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In the wake of the Euro crisis, the mission statement on the European Central Bank's (ECB) website was changed from 'Our mission is to serve Europe's citizens' to 'Our mission is to serve the people of Europe'. This article situates this discursive shift within a broader change of the ECB's self‐presentation in public discourses and explores its meaning in terms of political theory and public law. The article argues that the shift represents a response to the perceived necessity of reimagining the ECB's foundation of legitimate governmental authority following its exercise of emergency powers during the Euro crisis. The discourse emphasizes an organic link between the ECB and 'the people of Europe' as a political subject able to authorize previously unauthorized governmental practices such as the outright monetary transactions programme. It reflects, furthermore, a new governing philosophy that stresses flexibility and discretion rather than strict adherence to rules in the ECB's exercise of power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The politicization of the European Central Bank (ECB) is a recurrent theme in debates on the EU after the crisis, yet it is one that still suffers from a considerable degree of vagueness. This is unfortunate as it hinders the development of useful discussions on the place and legitimacy of the ECB within Europe's institutional order. To tackle this problem, this article presents a systematic analysis of the concept of ECB politicization and an agenda for future research on this phenomenon. After reviewing existing uses of the term in the form of three dichotomies – politicization versus independence, impartiality, and convention – the article proposes an alternative, preference‐based definition of politicization as a deviation from technocratic policy‐making in the ECB. Building on this definition, the article then indicates three avenues for the empirical study of politicization centred, respectively, on elite interviews and surveys, the analysis of central bankers' networks and the study of ECB language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present results from a survey of 785 prospective social science teachers who were asked about their attitudes on the euro crisis during their first year at university in Germany. The students strongly believe that the crisis is mainly due to excessive public debt and lack of competitiveness in the crisis countries but do not consider Germany's persistent trade surplus as a major problem. A regression analysis suggests that students' views about Germany's trade surplus are unrelated to their political orientation, their general support for the European idea or their perceptions of its efficiency and fairness. The implications for European integration and citizenship education are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Preserving the trust of bond markets is crucial for the world's many indebted countries, but it is still unclear when and how national or international actors can contribute to this goal. We present a set of arguments addressing this question and test them on the case of the eurozone debt crisis. Distinguishing between actors' capacity and willingness to avoid defaults, we argue that the crisis was marked by a lack of capacity at the national level, and limited or uncertain willingness at the European level. Accordingly, we find that European‐level efforts to reassure markets had considerably stronger effects than similar efforts at the national level. Furthermore, national efforts appear to have mattered the least in countries with the least capacity. These findings are based on a comprehensive new dataset of political events and relevant news, and they hold across a number of robustness checks and placebo tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Previous research finds citizens' attitudes towards international redistribution in the European sovereign debt crisis to be related to party preferences. This article further reveals the nature of this link. We show that citizens follow party cues on international bailouts, rather than having merely ideologically congruent positions. By employing an original survey experiment that exposes respondents to elite cues, we additionally uncover underlying dynamics. First, party cues mobilize support for bailouts even in the face of salient elite dissent and, second, even a strong elite consensus does not affect citizens without PID and low levels of political sophistication. The findings of the experiment are cross‐validated with data from the voter survey of European Election Study 2014. The results suggest that current debates about international bailout packages deepen a polarization between politicized and non‐politicized Europeans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, Europe has been facing the Euro crisis, questioning the whole process of European integration. However, scholars argue that this crisis also presents an opportunity for the Europeanization of national public spheres as public attention regarding Europe has increased. Therefore, this study examines the media discourse on the crisis and the possible convergence of the national public spheres of Germany and Spain. It investigates how the issue is framed and who participates in the discourse during the crisis between 2010 and 2014 in German and Spanish online quality newspapers. Based on a content analysis of 7,256 statements in 961 articles, frames were identified in a data-driven approach. Results show that German and Spanish media have Europeanized their framing during the crisis and mainly support Europe's policy. This convergence has occurred despite a slight renationalization of discourse participants, indicating that Europeanization has been increasingly sustained by national actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Political science analyses of the governance of the euro crisis largely build on conventional theories of European integration to account for the extent to which institutional developments either reflect supranationalism, inter-governmentalism or historical path-dependencies. This analytical focus captures the usual integration dynamics and institutional design outcomes, but overlooks the constitutional dimension of how the crisis affects the EU's legal order. In this agenda-setting article, I draw attention to legal scholarship that highlights important deviations from the EU's 'legal normalcy'. Legal studies find that a number of emergency measures were taken on an extra-legal basis and through quasi-autocratic procedures. Normative reconstructions interpret this practice as a form of transnational state of exception which transitions into permanent traits of authoritarianism in the EU's legal order. I argue that their findings offer a new terrain for political science research which transcends the explanatory categories of integration theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers whether the creation of a budgetary union in the European EMU (economic and monetary union) is a feasible and suitable way to resolve the current impasse created by the euro crisis. The article begins by identifying the major drawbacks concerning the transposition of prescriptions regarding fiscal federalism to the current E(M)U scenario, with the outlook that this appears to be an extemporaneous solution. It then indicates the alternative conception of an incomplete budgetary union, which is mostly characterized by the setting up of specific insurance mechanisms. These alternative measures are shown to be more realistic and feasible, since they combine path dependency with an innovative appropriation of specific features of the classic federalism model, modifying them to an E(M)U scenario in a heterodox way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes how the apparently merely technical introduction of reversed qualified majority voting for the excessive deficit procedure included in the Six Pack and the Fiscal Compact shifts not only the institutional balance between the European Commission and the Member States but also the relationship between liberalization and social regulation in the EU. In bringing together institutional analysis and a political economy perspective, the paper shows how the strengthening of the Commission's discretionary decision-making authority in a context of intergovernmental power imbalances between debtor and creditor states extends the asymmetry between market-making and market-correction to the area of political decision-making. In consequence, economic and social policies are subordinated to the primacy of austerity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A crisis can reveal characteristics of a political order which in normal times remain invisible. Two such moments of clarification hit European Union (EU) countries in quick succession. The euro crisis tested the resolve of leaders and peoples to save the single currency. The geopolitical standoff around Ukraine necessitated a joint response to a show of force. In both cases we saw a 'return of politics'. Geopolitical interests trumped economic ones; a need for government (and not just governance) made itself felt; European politics became more salient and intertwined with domestic politics. In the turmoil, notwithstanding calls for a big leap toward greater unity, the European Union also showed its dynamic in-between nature. The public perceives this politicisation perfectly, hence both its disenchantment and the calls for more democracy. EU integration, after 'permissive consensus' and 'constraining dissensus', could be moving to the era of binding dissensus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we examine the constraints on Germany's influence over reforms of the Economic and Monetary Union's (EMU) macroeconomic governance regime. Drawing on the insights of historical institutionalism, we show that the German government's control over the process is constrained by the increased sunk costs of European monetary integration and the unintended negative spillovers from its management of the eurozone crisis. While the German government attempted to promote the domestic societal interests underpinning its creditor preferences by deflecting the burden of macroeconomic and institutional adjustment onto the debtor countries, negative feedback loops linked to the pursuit of these preferences induced it to accept a less orthodox and increasingly accommodative central bank to make the EMU sustainable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study identifies commonalities between two historical incidents of debt assumption - in the United States in 1791 and in present-day Europe. By comparing the interests and behaviour of key players in these two incidents, we find three major parallels: first, in their strategic interactions, parties both for and against debt mutualization raise arguments based on notions of fairness and morality; second, in both historical episodes we find harsh rhetoric levelled against private creditors, who are derided as greedy speculators; third, bargaining is an essential element of the debt assumption process. Bargaining is directed toward limiting or expanding the scope of debt assumption. Further, bargaining typically leads to some form of conditionality imposed in order to increase the chances of the debts being repaid or to ensure benefits accrue to the parties assuming the debt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]