Celi, et. al. posit that Europe was ill prepared to face the Covid-19 pandemic. The 2008 Financial Crisis and the accompanying austerity, weakened the health infrastructure of the Southern Periphery countries. Even with the NextGenerationEUInitiative, the authors do not think there will be a symmetric recovery. Germany and the Eastern Periphery will simply recover quicker due to their export-oriented political economy.
The authors think that the EU needs a true “Hamiltonian” moment, which would involve adopting a common fiscal policy in support of the common monetary policy. Hamilton thought that the U.S. would only survive if the individual states saw their futures tied together. Otherwise, individual state interests would eventually tear the young country apart. For this discussion forum, is the current Covid-19 pandemic the crisis that finally convinces Europeans to adopt more common approaches? Are proposals such as the NextGenerationEUInitiative the way forward? If not, what kind of crisis would it take for the EU to reach the point where they see their futures tied together? What will it take for the EU to have this “Hamiltonian” moment?

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