29 December 2020

A difficult year looms for the European Union

BY DUNCAN ROBINSON

INTERNAL FRICTIONS, external worries and some long-anticipated farewells will be the order of the day for the European Union in 2021. A colossal amount of effort went into agreeing to issue €750bn ($888bn) in collective debt for the first time to allay a financial crisis, as covid-19 racked the continent. In 2021 EU politicians will learn that agreeing to borrow the money was the easy bit—agreeing how to spend it will be much harder.

Sceptical countries, such as the Netherlands, will keep a close eye on what governments are doing with the money; Spanish and Italian politicians will not appreciate other EU countries butting into their financial affairs. They will have to get used to it, though. Such debates are normally the purview of purely national politics. In 2021 they will start to take place on a European level.

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