Cross-National Solidarity and Political Sustainability in the EU after the Crisis

The recent economic shocks have severely tested the EU’s political sustainability. The deep-rooted and unending succession of existential crises demonstrates the sharp misalignment between the high degree of integration reached by the EU, its authority structure, and the absence of solidarity to sustain this structure. The contribution unfolds as follows: first, we claim that the Union has become a complex adaptive system and that attempts to restore the status quo ante are unrealistic. Section II shows that its authority structure is ill-suited to steering the complex system because it lacks adequate instruments for addressing common risks and democratic externalities. Section III argues that contemporary EU leaders are failing to promote the principles of solidarity which, according to its founding father are required to disarm centrifugal tendencies. Section IV presents empirical evidence which signals the existence of considerable popular support for these pan- European forms of solidarity.