Can the eurozone's economic governance combine political accountability, legitimacy and effectiveness?

Sep 01, 2015
Fabian Zuleeg
Chief Executive and Chief Economist
After years of economic crisis, resulting in significant changes to economic governance at EU level, especially for the eurozone, the time has come to consider the longer term political and economic implications of this new situation for the economic integration process. Not only to determine how well the system is likely to function but also what more needs to be done to ensure long-term stability and to provide the EU institutions with sufficient political legitimacy to carry out this new role.

This article does not consider abolishing the euro, based on the conviction that introducing the euro created a path dependency that makes trying to unpick the seams of the process extremely costly. While, economically, the exit of one eurozone member state might conceivably be manageable (but costly, especially for that country), the long term political costs might end up unravelling the whole European integration process, with the potential for a bankrupt and politically unstable state outside the euro but still within the EU. However, the status quo situation is still unstable, politically and economically, and needs further policy reforms.

Read the full paper here

Related publications

EPC ROUND-UP
Aug 14, 2026
by Georg Riekeles, Johannes Greubel, Fabian Zuleeg, Helena Hahn, Brooke Moore, Elizabeth Kuiper, Paweł Świeboda, Varg Folkman, Samuel Goodger, Talisa Mazzoni, Liza Saris, Tabea Schaumann, Javier Carbonell, Linda Solstrand Dahlberg, Edward Fishman, Bart Hogeveen, Levente Kocsis, Maria Martisiute, Maria Demertzis, Tobias Etzold, Vanna Curin
POLICY BRIEF
Aug 03, 2026
by Linda Solstrand Dahlberg, Maria Martisiute, Tobias Etzold

By the same authors

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. More information is available in our Privacy Policy