Teutonic discipline - The Best from Greece

FISCAL discipline is the catchphrase of the two-day EU summit that will examine proposals to revise the Lisbon Treaty and establish a legal footing for joint fiscal rules to apply throughout the 17-nation eurozone.

 

 

Germany, Europe’s largest and most prosperous economy, is being accused by critics at home and abroad for using the debt crisis to dominate the bloc. And in many ways that’s true, but not necessarily in the sinister way many critics would like to assume.

 

 

Given that it was the lack of discipline that blew the debt drama into a full-blown crisis in the first place, and that it is Germany that has been bearing the brunt of the subsequent financial fallout, one cannot blame Berlin for its insistence on tighter regulations and for national budgets to come under supervision of a more centralised EU authority.

 

 

Truth be said, the German economy has benefited to the utmost - perhaps more than any other country - since the introduction of the euro, and Berlin will go to great lengths to safeguard the common currency.

 

And the Germans believe they can achieve this is by imposing the Teutonic model of fiscal discipline on eurozone members. However, it must be stressed that both Germany and France are guilty of flouting the fiscal rules.

 

 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel can be blamed for taking too long to act when the crisis erupted in Greece two years ago. But this is the reality of the situation, as is also the fact that Germany’s role in the fight to save the euro is the most crucial one of all.

 

 

The only way this financial union will work is for all its members to hand over some political authority to Brussels. Financial union without a corresponding political union is simply not sustainable.

 

 

Critics may cry that Europe is compromising its democratic values, but they must not forget that the whole point of a fiscal and, by extension, a political union is, ostensibly, to ensure Europe’s prosperity and safety within a democratic framework. If the vision is a centralised, unified Europe transcending national boundaries, then ceding some sovereignty in the name of a fuller union is not necessarily an assault on democracy. In fact, it’s the way to a different type of democracy - one based on a United States of Europe

 

 

Europeans must now decide what type of union it is they want. Once they clear that hurdle, it will be easier to achieve their goals. If note, the union faces an uncertain future.