Curiously, such a policy shift might be emerging, despite some member-states’ (namely, Germany and the Netherlands) reluctance to embrace the idea of Eurobonds. After the eruption of the pandemic, the European Commission organized successfully a procurement scheme for life-saving equipment; created a stockpile of essential medical equipment, and launched an unemployment reinsurance scheme – which is to be financed through bonds issued by the EU itself.
Thus, the ‘Brussels bureaucracy’, much derided for its infamous red tape and cumbersome decision-making, is providing swift leadership. Moreover, the Commission has ventured outside its usual market-integrating role and is displaying capacity to deliver what many of its members struggle to provide on their own – a social safety net, including a public healthcare system.
This not only goes beyond the idea of ensuring a level playing-field among its members, which has long been the raison d’être of the EU governing institutions. It also surpasses the minimalist idea of social justice as a matter of wealth distribution from rich to poor regions. We could see this as a move towards something even more ambitious – building a robust public sector at the heart of a thriving European Welfare State.
At this point we are back to the old debate about sovereignty – is the EU to be transformed into a European Republic? When we confront this issue again and ponder the balance between national sovereignty and trans-European unity, between democracy and bureaucracy, let us not be sidetracked away from the key concern – how to deliver socially responsible rule. Neither national democracies nor the European bureaucracy have so far managed to shelter our societies from the vagaries of globally integrated capitalism. We need a new institutional design.
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