From governance to government: Banking union, capital markets union and the new EU

Abstract

European banking union and Capital markets union have emerged as two of the key pillars of European integration since the post-2008 financial crisis. Neither were anticipated prior to the financial crisis, nor was the rapidity of their construction. Both imply the same critical shifts in Europe’s institutional political economy. The first relocates national oversight and authority to supranational institutions (a political shift), while the second increases the power and responsibility of market actors by reducing national controls (an economic shift). If banking union aims to break the hold of national governments over banking entities to foster a less fragmented and more efficient European union banking market, capital markets union aims to remove national-level impediments to a single market for capital in which jurisdictional differences are minimized, investor freedoms maximized and business gains access to a greater range of financial resources.

EU Agencies in Banking and Energy between Institutional and Policy Centralisation

“…Tröger, 2014) and political science literature (e.g. Epstein and Rhodes, 2018;Epstein and Rhodes, 2016) as to the degree to which authority has been centralised in this context. The EBU relies on three pillars, the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM), the Single Resolution Mechanism (SRM), and the European Deposit Scheme (EDIS), out of which the first two have so far been realised.…”

European Union financial integration, a geography perspective

“…The current conjuncture's policy cycle is still ongoing and it is therefore impossible to tell how the European financial space will react to current policy initiatives. We can, however, interrogate the 2012–2017 conjuncture's key representational space: “financial union.” According to Epstein and Rhodes (), financial union will transform European economic governance in European economic government . Financial union is the outcome of the Five Presidents Report (Juncker, ) and the Four Presidents Report (Van Rompuy, ; see Howarth & Quaglia, , p. 201), which promises that, this time, Europe will move towards a “ genuine economic and monetary union” (title of Van Rompuy, , emphasis added).…”

“…Financial union is the outcome of the Five Presidents Report (Juncker, ) and the Four Presidents Report (Van Rompuy, ; see Howarth & Quaglia, , p. 201), which promises that, this time, Europe will move towards a “ genuine economic and monetary union” (title of Van Rompuy, , emphasis added). The Juncker Commission spearheads financial union, which integrates the continuing struggle about banking union with an FSAP‐style initiative called Capital Markets Union (CMU) (Epstein & Rhodes, ). Juncker is a veteran of eurocrisis politics (Holmes, ) and as former prime minister of Luxemburg, a main beneficiary of a dominant financial sector, optimistically predisposed toward finance's role in renewing European integration (Dörry, ; Quaglia et al, ).…”

“…Financial union is the outcome of the Five Presidents Report (Juncker, 2015) and the Four Presidents Report (Van Rompuy, 2012;see Howarth & Quaglia, 2016, p. 201), which promises that, this time, Europe will move towards a "genuine economic and monetary union" (title of Van Rompuy, 2012, emphasis added). The Juncker Commission spearheads financial union, which integrates the continuing struggle about banking union with an FSAP-style initiative called Capital Markets Union (CMU) (Epstein & Rhodes, 2018).…”

Ideational power and pathways to legitimation in the euro crisis

“…Without a clear blueprint for reform, these actors depended on their capacity for 'intra-elite persuasion' (Blyth 2007) that in large part hinged on claims to knowledge and expertise . But even in this relatively 'quiet' policy process (see Epstein and Rhodes 2018), the Commission was hard at work developing a communicative discourse legitimizing the Capital Market Union as helping medium-sized enterprises, while in actual policy it sought to build stronger capital markets as a source of funding for large banks (Engelen and Glasmacher 2018). Distinguishing between the three dimensions of ideational power, and how they each relate to legitimacy struggles, thus serves to highlight how legitimation occurs both between elite and public and through more 'quiet' intraelite relations.…”