Sworn to Grim Necessity? Imperfections of European Economic Governance, Normative Political Theory, and Supreme Emergency

Abstract

This contribution examines the Euro Area crisis and European economic governance reforms through a less technocratic lens. It argues for the need to reframe debate around foundation issues in normative legal and political theory. The defining issue is supreme emergency. The credibility of its capacity to act in supreme emergency is of existential significance for the Euro Area. At the same time this capacity poses is bound up with basic legitimacy issues. In particular, it involves ultimately contentious requirements for supranational executive discretion, including credible contingent commitments to take exceptional measures. Meeting these requirements exposed a power vacuum within the Euro Area, consequent on domestic political constraints. This vacuum was filled—if reluctantly—by the European Central Bank. However, difficult legitimacy issues remain. They leave open the credibility of the ECB contingent commitment to act in supreme emergency.