The big recession and its impact on the European integration

The economic crisis started at the United States in 2007 led to severely damaging consequences for the global economy, but the recession has been particularly intense and protracted in the Eurozone, with its periphery countries being the most affected ones. The confluence of very seriously imbalanced economies, negative spillovers from the global financial crisis and well-known faults in the European Union/ Eurozone institutional design has caused not only terrible consequences for these countries but serious disintegration effects (political, social and financial) in the whole area. The negative impact on the monetary and financial integration has been of a particular relevance, as it was the most advanced area of the common European project. Even if the institutions and governments in Europe has taken a large number of measures (not always in a timely and/or successful manner) to deal with the problems, the crisis has not yet been overcome. A brave and intelligent effort to progress towards a higher degree of integration (through a Banking Union, a Fiscal Union and a common pro-competitiveness strategy) is most surely needed to prevent the EU to suffer from a renationalization and become a simple free trade area.