Jürgen Habermas calls for more political integration of EU

The current euro crisis demands stronger EU political integration, writes the German social philosopher Jürgen Habermas in the Blog A Europa desalinhada: "In the short term, the crisis will require careful attention from Europe's political actors. But above and beyond this effort, they should not neglect the problem of fundamental weaknesses in the structure of the monetary union that can only be resolved by the development of an adequate political union: the EU does not have the necessary competence to harmonise national economies, which are marked by drastic divergences in their capacity to compete. The "pact for Europe" that has recently been reinforced has only served to aggravate a long-standing problem: non-binding agreements in the circle of government leaders are either ineffective or anti-democratic, and it is for this reason that they should be replaced by common decisions taken in a clearly defined institutional framework. The German federal government has become the catalyst for the increasing dissolution of solidarity in Europe, because it has spent too long ignoring the single constructive issue that the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has laconically described as the issue of 'More Europe'."

» full article (external link, Portuguese)
More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » Europe
All available articles from » Jürgen Habermas
Who's saying what » Ways out of the debt crisis

» To the complete press review of Friday, October 28, 2011