Inter-European solidarity has been in short supply across the Euro zone. While politicians deployed solidarity as one of the rationales for aiding the Greek economy, the notion has largely lost its appeal as the crisis continues. In Finland the rapid erosion of sense of solidarity is embedded in a sense of injustice

Keranen, Outi

LSE Research Online

OutiKeranen4/5/2013Fair and Unfair Solidarity?blogs.lse.ac.uk /eurocrisispress/2013/04/05/fair-and-unfair-solidarity/By Outi KeranenInter-European solidarity has been in short supply across the Euro zone. While politicians deployed solidarity as oneof the rationales for aiding the Greek economy, the notion has largely lost its appeal as the crisis continues. InFinland the rapid erosion of sense of solidarity is embedded in a sense of injustice. The EU is not only an economic union but also a normative community sharing values and beliefs. Solidarity hastraditionally been one of them; the common market and redistributing the benefits of economic development fromthe richer to the poorer regions of Europe have been seen as generating prosperity and stability for all. Equity,reciprocity and fairness have, at least on paper, underwritten sense of mutual solidarity within the EU. However, aprofound sense of unfairness of the Euro crisis has undermined the notion of solidarity in the Finnish publicdiscourse; why should member states conducting responsible economic policy pick up the tab of those who havelived beyond their means, many Finns ask.In a policy speech on the EU last week, the Finnish Prime Minister, Jyrki Katainen, formulated his vision of solidarity.In catering for the public unease over the Finnish participation in the Euro zone rescue packages, Katainenarticulated the kind of solidarity the EU needs; ‘fairer solidarity’. ‘Unfair solidarity’, according to the Finnish PM, iswhat we are currently witnessing; member states opting for lax economic policy are bailed out by those playing bythe EU rules. What the EU needs, Katainen argues, is not large scale institutional reform, but ‘fairer integration’.Fairness, as he points out repeatedly, boils down to abiding by the common EU rules.Indeed, both advocates and critics of rescue packages in the Finnish public debates reject what are seen asSouthern European demands for unconditional political, social and economic solidarity. For many Finns participationin the Euro zone rescue effort has more to do with economic necessity than moral or social kinship. That different conceptualizations across Euro zone states of what solidarity reallymeans is hardly surprising. Even official EU documents, often referring tosolidarity, fail to provide an unambiguous definition of the concept. While thesolidarity clause in the Lisbon Treaty compels member states to assist oneanother in the case of terrorist attacks or natural disasters, solidarity beyond therealm of security remains an elusive concept. Ultimately, the meaning and scopesolidarity are likely to be determined by what is politically expedient in eachmember state.As the crisis deepens, the different notions of European solidarity are likely todrift further apart. This serves as a stark reminder of the fundamentallycontested and uncertain future of the EU. Economic union may be able tofunction without a sense of solidarity but the EU – with its distinctly politicaldimension – is far beyond being merely a common market. What is clear is thatif the way out of the current crisis is deeper political integration, the growingsolidarity deficit is bound to make further political integration a task of herculeanproportions.  1/1

Fair and unfair solidarity?

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