Some differences, many similarities: comparing Europe’s responses to the 1973 oil crisis and the 2022 gas crisis

Abstract

Scholars of European integration are primarily interested in explaining change and variation over time. Indeed, given that integration has progressed over 50 years and competences have been transferred to the European level in policy fields, including energy, fast and coordinated action in the face of a major external threat might have been anticipated. Yet, as this article documents, member states struggled to establish a cohesive and solidary European response to the 2022 gas crisis, just as they had failed to cooperate effectively during the 1973 oil crisis. Building on recent literature on European polity development and integration through crises, this article argues that differences in national crisis affectedness and energy structures hampered cooperation. Such asymmetries became particularly visible on the part of France and Germany, the Union’s two largest member states, who could have provided regional political leadership. Consequently, both the 1973 and 2022 energy crises led to very limited steps in European integration and collectively suboptimal policy outcomes, such as high energy prices and uneven access to energy resources.