The severity of the pandemic shock has varied greatly across euro area countries and sectors, which is leading to uneven economic developments and recovery speeds. Countries more heavily affected by the coronavirus crisis and the associated containment measures suffered the sharpest falls in economic activity in the first half of 2020.
Reforms are needed, in fact long overdue, to improve their functioning in order to increase their legitimacy and safeguard their role in the future. It is easier to reform the existing institutions than to dismiss them and try to build new ones. By definition, however, multilateralism cannot be preserved by the goodwill of one side alone.