Rogier Van Vaerenbergh

This year we celebrate the 60th anniversary of the EU. What began with the signing of the Treaties of Rome and the European Community of Coal and Steel has developed in the biggest peace project the world has ever seen. In this year where for the first time the EU will not expand but will […]

In 2014 Juncker presented his vision on the European Energy policy, whereas we need to pool our resources, combine our infrastructures and unite our negotiation power with third countries. He established 4 pillars for an Energy Union: creating an Energy Union by pooling resources and connecting networks; diversifying energy sources; helping Member States becoming less […]

The European Central Bank (ECB) is the central bank for the euro and administers the monetary policy of the eurozone, which consists of 19 EU member states and is one of the largest currency areas in the world. It is one of the world’s most important central banks and is one of the seven institutions […]

Since the advent of the Bretton Woods System when the dollar was issued as an international reserve currency, Europeans especially the French, decried ‘le privilege exorbitant’ of the US. Indeed, the exorbitant privilege was used and misused throughout the 1960s, to pay for Johnson’s New Society and for the Vietnam war. This currency power has […]

What is next? Post-industrial areas – particularly in Wales and Northern Ireland – benefit significantly from EU structural funds, and their governments will continue to advocate on their behalf. But these funds aside, who will speak in the Brexit negotiations for the interests of those people who have just voted to leave? When Britain’s fiscal […]

Geo-economics may be defined in two different ways: as the relationship between economic policy, changes in national power and geopolitics (in other words, the geopolitical consequences of economic phenomena); or as the economic consequences of trends in geopolitics and national power. Both the notion that ‘trade follows the flag’ (that the projection of national power […]

On one level, the recurring Greek crises fits the idea from Karl Marx of history repeating itself, first as tragedy, then as farce. Greece came close to a eurozone exit last summer. While it will probably come close again this year, it is unlikely to leave. The eurozone, Greece and International Monetary Fund (IMF) stood at […]

Competition means that businesses are under constant pressure to be better than their competitors so as to win customers. Competition stimulates innovation and technical progress, and this improves consumer welfare. Consumer interests are thus at the core of competition policy. In a competitive market, each business strives to “be the best”, attracting consumers by cutting […]

With the start of the 12th round of trade negotiations between the USA and the EU, the stars are shining bright in completing the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) at the end of this year. But that is if we only count the opinion of the policy advisor’s and politicians. Civil society and the unions are […]

With the attacks in Paris last year some leaders in the European Parliament have called for a pan-European intelligence agency. The leader of ALDE, Verhofstadt, is a proponent of such an organization. He has called for more cooperation between intelligence agencies or the start of an independent European Intelligence Agency. With this call he has […]

At the heart of the Economic and Monetary Union lies a fundamental contradiction. On the one hand, the EMU requires considerable integration of policies at euro zone level, and a high degree of economic discipline at the national level. On the other hand, most people of the euro zone do not want to be ruled […]

When a country joins a monetary union, it gives up its monetary policy stance that is tailored to its needs, i.e. the level of interest rates and money supply that is appropriate for its economy. The resulting common policy is a one-size-fits-all policy. Booming regions, with high inflation, have the lowest interest rate in the […]