The Future of Europe: Another Historic Moment?

On 10 September 2025, in her much-anticipated State of the Union address, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen delivered a stark message: Europe is locked in a struggle to safeguard its independence in a world increasingly shaped by clashing imperialisms.

*****

The Future of Europe: Another Historic Moment?

On 10 September 2025, in her much-anticipated State of the Union address, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen delivered a stark message: Europe is locked in a struggle to safeguard its independence in a world increasingly shaped by clashing imperialisms. Her questions—whether Europe is equipped for this contest, whether it can muster urgency, political will, and unity of action—resonate well beyond institutional Brussels. They go to the heart of Europe’s trajectory at a moment when internal fragility and external turbulence intersect. The following reflections situate her diagnosis within the broader historical pattern of European integration: born of conflict, tested by recurrent crises, and repeatedly forced to prove its resilience. Just as Jean Monnet observed that “Europe will be forged in crises,” the present conjuncture may once again compel the Union to adapt its model of integration to the demands of a harsher geopolitical era.

Having emerged from the conflict that redefined global geopolitics in the first half of the twentieth century, European integration has seen its (relatively brief) history punctuated by internal and external shocks that have repeatedly called into question its very purpose and survival. From General de Gaulle’s “empty chair” to the pandemic, the list needs no repeating. Yet, each time, beyond the emotions of the moment, history has vindicated Jean Monnet: Europe advances through crises.

February 24, 2022, October 7, 2023, and January 20, 2025—the launch of a new phase of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, the terrorist Hamas attacks in Israel, and the swearing in of a new U.S. presidential administration—stand as tipping points in longer-term processes. Their acceleration has created a zone of maximum uncertainty, where “happy globalization” appears to give way to the return of power politics, once again posing an existential question to Europe. The turbulent first half of 2025 and the jolts of the summer illustrate this perfectly. Without venturing into predictions, the months ahead will be crucial.

States ill-prepared for future shocks

One conclusion is unavoidable, without lapsing into self-flagellation: Europe is not in its best shape. The reshaping of political landscapes following European and national elections compels a reconsideration of policies whose fulfillment presupposed sustained long-term effort. A succession of reports commissioned from eminent figures highlights that the single market remains unfinished, growth is stagnating, European societies are ill-prepared to withstand shocks of any kind, and that radical measures backed by strong political will are indispensable to meet these challenges.

The challenge of power politics

More fundamentally, as Pascal Lamy noted, the Union—born of war to build peace—appears ill-prepared to operate within the emerging logic of power politics. Member States are awakening only slowly, and unevenly, to this new geopolitical reality—one that requires actors to possess a clear sense of their interests and the power to pursue them. Progress, where it occurs, is anything but linear, driven more by the need to react than by a guiding vision. All this as the Union faces rivals who, at best, seek to push it off the table of great powers, and at worst, aim at its destruction—exploiting its internal divisions as their most effective weapon.

A bleak picture

The picture is bleak: a frantic arms race (catching up on decades of overindulgence in the “peace dividend” is needed, but where is the common strategic concept?); “negotiations” with the United States in which the EU refrains from using its powerful trade instruments (a stance likely to affect relations with other partners); a dramatic silence on the Middle East (beyond the humanitarian tragedy, the relationship with the southern neighborhood is at stake); and the difficulty of articulating a genuine initiative on Ukraine grounded in a distinctly European conception of security architecture.

Ambitious objectives but insufficient means

Whether or not the distinction between internal and external policies still makes sense, these questions now demand priority attention from decision-makers—even as the domestic agenda remains heavy. This includes hesitations over completing and implementing the two pillars of the previous legislature—climate action and the digital decade with its regulatory framework—while negotiations on the next financial perspectives open. These talks will be difficult—an understatement—but most observers agree: as things stand, the means are lacking in achieving the EU’s multiple, ambitious objectives. Moreover, further underscoring the artificiality of the internal/external divide, enlargement may now impose itself as the unavoidable geopolitical urgency it has in fact become.

Three conditions for a European relaunch

What, then, is to be done? Three conditions must be met even before attempting to answer:

• Cohesion among member states, whether born of fear of the void or conviction that Europe achieves more and better together (as after the initial panic of the pandemic).

• A legitimate common leadership that transcends institutional divisions (as in the Merkel-Macron-von der Leyen trio’s role in designing NextGenerationEU).

• A clear understanding of the new constraints of the international game and the limits that follow—some astute observers now prefer the term “strategic resilience” over “strategic autonomy.”

The way these conditions are—or are not—met will determine the contours of Europe’s way out of the current crisis:

• A “Wir schaffen das” rooted in renewed confidence in the solidity of European integration’s founding pillars, albeit with adaptations in their implementation.

• Or a more radical revision, defining an alternative model (and geometry?) of integration tailored to the imperatives of an age of power politics.

In her State of the Union address, President von der Leyen confirmed the diagnosis: Europe is engaged in a battle to secure its independence in a world of imperial contest. She asked the right questions: Is Europe equipped for this struggle? Can it summon urgency, moral strength, political will, and agility? Above all, can its institutions and member states forge the indispensable unity of vision and action required to define objectives and mobilize the means to achieve them?

No need for dramatization or sterile conjecture: through deliberate choices or gradual shifts, Europe’s future will take shape by the end of the legislative term.

This article will subsequently be published in French by Agridées.

(Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)