In September 2010, the Heinrich Böll Foundation has convened a Future Commission made up of 50 experts under the title "European Solidarity and Strength". Its mission: to come up with concepts and proposals for action in the five following main fields of European politics that could give cooperation new impetus: European Climate and Energy Policy, European Enlargement and Neighborhood Policy, European Agricultural Policy and European Economic, Financial and Social Policy.

Today, the European Union is at a crossroads. On the one hand, the debt crisis has brought to light the need for more cooperation and integration. At the same time, public support for an expanded community that sticks together and is mutually liable for all of its members is waning. Solidarity and Strength of the EU are closely linked in this context: without internal cohesion, there is also no external ability to act. Europe has to prove the capability of the liberal constitutional state, the social market economy and supranational integration to overcome the enormous challenges of our time and thus also promote its model.

Particularly in times when there is growing fatigue for integration, we need a public debate on the outlook for the EU. How far should and can solidarity in Europe go? Which binding rules does a community that stands together in times of crisis need? What political decisions have to be made now to move the EU forward again?

The results of the Future Commission’s one year of work was presented for discussion at the EU Quo vadis conference in Berlin on October 19 and 20, 2011.

 

• Dossier in German