The European Union Post‐Brexit: Static or Dynamic Adaptation?

The choice facing the leaders of the European Union, after Brexit, is between a static adaptation, leaving the current approach to integration essentially unchanged, and a dynamic adaptation, which recognises the need for radical changes. Dynamic adaptation requires institutional leadership—something apparently incompatible with the basic principle of the equality of all the Member States. The clearest indication of a deficit of leadership is the failure to define the real purpose of the collective activity. This failure is at the root of Brexit, as may be seen from the explicit rejection of the indefinite goal of ‘ever closer union’ by the British prime minister in November 2015. An alternative approach to European integration finds a good theoretical foundation in Buchanan's theory of clubs. The essential principle of a functional organisation at supranational level is that activities would be selected specifically and organised separately. A strictly functional approach to integration could revive an interest in political union in the form of a confederation. As Tocqueville had clearly understood long ago, the weakness of confederations increases in direct proportion to the extent of their nominal power. What is most important today is to distinguish between the general idea of European integration and one particular implementation of that idea, such as the European Union.