Why the EU needs to be fundamentally reformed

We would like to share with you an article published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) and written by Sven Simon, MEP EPP, Professor of International and European Law at Philipps University of Marburg and Chair of the Committee on Constitutional Affairs of the European Parliament (AFCO).

Read the article in German here: LINK

"The world order on which Europe’s security and well-being were founded has given way to a policy of imperial power. If the EU wishes to continue to play a role in the future, it must become more capable of taking action.

The international order on which Europe’s security and well-being were based for decades no longer exists. It is not weakened, nor is it in a state of transition: it has vanished. In its place, a world of imperial structures, strategic power politics and the systematic exploitation of dependencies is taking hold. In this order, it is not formal equality that matters, but the capacity to act politically – whether actors shape events or are shaped by them.

Europe finds itself at the centre of this new reality: too large to be ignored, yet too fragmented to be taken seriously as a power. In key policy areas – security, energy, technology, industry and capital markets – national sovereignty alone is no longer capable of acting. Under the conditions of the new world order, strategic sovereignty can only be organised at the European level.

Federal strength rather than national fragmentation

The experience of the European Union has long confirmed this. Where Europe has federal decision-making and oversight structures, it is able to act and assert itself. The internal market, trade policy, competition law and monetary policy demonstrate what is possible when responsibilities are concentrated and decisions are made in a binding manner. Where, on the other hand, Europe clings to national fragmentation, it emerges politically weakened, pitted against one another and dependent on external actors.

Coordination alone does not generate power in this world. A confederal order remains a collection of national vetoes. What appears to individual states as protection actually creates vulnerability in the context of imperial competition. With growing dependence on energy imports, critical raw materials, global supply chains and foreign technology, the strategic risk for Europe is increasing. Those who lose their economic and security autonomy will, in the long term, also lose the ability to defend their own values.

Trust is being undermined

The ability to act at the federal level in certain policy areas is therefore inevitable from a geopolitical perspective. It is precisely this necessity, however, that is meeting with ever-increasing political and social resistance across Europe. The reason for this lies less in the issue itself than in the institutional structure of the European Union. The EU possesses considerable regulatory power; its decisions increasingly affect highly political key sectors of state sovereignty. At the same time, its institutional architecture is only capable to a limited extent of ensuring political responsiveness, public accountability and adaptive governance.

Highly political decisions emerge within a complex, multi-level system that diffuses political responsibility, depersonalises political conflicts and systematically prioritises legal continuity over the capacity for political correction. In practice, European law is easier to create than to amend or repeal. This structural asymmetry generates dissatisfaction – not because European politics is fundamentally rejected, but because it is perceived as difficult to correct from a political perspective.

It is precisely this lack of capacity for revision that undermines trust. Where political decisions cannot be visibly reviewed, adjusted or, in case of doubt, even revoked, the impression of technocratic inevitability is created. Federal solutions then appear not as a necessity, but as an irreversible transfer of powers. In this way, institutional shortcomings block the political mediation that is precisely required during those phases of integration that would be objectively necessary.

The EU must be reformed now!

From this diagnosis emerges a reform architecture comprising five interconnected elements.

Firstly, a European executive is needed that is clearly politically accountable, whose actions can be attributed to the Parliament. European politics needs visible accountability, not just efficient procedures. In other words: the European Commission must become politically electable and removable.

Secondly, the European Parliament must be substantially strengthened, in particular through a genuine right of legislative initiative – not primarily to create new laws, but to be able to propose independently which existing European laws should be amended, adapted or repealed. Political accountability without autonomous decision-making power remains incomplete. It is precisely the ability to correct flawed strategic decisions that has been lacking so far, yet it is fundamental to democratic acceptance.

European law must not be irreversible

Thirdly, strategic policy requires dynamic European law. In key policy areas, systematic mechanisms for review and revision must be established, for example through review and sunset clauses. European law must not be understood as an irreversible end state, but as a politically verifiable decision. The possibility of amending or repealing EU law in a targeted manner is not a sign of weakness, but a prerequisite for democratic stability.

Fourthly, functional federalisation is necessary – where appropriate within the framework of enhanced cooperation. In areas of genuine European interdependence, clusters of sovereignty must emerge that bring together decision-making and oversight powers, without pursuing generalised centralisation.

What role will Europe still play in the future?

Finally, Europe’s capacity to act requires a political declaration. Formal transparency is not enough. A forum for accountability linked to the European Parliament could contribute to this, without transferring decision-making powers. It could bring together, on a case-by-case basis, MEPs from the majority and the minority, representatives of national parliaments and the European executive in a clear accountability role, to make decisions publicly comprehensible both before and after their adoption.

The old order has vanished. The new one has not yet been written. It is time to decide whether Europe will be an object or a subject in this world. The capacity to act at a federal level is inevitable from a geopolitical perspective, but politically sustainable only if European power remains verifiable, correctable and democratically accountable. This is not a technical detail, but the key to democratic acceptance."