Causes of Eurozone Crises

No-one is optimistic about the Eurozone’s prospects. This column highlights the major causes of the Eurozone crisis, highlighting that many US economists thought the euro a bad idea from the outset. Previous emerging market crises have important lessons for Europe – if Alexis Tsipras were able to shift gears in the way that Kim Dae Jung did in Korea, he would better serve his country. After six years of crisis in the Eurozone, it is hard to find anyone who is optimistic about its prospects. To make the monetary union work seems to require that the Member States relinquish more national sovereignty than they originally agreed to. Meanwhile the crisis has made the public in most of Member States less inclined to give up sovereignty than before, even if their elites ask them to.