In my frequent visits to the United States these days, I am asked most insistently two questions about Europe: "What will happen in 1992?" and "Can a united European market work?" Many Americans are either skeptical about the future of Europe or nervous about it. Some predict that when put to the test a united Europe will quickly splinter under national and local political pressures. Others fear that Europeans will drop their internal trade barriers only to erect a higher new external wall, creating a kind of "Fortress Europe."
In John Gillingham's latest book, European integration is an economic story. But how does that affect internal security issues and a common foreign policy?
Most pundits argue the eurozone has only two options: break up or create a fiscal union to match its monetary one. In fact, there's a third, and better, path: adopt tighter market discipline, bailing out illiquid countries while letting truly insolvent ones go bust. The result would be a collection of fitter economies and a Europe strong enough to play a big role on the world stage.
