K A I R O S

On August 12th, 2017, the State of Alabama held an extraordinary The European Commission just opened session to work on the topic of legitimacy crisis of European Union and Future Crisis. Commissioners have firstly called attention on the state of the economy, security, international relations. The concerns of the Commission around Brexit, refugees’ situation and irregular immigration, the lags of Economic Crisis in 2008, between many more, have come to surface. The economic and immigration policies 

 

So far, the Commission has talked about the definition of fragile state, which is going to guide the discussion in the forthcoming sessions. From weak budgets to the lack of universal values, Commissioners have proposed different dimensions of the definition of fragile state. The description discussed, said the Commissioners, had to take into account that the European Union is not any state; it involves many sovereign countries, their particularities, and wills. Commissioners arrived at a consensus in the idea that the European Union involves shared competences, meaning those in common for all the member states and therefore for the Union; individual interests, meaning those of a country in particular; and interests involving support, saying those of the Union concerning assistance of member and non-member countries. After a lengthy discussion, Commissioners stated that the failure of institutions, the internal imbalances and the weakened relations between nations could be seen as potential causes of fragility. However, Pierre Moscovici and others called attention on the importance of recognizing that the current status quo, although problematic, is not correspondent to the one of a fragile state. 

 

After the mentioned debate, Commissioners brought attention to the economic status quo and possible solutions to the unstable situation of the European Union. Although it was recognized that nowadays the organization has considerable capacity economically speaking, due to their high incomes, there were some aspects concerning economy brought to the discussion that are not necessarily in their best state. The German Commissioner called attention on the actual economic imbalance and the need for a fiscal union, which increases the collection capacity of the EU. However, Austrian Commissioner responded that it is problematic to declare a standard taxation regime because different countries have different priorities and that they should keep their capacity to collect and invest budget. Taxation is a still to debate topic on the Commission, but the core of the debate seems to be between national autonomy and the Union’s strengthening.

 

Also, there were proposed some policies to incentive the investment in the Union, like the European Investment Bank, to generate jobs and to promote entrepreneurship in the continent. Commissioner Vestager brought the focus on competition and the need for regulation regarding, to boost European economy. More mechanisms to improve the economic performance of the Union and, furthermore, its global legitimacy, are being proposed and discussed.