For decades, Europe has been building deep interdependence among its states. The challenge now is to turn it into stronger cooperation, grounded in trust, shared responsibility and a vision of the future that also encompasses our relationship with those beyond its borders.
Nearly 25 years ago, on 1 January 2002, euro banknotes and coins first entered circulation. The banknotes featured bridges that looked historic, although none of them actually existed. They were designed to symbolise communication among the peoples of Europe and between Europe and the rest of the world, without favouring any particular country. The story later took an unexpected turn: in Spijkenisse, near Rotterdam, designer Robin Stam turned those imaginary structures into real bridges.
The European project arose from a specific historical need: to make it much harder for states that had repeatedly been at war to devastate one another again. The Schuman Declaration of 1950 proposed making progress through “concrete achievements” capable of creating “de facto solidarity”. Coal and steel, markets, institutions, legislation and increasingly permeable borders gradually made national decisions ever more dependent on those of others.
That mechanism worked. Yet depending on others and cooperating with them represent different levels of relationship. Cooperation has an instrumental dimension: coordinating rules, resources and decisions to achieve specific objectives. It also has a relational dimension: recognising the other as a legitimate interlocutor, understanding their constraints and accepting that part of their future affects our own.
Europe has developed extraordinary instrumental capacity. It can regulate markets, redistribute funds and coordinate policies across twenty-seven states. Its relational dimension is more uneven. This brings us to the central point: cooperation between societies is more enduring when they see their future as meaningfully linked to the future of others.
What crises reveal
Jean Monnet wrote that Europe would be forged in crises and would ultimately be the sum of the solutions adopted to address them. Recent history partly bears him out, while also allowing us to refine his insight.
The euro crisis produced new institutions and coordination mechanisms, but it was marked by a deep divide between creditor and debtor countries. In the case of Greece, bailouts, the Troika and austerity gave rise to narratives of responsibility, blame and discipline. Between 2007 and the end of 2014, Greek national income fell by around 25%, while unemployment and poverty hit young people particularly hard, according to a European Parliament study. Behind the macroeconomic negotiations were people losing their incomes, jobs and prospects for the future.
That crisis also involved difficulties in communication between societies. In some countries, neighbours came to be seen as having lived beyond their means; in others, creditor institutions and governments were seen as imposing the costs of the crisis from outside. When one society views another primarily through the lens of blame, irresponsibility or coercion, interdependence can persist even as the relationship deteriorates.
The pandemic produced a different dynamic. The health crisis affected everyone and fitted less neatly into that moral divide between responsible creditors and irresponsible debtors. The European response culminated in NextGenerationEU and an exceptional capacity for joint borrowing to finance the recovery. This time, instrumental cooperation was accompanied by a more widespread sense of shared vulnerability.
The war in Ukraine has opened up another front. Following the political agreement reached in December 2025, 24 member states formalised a €90 billion loan to Ukraine in 2026 through enhanced cooperation. The indicative allocation provides €30 billion for macroeconomic support and €60 billion for defence industrial capacity and the procurement of military equipment.
From a humanist perspective, this capacity to respond raises an uncomfortable question. Europe shows that it can mobilise enormous resources when it perceives a military threat. That contrast compels us to consider how much capacity Europe devotes to diplomacy, conflict prevention, social protection and humanitarian response. For some in Europe, strengthening defence means protecting lives and societies against a direct threat; critics warn that other political and social priorities risk being squeezed out.
The issue extends beyond defence. We can rapidly increase our capacity to act together without having built an equivalent degree of shared understanding of why we are acting, what costs we are willing to accept and what future we want to protect. This is also why disagreement matters. An objection may reveal unevenly distributed costs, different historical experiences or a vision of the future in which part of society cannot see itself reflected. The enhanced cooperation used to support Ukraine shows one possible institutional way forward when full unanimity is lacking.
Rights, identity and borders
The question of who is part of that shared future inevitably raises the issue of European identity. In 1979, Dolf Sternberger coined the term “constitutional patriotism”. Jürgen Habermas later developed the concept and extended it to Europe: a political community capable of generating solidarity around rights, democratic institutions and participation without relying on a single national identity.
This idea allows us to imagine a Europe in which societies with different histories, languages and interests share a political community because they recognise certain principles as their own. Borders are among its most demanding tests. For decades, the European project radically reduced the everyday significance of many internal borders through free movement, Schengen and European citizenship. At the same time, its external border has become more restrictive.
The new rules of the Pact on Migration and Asylum have applied since 12 June 2026, with common procedures for registration, asylum, return and the management of external borders. On 17 June, the European Parliament also adopted its position on new return rules, which allow transfers to third countries under certain conditions through so-called “return hubs”. The text includes references to respect for fundamental rights, the principle of non-refoulement and the prohibition of collective expulsions. Amnesty International has nevertheless warned of risks of arbitrary detention, ill-treatment and forced returns associated with these centres.
Here, the distinction between instrumental and relational cooperation takes on its most human dimension. On 14 July 2026, RaiNews reported the arrival on Lampedusa of 38 people in two boats. The first carried six Tunisians, including a man with tetraplegia who was brought ashore on a stretcher; the second carried 32 people who had travelled from Libya, including nine minors.
That same day, in a separate incident, Reuters reported a shipwreck off Libya’s eastern coast. Ten people survived, while at least fifty, including women and children, died or went missing. The survivors were rescued near the island of El-Bardaa, about 70 kilometres west of Tobruk. At that point, “migration” ceases to be merely an administrative category.
Europe can develop increasingly effective systems for managing a border. The relational question is who we see on the other side: a case file, a source of migratory pressure, a threat, or a person with a history, relationships and a future that intersects with our own. If European identity is to be grounded in rights, human dignity and limits on the exercise of power, the way Europe treats people at its borders reveals how far those principles really extend. This consistency also shapes Europe’s capacity to contribute to mediation and peacebuilding. Its international legitimacy will depend, in part, on the relationship between the principles it invokes and the way it applies them within its territory and at its borders.
Making the bridges real
The bridges on the first euro banknotes began as a graphic design solution. They represented connection without having to decide which country should feature on the notes. In Spijkenisse, they ended up with pillars, ramps, railings and people crossing them.
For decades, Europe has built the architecture of interdependence: treaties, markets, institutions, rights and procedures that can connect societies once in conflict. Redefining Europe now depends on the quality of those relationships. Lasting cooperation requires the capacity to act, but also recognition, listening and responsibility for the consequences of shared decisions. Making the bridges real means turning institutional connections into human relationships and accepting that a shared future also demands shared responsibility.
