One reason for the lack of credibility of national politics is that it keeps on giving people the illusion that national powers are capable of tackling issues (energy, climate, finance, security, migration, primary goods) which are not national, but continental and global.” These words, spoken before the outbreak of the sovereign debt crisis, are highly relevant.
It is necessary to further increase the coordination of economic and structural policies and the incentives for reforms, to shift from an intergovernmental form of management based on the peer review of national policies to the formulation of truly common policies. The scope of the project for a common euro-area budget must be defined as well as the timeframe for its implementation.