"Its [the refugee waves] solution would be straightforward in the presence
of a central authority empowered to take decisions. But this is not how
the EU works. It works through co-ordination and harmonisation –
through fiscal rules, banking regulation and neighbourhood policies. But
none of them prevented the crisis, and none of them helps solve it. The
problem was never a lack of rules or policies. It was the simple fact
that certain things in life cannot just be co-ordinated.
Nor are member states big enough to act on their own -
not even Germany. Angela Merkel is, for once, on the right side of the
argument. But Germany does not have the capacity to absorb all the EU
immigrants.
Viktor Orban, Hungary’s populist prime minister,
produced a good rendition of the mindset that gives rise to collective
action problems. He said last week this was not a European crisis, but a
German crisis, since all the refugees wanted to go to Germany. Germany,
I would add, acted in a similarly cavalier fashion during the euro zone
crises.
The collective action problem is nobody’s fault in
particular. It is hard-wired into the system. The EU’s job is not to
prevent financial crises, or to save children from drowning in the
Mediterranean Sea."
This sounds like when every individual [nation, in this case] wants to adhere closely to its own agenda and ideas, collective action falls flat.
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