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# Why the Euro is a force of political centralisation
- URL: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/why-euro-is-force-of-political-centralisation/
- Published: 2011-09-04T11:09:30.000Z
- Updated: 2026-04-22T10:49:55.000Z
- Description: This article was published 11 years ago in the Salisbury Review - then a small right-wing magazine edited by oD author Roger Scruton. The author wonders why he stands behind the basic position and analysis despite having moved from right to left over the decade
- Author: Tony Curzon Price
- Tags: Economics, #Migrated, Europe, EU, Switzerland, Euro, European Union, #en, #Import 2026-04-09 16:12, #appended-excerpt

An article that I wrote in 2000, on the introduction of the Euro, and why I was against it then. Despite what feel to me like substantial changes in my political views in the intervening 11 years - I used to self-describe myself as on the right, while I now self-describe myself as on the left - I was surprised to still stand behind a lot of this analysis. So what has actually changed?

At the core of the article is a belief in a Rousseauan, participative democracy, which I stand by. What has changed - for me, in my view of the economy, at least - is that I used to think that the State was the real impediment to that democracy; I now believe it is the collaboration of a marketised State and its client interest groups, most of the really damaging ones being corporate.

So what is to be done *now* with the Euro? That is for the next article.

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This article was published 11 years ago in the Salisbury Review - then a small right-wing magazine edited by oD author [Roger Scruton](http://www.opendemocracy.net/author/roger-scruton). The author wonders why he stands behind the basic position and analysis despite having moved from right to left over the decade