A Federalist Alternative for European Governance

Please Join us on Tuesday, April 22nd, for a book talk with Professor Sergio Fabbrini on his latest book, A Federalist Alternative for European Governance: The European Union in Hard Times.

How did the European Union (EU) deal with the crises of the 2010s and 2020s? These crises arose in policy realms that were the province of national governments, so the European Council was the driving institution for managing them. National governments were able to take decisions, but their decisions were contradictory and unaccountable, and regularly hindered by divisions between them. In order to manage a policymaking process dominated by the claims of national and sub-regional governments, Sergio Fabbrini argues that intergovernmental governance has had to transform the EU into an international organization. Fabbrini shows that differentiated integration would further distance the EU from the project of an ‘ever closer union’ and, on the basis of a comparative federalism approach, he proposes an alternative paradigm of a multi-tier Europe with a federalist core to balance national sovereignties and supranational authority.

About the Speaker:

Sergio Fabbrini is Professor of Political Science and International Relations, Intesa Sanpaolo Chair on European Governance, at the Political Science Department of the Luiss Guido Carli in Rome. He is a highly respected scholar of European politics renowned for bringing federalism back to the scientific debate. His recent publications include, Europe’s Future: Decoupling and Reforming (Cambridge, 2019), Which European Union?: Europe after the Euro Crisis (Cambridge, 2015), and Compound Democracies: Why the United States and Europe Are Becoming Similar (Oxford University Press, 2010). He is also a political editor for the Italian financial newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore, for which he was awarded the 2017 Spinelli Prize.

This event is presented by the Institute of Governmental Studies, and is co-sponsored by the Institute of European Studies and the Institute of International Studies.

This is an accessible event. If you are a disabled person and need reasonable accommodations to participate they will be provided. For more information, and to make a request, please contact Ezra Bristow at [email protected]

Host or Publisher Institute of Governmental Studies