Press

“The EU’s initial belated and chaotic response and its failure to coordinate has weakened its reputation and provided fertile ground for euroskeptics,” said Agata Gostynska-Jakubowska, senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform in Brussels. “This shock is of a more symmetric nature and can hit the north and south equally. So the question is whether this makes the north more open to risk-sharing.”

A paper by Christian Odendahl of the Centre for European Reform, Sebastian Grund of Harvard Law School and Lucas Guttenberg of the Jacques Delors Centre suggests the European Commission could raise 440 billion euros in 30-year bonds to fund the collective costs of fighting coronavirus. Crucially, however, the money would be granted to member states rather than lent. Responsibility for repaying the bonds would be divided between EU members according to the relative size of their economies in 2050, allowing the strong to support the weak.

„Nach Corona wird es aber ohnehin schwer, eine Politik links von Johnson zu machen“, gibt Charles Grant, Chef des Centre for European Reform, zu bedenken. 

"Those countries that did not respond may have been worried they were about to be hit themselves, but the optics were absolutely atrocious and made even worse by the fact at the same time, China and Russia were taking advantage and sending medical teams and medical treatments," says Luigi Scazzieri, a research fellow at the Centre for European Reform.

"The way other member-states initially responded to Italy’s coronavirus plight has shaped the narrative of the crisis," says Luigi Scazzieri, of the Centre for European Reform (CER). 

Christian Odendahl and John Springford and the Centre for European Reform want governments to avoid the economic mistakes of 2008 by stimulating the “economy once the containment phase is lifted”.

"Basically the outcome of the summit is something not particularly surprising but still it’s obviously an outcome which is going to cast a shadow on a previously pretty efficient EU response," said Agata Gostyńska-Jakubowska from the Centre for European Reform.