European Groundhog day: will we ever wake up?

LinkedIn blog post, 21/09/2025, by Sven Franck (en français , in Deutsch)

If you are a Europe aficionado or among the record high population that believes more Europe is kinda warranted, you must also start to believe we are in the equivalent of a European Groundhog day.

Every mid September at 9:00 am, the Commission President wakes you up with SOTEU - the state of the European Union address. A stronger Europe is summoned, joint defence is preached and treaty reforms are teased. Next, Mario Draghi issues a report or reminder begging for all of this to be done asap. Then, various 💩 hits the fan, prompting press releases of the Commission. Depending on the iteration we also get an existential bummer like Covid, or the EU-US trade deal, but more EU is nowhere in the making and suddenly, it's again mid September, 9:00 am, and we start over.

A 27-fold prisoner's dilemma

Let's face it: member states don't really feel like going down the path of less relevance, more subsidiarity and dare we say the f-word: federalism. They like taking the Commission President along when they do foreign policy and unanimity is their catch-all excuse to maintain the status quo. While Trump can play 4D chess, European heads of state cannot figure out a 27-strong prisoner's dilemma, mounting up losses for citizens through their unwillingness to cooperate beyond the minimum necessary.

Problem is, a European democracy has never been done. There is no blue print. Just stuff that sounds easy on paper. Like transnational lists: as if your candidate from Cyprus will swoon a Finnish elector on the arctic circle. Ditto for the United State of Europe: we cannot just copy the US. Kentucky is not France. After often centuries, EU member states won't just say, "We be Europe". It's so unfathomable, nobody in power seems willing to even try.

If you build it, they will come (and maybe even copy it)

I always regard Volt Europa as a mini-EU. We have big and small chapters with diametrically differing opinions. A European Board (think Commission) and a conflict resolution body (think CJEU). We don't have a Parliament (long story) but a Council. Ours is called Country Council. And there is only one.

We still have some way to go to figuring out how our own internal European democracy should work. I like the idea ofcsomething that resembles the European Union we propose in our programme. Practice what we preach. Speaking of, we always look for best practices. For a European democracy, Volt Europa should eventually provide this best practice.

Ours would be a small scale version of the EU that figured out how to function with 27+ countries. Quick reactions, consensus, votes and how to get there. In order to provide a working example to the real Commission and heads of state. Maybe this will be one step or even a lever that will wake us up from European Groundhog day. Worth trying. With #jumpstartEU.