toppled in Brussels-backed coups. Eurocrats were brought in to head what were, in effect, civilian juntas, whose purpose was to pursue a series of economic policies that would have been rejected at the ballot box. Or consider the EU’s response whenever a referendum goes against closer integration, as in Denmark, France, Ireland or the Netherlands. Public opinion is treated as an obstacle to overcome, not a reason to change direction."

VodkaHaze 10y ago
The old joke goes: "If the EU tried to join the EU it would be refused for being too undemocratic"
sevenless 10y ago
The EU is 'undemocratic' - as opposed to Britain's unelected Prime Minister, Queen and House of Lords, of course. A more serious response is that democracy can only be justified by its outcomes, and isn't a good thing in itself. A racist democracy that votes to harm minorities is worse than a dictatorship that upholds human rights and prevents the majority harming the rest. With the rise of explicitly anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim parties in Europe, this is not a theoretical consideration.
- anexprogrammer 10y ago
  I imagine I'll be thoroughly downvoted, but I like the unelected House of Lords. There's a heck of a lot wrong with it - not least the ease of pushing ex party members up there in vast numbers, but all alternatives thus far proposed are far worse. All proposed alternatives will give us more elected politicians adhering to party lines. None of the alternatives will give us better government. Lords are pretty good at being difficult in the face of bad legislation - yet every time a notable instance takes place there are more calls to abolish the place. Their party allegiance mellows as they age - so you get Tory peers ridiculing some aspect of the current Tory government. Last there are enough independents (usually with long non-political careers) to bring domain knowledge and independent thought to the place. Most instances of Lords reform have been as a result of them doing their job well, inconveniencing or embarrassing the elected government of the day. It's not democratic, but it works.
  - spoonie 10y ago
    I mostly like it too, it's a similar model to Canada Senate. Who needs to go are the current hereditary peers: they weren't elected or even appointed by someone elected. At least they abolished the hereditary system.
  - kps 10y ago
    The current role of the House of Lords (like the Canadian Senate) is to introduce hysteresis into Parliament. It's a smoothing function over the last n elections to limit damage from noisy inputs.
- Wildgoose 10y ago
  (1) Britain's Prime Minister is the elected MP for the Maidenhead constituency in Berkshire. (2) The Queen is the Head of State but does not control our Democracy - she doesn't even have a vote. (3) The House of Lords is actually a revising Chamber, but in this last case I am largely in agreement with you with regards to its democratic credentials. The EU on the other hand has a so-called "Parliament" which cannot propose legislation, cannot amend legislation and cannot repeal legislation. It has neither "Government" nor "Opposition", being essentially a rubber-stamping body for the unelected EU Commission. You seem to prefer this to the idea of allowing people a democratic choice simply because a minority of those people are voting for parties of whom you do not approve. However what happens when that unelected group (which is lacking in democratic restraints) starts to act in ways even more harmful than its current actions? You might not like Democracy, but at least it allows the possibility of correcting its mistakes.

sremani 10y ago

May be there is something to do with multiple sovereigns and diverse economies, that form the Centrifugal forces on EU. It is too simplistic to blame Euroskeptics. The bigger question is how did Greece even made it into the Common currency, when the writing was on the wall.

VodkaHaze 10y ago
Yes, because things are going so well in Italy and Spain and forcing them to use the same monetary policy as Germany and France is a superb idea
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  It depends on whether you choose to take a short or long term view. Part of the purpose of the EU and its instruments, such as the euro, is normalisation of European economies into a single framework, with the ultimate goal of parity, which would not only bring about a more efficient and frictionless market (I.e. Simple cross-border trade for services and products), but also ultimately elevate the standard of living for all citizens. This is why some states which are less developed are currently net beneficiaries of European funds, and others are net donors. Currently. Wealthier nations beget wealth in their neighbours. To look at monetary policy in a vacuum is a mistake, as it ignores the substantial eu development funds which Italy and Spain are beneficiaries of. If you look at things in the short term, then poor Britain is being ripped off, the Spaniards are starving, the Greeks are broke - but if you take a longer term view, you'll take into consideration that all normalisation processes inevitably have over and undershoots, which can result in an imperfect present - but only define the future if you choose to let them do so.
  - mirekrusin 10y ago
    You don't need to use euro currency to take advantage of unified trade/no borders etc. ie. currently Poland.
  - thatfrenchguy 10y ago
    "which would not only bring about a more efficient and frictionless market (I.e. Simple cross-border trade for services and products), but also ultimately elevate the standard of living for all citizens." But you would have to have a working culture that is similar, which is not the case in the EU. People in Spain don't work like people in France or Germany, their government are different and wanting to have a single fiscal policy is doomed to fail. Also, the 1 to 5 salary for entry level workers is killing entry level workers in Western Europe, and that's one of the reasons behind so much euroskepticism

Noseshine 10y ago

Neither do I understand the word "admits" in the title. AFAIK he's been consistent in his message about the Euro over the years and has nothing to "admit". At least I remember reading him saying pretty much the same thing at previous (non-recent) occasions. For example, here he is in July 2014: "Stiglitz: How to save a broken euro" (https://www.euractiv.com/section/euro-finance/opinion/stiglitz-how-to-save-a-broken-euro/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/euro-finance/opinion/stigli...), or here is an opinion piece from him in the Guardian from May 2010 "Reform the euro or bin it" (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/may/05/reform-euro-or-bin-it-greece-germany https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/may/05/reform...)

tptacek 10y ago
Isn't the Telegraph a Euroskeptic paper? Not the worst of them during Brexit, but notable for it before Brexit?
- Noseshine 10y ago
  What is your point? I don't see a connection to what I wrote. He did write that article and over 6 years ago, so he has nothing to "admit" since he's said the same things all along.
  - tptacek 10y ago
    I agree with your complaint about the headline and was trying to add some context.
    - tim333 10y ago
      The Telegraph tends eurosceptic but the Guardian which trends pro europe has a similar review https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/22/the-euro-and-its-threat-to-the-future-of-europe-joseph-stiglitz-review https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/22/the-euro-and-i...
- et-al 10y ago

MichaelGG 10y ago

Isn't that what Eurosceptics have been saying though? They don't want a political union? I've only seen a few videos but I'm pretty sure Farage has been saying something like that. That things cannot work without going all the way, and they don't want to go all the way. "Undermined" seems like the wrong word for opposing.

kwhitefoot 10y ago
Eurosceptics and europhiles are not necessarily on opposite sides when it comes to closer political union. Many of us who are of the opinion that the European Union has done a lot of good are nonetheless of the opinion that tighter integration and standardization are not necessarily a good idea.
tonyedgecombe 10y ago
I'm not sure what Farage wants apart from attention, it's been obvious for a number of years that political union was very unlikely and that the UK isn't going to join the Euro zone yet he continued to campaign. My feeling is most of the brexit campaigners didn't like the EU because they saw it as left leaning, this is why the opposition mainly came from the right.

spriggan3 10y ago

> the Eurosceptics have undermined at every opportunity The Eurosceptics don't want a political union for good reasons. It would devolve into a soviet style dictatorship. People that different just can't live under the same government. Europe is not USA. The Eurosceptics are the ones that are grounded in reality here, the other camp is trying to push an utopia that already had horrible consequences.

madaxe_again 10y ago
1) EU 2) ....? 3) Soviet union! There's a gap somewhere in your logic. Europe is far more likely to end up a set of Soviet vassal states if it disintegrates, as that big hegemonic power called Russia is still very much a thing.
- spriggan3 10y ago
  There is absolutely no gap in my logic. Tyrannies are often born from virtuous ideas and well intended people. The problem with concentration of power is that the people holding that power only care about insuring their own survival, not the good of the people they govern. This is already true at the national level and even more true at the supra-national level in EU. I don't want to give more power to corrupt bureaucrates that are completely disconnected from national concerns.
- zigzigzag 10y ago
  The EU and latter day Soviet Union share more similarities than people would like to admit. The EU tries to prevent countries breaking away from its dictats using economic war as a threat (i.e. you obey us or we stop trading with you), rather than "hot war" - at present. But elements of the EU are pushing to get its own army, and the EU already has a system in place to effectively eliminate or take over governments that are deemed to not be reflecting EU "values": http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/05/24/eu-vows-use-new-powers-block-elected-far-right-populists-power/ http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/05/24/eu-vows-use-new-p... Fast forward 20 years and you get zealots like Juncker who already want to "punish" countries where voters disagree with him, put them in charge of their own army with a puppet parliament, and presto - the USSR is back.

bane 10y ago

Something I don't understand, as somebody who's not a European, is that stronger institutions, more centralization of power in some European-wide political body, more executive control in crisis situations, etc. all points very clearly to a European-wide Federal System a la the U.S., or maybe Australia or Canada, with a centralized Federal government, and some executive position -- all able to overrule local state autonomy. But even many of my European friends who favor these things seem to not agree that that's the inevitable vector that these institutions point to. I'm certainly not saying that the system will mirror the U.S. system, but it certainly will end being a system like this if Europe continues on the present unification course. Is there some nuance of the direction that I don't understand? It seems like as every crisis comes to Europe, advocates of pro-Europe seem to continue to point to centralization and empowerment of a single over-arching European government.

tim333 10y ago
Voters are often not keen on being governed by another nationality or culture. The US only managed to keep their federal system by fighting a war to prevent the south doing their own thing and the Brexit vote is another sign the voters are not keen. Much of the European project has been pushed through without voter consent but there are limits.
- cynusx 10y ago
  Voters are not keen on being governed by a government they didn't elect, if you look at it that way then you can see the civil war as the final step in the consolidation of the democratic authority that was vested in the US president as the only directly elected official in the federal government. The south didn't vote for Lincoln and attempted to secede with the US president initiating the war to overturn the local state's right to do so. I think a lot of europe's problems would be fixed by making the office of the EU presidency a directly elected office in a similar fashion to the US presidency. The EU would still require further centralization to maintain the eurozone and to further deepen the EU single market. They are just required to maintain our current levels of wealth and to fix the banking crisis that has never really been solved in the EU. A single individual with a policy platform that has gained legitimacy through campaigning in all EU member states would settle questions related to the future of the union and will be best placed to implement and direct policies that benefit the majority of the EU population.

mseebach 10y ago

You can't really lay this at the feet of eurosceptics. No, they don't want the institutions (and they also didn't want the currency), so they fought against them, which is exactly what you are supposed to do in a democracy. But it was not eurosceptics who ignored Stiglitz and other economists and pushed forward with the implementation of a common currency anyway.

sevenless 10y ago
As you say, having done everything in their power to undermine the institutional effectiveness of the EU, the Eurosceptics cannot reasonably turn around and blame the results of their own actions on the EU. Nonetheless, that's exactly what they do. It's very similar to the Republicans in the US making sure the federal government can't pass any bills, then blaming 'big government' for being ineffective. Case in point: The migrant crisis, caused by large numbers of refugees coming to Greece and Italy's wide open coasts. How did they get there? No unified European border or coast guard and no integrated defense, which Britain ensured would never happen. No government should tolerate this kind of behavior, as it is a hostile action against the state, holding the population hostage. It should be treated as a form of criminal extortion or terrorism.
- zigzigzag 10y ago
  lol ... let me get this straight, the UK is a terrorist state because the EU doesn't defend its southern border? It was President Juncker who said he thought borders were the worst invention of politicians ever, not the Brits who we learned recently are rather fond of borders. Your argument is backwards.
  - sevenless 10y ago
    You have Juncker backwards. He was saying internal EU borders are a bad idea. Rejecting all borders is a tenable ethical claim - indeed it's hard to justify why states should exist in most ethical frameworks that value human equality - but Juncker didn't go there. But yes, Britain sabotaged the EU, including its having a joined-up defense and border strategy. Indeed, you might expect the departure of the most Eurosceptic nation to strengthen the EU.

rayiner 10y ago

It's not quite so simple as that, right? The single currency was never billed as something that required individual countries to give up their autonomy to centralized EU institutions. If it had been sold as a package deal from the start, the Euro never would have happened to begin with. The lesson Europe seems to have failed to take from the US is that federalism is a Trojan horse. The U.S. federal government was billed as being sort of like what the EU government is pitched as today, but ultimately destroyed the sovereignty of the States and reduced them to administrative divisions that have to take orders not just from Congress, but unelected bureaucrats at random federal regulatory agencies. And it wasn't some slippery slope process, but necessity. States in a federal union have none of the tools of international relations. California can't embargo imports from Michigan that, e.g. don't meet its environmental standards. It can't threaten economic sanctions against Alabama for its treatment of minorities. It can't bomb anybody. The only way to avoid race to the bottom problems becomes pushing more authority up to the federal government.

pfranz 10y ago
If that's the case, how can California have auto safety standards or standards for gasoline that are more strict than other states?
- initram 10y ago
  Exactly! And living in California, I can't tell you what a pain in the ass it is to try to send a friend in another state a bottle of wine. Whenever you visit a vineyard or even a wine specialty shop, they have a list of states they can't send anything to, and states they can stuff to with restrictions. It's kind of a mess!
- rayiner 10y ago
  California has special standards for gasoline and fuel efficiency under a special exemption to the Clean Air Act granted to California and only California.
  - Mz 10y ago

gaius 10y ago

There are some people for whom the solution to any problem with the EU is always "more EU". And there are some who say, when you're in a hole, stop digging.

tonyedgecombe 10y ago
Is there evidence the EU has been expanding it's activities? Has it been creating more or less laws? Beyond the accession of new members. I'm asking because I really don't know the facts although I do know what some people who have me believe.
- gaius 10y ago
  The treaty text the UK failed to get removed that basically forced the referendum to happen was the bit about the goal of the EU being "ever closer union".
  - tonyedgecombe 10y ago
    The referendum came about because of agitation from UKIP and the right of the Tory party, Cameron's rather lame attempt at renegotiation came after the referendum was called. But despite all that and the words in the treaty I am still not sure if the EU has expanded it's activities, has there been "more EU"?