The financial and economic crisis in Europe is not over, and the radically opposing strategies on how to proceed has only increased the complexity of problems in the region, revealing the shortcomings of the EU’s architecture. The European Union, perhaps for the first time in its history of more than seventy years, is being perceived as a threat to the financial and monetary stability of the world. A Global Perspective on the European Economic Crisis explores the connection between internal EU actions and institutions and the external factors that influence the ongoing response to the European crisis. With a unique collection of international and interdisciplinary essays, this book considers the complex macroeconomic and challenging political landscape of Europe, looking at how and why the European Union is untenable in its current state. The chapters outline what should be done to make the common currency area more resilient, and explain why external events are particularly problematic for the EU, ultimately offering suggestions for what Europeans should do in order to avoid harmful internal consequences. This volume confronts the causes of the crisis’ persistence, its economic and political consequences, and the impact of more recent events and policy decisions. It will be of interest to researchers and policy-makers keen to understand the EU relations and the influence of international organizations in the European economic crisis.

The financial crisis of 2008-09 took an unexpected turn upon challenging a core symbol of Europe's integration project, the Euro. In this volume, leading experts tackle questions on the capacity of the EU to respond, the manner discontent electorates will hold their leaders to account, and the implications for Europe's future relations with Russia.

Economic shocks pose a threat to health and health system performance by increasing people’s need for health care and making access to care more difficult – a situation compounded by cuts in public spending on health and other social services. But these negative effects can be avoided by timely public policy action. While important public policy levers lie outside the health sector, in the hands of those responsible for fiscal policy and social protection, the health system response is critical. This book looks at how health systems in Europe reacted to pressure created by the financial and economic crisis that began in 2008. Drawing on the experience of over 45 countries, the authors:  analyse health system responses to the crisis in three policy areas: public funding for the health system; health coverage; and health service planning, purchasing and delivery assess the impact of these responses on health systems and population health identify policies most likely to sustain the performance of health systems facing financial pressure explore the political economy of implementing reforms in a crisis The book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the choices available to policy-makers - and the implications of failing to protect health and health-system performance - in the face of economic and other forms of shock.

'An important and timely contribution. David Howden has brought together an excellent collection of essays which go beyond the theoretical discussion of Austrian business cycle theory, exploring instead its empirical relevance to one of the most serious financial crises in modern European history.' – Mark Pennington, Queen Mary, University of London, UK 'This is an important and refreshing book which provides an approach of current problems quite different from what is (too often) written. In my opinion it is the only correct analysis of the economic crisis and of European problems. In spite of the diversity both of contributors and topics, a common and rigorous intellectual foundation gives unity and strength to this book. It offers the clues for the best understanding of present and future economic problems.' – Pascal Salin, Emeritus Professor of Economics, University Paris-Dauphine, France 'The current European recession is being offered as an excuse for a wider, more expansive centralized Europe. Failure to recognize the true causes of the recession – failed institutions that have plagued Europe for years, and will continue to do so if permitted to continue – will prolong the current malaise, and hold Europe back from its new future. Let us hope that the current volume does much to bring this new Europe to us.' – From the foreword by Jesús Huerta de Soto This critical and thought-provoking book explores the causes and consequences of Europe's failed political and economic institutions. Europe's recession has created new challenges as market turmoil has shaken the foundations of the twin pillars of the new drive for European integration – political and monetary unions. This book critically assesses the patchwork solutions continually offered to hold the troubled unions together. Failed political policies, from the prodigious 'Common Agricultural Policy' to ever more common fiscal stimulus packages, are shown to have bred less than stellar results in the past, and to have devastating implications for future European growth. The contributors outline the manner through which European monetary union has subsidized and continues to exacerbate the burgeoning debt crisis. Most strikingly, the interplay between Europe's political and economic realms is exposed as the boondoggle it is, with increasingly bureaucratic institutions plaguing the continent and endangering future potential. Combining political and economic analysis, this comprehensive book will prove essential for researchers and students in international business and macroeconomics. Educated laymen wanting a keener perspective on Europe's recession will also find this book to be invaluable.

The economies of the European countries are still in recession, the development process is at a standstill, companies are facing financial difficulties, and the EU’s monetary policy is tight and focused on lowering inflation. The fiscal problems and high debt levels of the northern European countries are of great importance, and they are the consequences of both the European economy’s structural characteristics and the EU’s policies. The economic area of Eastern Europe, the Balkans and the Black Sea countries is also vital, due to its special economic characteristics. The effects of the economic crisis on this particular area are catalytic, while the prospects for recovery are doubtful. The present book deals with the key aspects of the economic crisis in Europe, especially focusing on southeast Europe and the Balkans. The consequences of the crisis in these countries are analyzed and suggestions for how to address the crisis are outlined.

Can the eurozone’s emergence from crisis turn into a real economic recovery and a new vision for Europe’s future? Or is Europe heading for a “lost decade” in terms of growth and a rise in old style nationalism? Kemal Derviş and Jacques Mistral have assembled an international group of economic analysts who provide perspectives on the most audacious supranational governance experiment in history. Will the crisis mark the end of the dream of “ever closer union” or lead to a renewed impetus to integrate, perhaps taking novel forms? Among the key issues explored are the · Onset, evolution, and ramifications of the euro crisis from the perspective of three countries especially hard hit—Greece, Italy, and Spain. · Concerns, priorities, and issues in France and Germany, the couple that has so far always driven European integration. · Effects and lessons in two key policy areas: banking union and social policies. The volume concludes with a possible renewed vision for the EU in the 2020s, including much greater political integration but where some countries may keep their national currencies and share less of their sovereignty. It is a vision of two Europes within one, ready for the twenty-first century.

How has the economic and financial crisis that started in 2007 affected European integration? Observers have been speculating about whether the crisis will ultimately lead to a strengthening or weakening of the European Union. This book studies the effects of the crisis on EU policy-making and institutional arrangements on one hand, and citizens’ EU attitudes and political parties’ electoral strategies on the other. It concludes that, at least in the short run, the crisis has overall created an opportunity for European integration rather than an obstacle. First, it has triggered events of proposed and actual far-reaching policy and institutional change. Second, negative effects on public opinion have not (yet) systematically translated into tendencies of stagnation or disintegration. The book brings together established scholars of European integration whose diverse research expertise contributes to an improved theoretical and empirical understanding of how the economic and financial crisis has affected EU policies, institutions and citizens. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of European Integration.

This book analyzes the European Great Recession of 2008-12, its economic and social causes, its historical roots, and the policies adopted by the European Union to find a way out of it. It contains explicit debates with several economists and analysts on some of the most controversial questions about the causes of the crisis and the policies applied by the European Union. It presents the cases of Iceland, Greece and Ireland, the countries that first declined into crisis in Europe, each of them in a different way. Iceland is a case study for reckless banking practices, Greece of reckless public spending, and Ireland of reckless household indebtedness. At least seven other countries, mostly from the peripheries of Europe, had similarly reckless banking and spending practices. In the center of the book are the economic and social causes of the crisis. Contemporary advanced capitalism became financialized, de-industrialized and globalized and got rid of the "straitjacket" of regulations. Solid banking was replaced by high-risk, "casino-type" activity. The European common currency also had a structural problem — monetary unification without a federal state and fiscal unification. The other side of the same coin is European hyper-consumerism. A new lifestyle emerged during two super-prosperous periods in the 1950s to 1960s, and during the 1990s to 2006. Trying to find an exit policy, the European Union turned to strict austerity measures to curb the budget deficit and indebtedness. This book critically analyzes the debate around austerity policy. The creation of important supra-national institutions, and of a financial supervisory authority and stability mechanisms, strengthens integration. The correction of the euro’s structural mistake by creating a quasi-fiscal unification is even more important. The introduction of mandatory fiscal rules and their supervision promises a long-term solution for a well-functioning common currency. These measures, meanwhile, create a two-tier European Union with a fast-track core. This book suggests that the European Union will emerge stronger from the crisis. This book will be of particular interest to students and researchers of economics, history, political science and international finance, but will also prove profitable reading for practitioners and the interested public.

In recent years the countries of southern Europe have undergone, with varying intensity, a serious and prolonged economic crisis. Most have had to implement comprehensive economic adjustment programmes, including a wide range of structural reforms. Economic Crisis and Structural Reforms in Southern Europe examines these reforms, drawing policy lessons from their successes and failures. This book employs two basic strands of analysis: issues of policy design, and political economy considerations. It considers the choice of timing and sequencing of reforms, the choice of the appropriate policy instruments, the pressure of interest groups and the political calculations involved in reforms. Featuring chapters in which contributors explore both national cases of specific structural reforms, and a comparative approach in order to evaluate similar reforms across countries, this important and topical work explores ongoing issues within the economy. Focusing on the challenges of designing and implementing structural reforms under conditions of crisis, this book will be of interest to policy makers and researchers from national and international organizations as well as academics and members of research institutes interested in the economics and politics of the Eurozone crisis.

A #1 Sunday Times bestseller [UK] A titanic battle is being waged for Europe's integrity and soul, with the forces of reason and humanism losing out to growing irrationality, authoritarianism, and malice, promoting inequality and austerity. The whole world has a stake in a victory for rationality, liberty, democracy, and humanism. In January 2015, Yanis Varoufakis, an economics professor teaching in Austin, Texas, was elected to the Greek parliament with more votes than any other member of parliament. He was appointed finance minister and, in the whirlwind five months that followed, everything he had warned about-the perils of the euro's faulty design, the European Union's shortsighted austerity policies, financialized crony capitalism, American complicity and rising authoritarianism-was confirmed as the "troika" (the European Central Bank, International Monetary Fund, and European Commission) stonewalled his efforts to resolve Greece's economic crisis. Here, Varoufakis delivers a fresh look at the history of Europe's crisis and America's central role in it. He presents the ultimate case against austerity, proposing concrete policies for Europe that are necessary to address its crisis and avert contagion to America, China, and the rest of the world. With passionate, informative, and at times humorous prose, he warns that the implosion of an admittedly crisis-ridden and deeply irrational European monetary union should, and can, be avoided at all cost.