Identity Politics behind the Recent Euro and Refugee Crises of the European Union

Abstract

The recent crises in two flagship integration projects of the European Union (EU), i.e. the Euro and the Schengen integration, pose existential threats upon the Union. External shocks that revealed operational and institutional flaws within the EU have surfaced conflicts of preferences among the members and raised dubious questions about the future of integration. Although the causes and early stages of both crises had structural similarities, they resulted with completely different outcomes. This paper provides a liberal intergovernmental explanation for the divergent results of similar types of crises by referring to identity politics as the explanatory factor. It argues that the need for the collective identity in the Euro crisis and contradictions between European and national identities in the refugee crisis shaped the outcomes of the inter-governmental conferences and determined the future of each crisis.