Ostrum
  • News & Chronicles
  • France
  • Euro Area
  • United States
  • International
  • Politics & Society
  • Monetary Policy
  • Media
  • Decoding
  • About Philippe Waechter
Philippe Waechter's blog
  • Insights
  • About us
  • Expertise
  • Our people
  • Media

Philippe Waechter's blog
My french blog
  • News & Chronicles
  • France
  • Euro Area
  • United States
  • International
  • Politics & Society
  • Monetary Policy
  • Media
  • Decoding
  • About Philippe Waechter
  • News & Chronicles
  • Climate
  • France
  • Euro Area
  • United States
  • International
  • Politics & Society
  • Monetary Policy
  • Media
  • Decoding
Philippe Waechter's blog
Prévôté
Previous Next
  • 2 min

What has changed for Europe?

  • 7 March 2025
  • Philippe Waechter
  • Climate Change
  • Political Risks
  • Trade barriers
Total
0
Shares
0
0
0

Things have moved very quickly since Trump arrived in the White House just 6 weeks ago.
But for Europe, what is changing?

Three levels to consider.
1- That of economic policy. The tariff barriers of the new American administration will have negative effects on activity in the world at the risk of also generating a little more inflation.
2- The political shock when Europeans perceived that the United States was no longer the guarantor of their security.
3- The disengagement of the Americans from the fight against climate change is a shock for the Europeans who had based their strategy on this structuring choice.

We need to go further in the analysis.
On the economic policy shock, which we can regret, the dynamics of the economy remains within the scope of the model that we know. The parameters associated with customs tariffs push the model to its limits but there is no break. If there is a break, it reflects the exit from a cooperative and coordinated environment that had allowed the development of globalization. The answer is to become less dependent on fossil fuels and on innovation. This requires efforts causing adjustments in macroeconomic priorities.

The political shock is more complex because it takes Europe out of the framework in which it was established. The effort must now focus on security in all its forms. The United States is no longer there to protect us. We must radically relaunch military spending, make it a priority, and arbitrate with other spending. We absolutely must rethink the hierarchy of Europe’s political objectives.
The model is no longer the same, which raises the question of the composition of countries playing by the same rules. We have seen the rapprochement between France and England, but also the distrust of Orban and Fico towards European choices. Georgia Meloni will have to define herself more precisely. The reconstruction of Europe depends on this.

The third point is the climate. The European Commission had made it its primary objective. The United States’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and the arbitration in favour of production at all costs against sustainability objectives have destabilized the choices made in Brussels. The climate issue is no longer at the top of the pile of issues to be addressed.
On this point, either Europe reaffirms the legitimacy of its fight or it aligns itself more or less with the American position. Companies that do not necessarily benefit from more favorable conditions in Europe because of the higher price of energy could tip the balance.

Europe must reinvent itself. In the past, it has had the talent to invent itself; it is up to it to show that it is capable of rethinking itself to increase its autonomy and maintain its place in the concert of nations.

Related Topics
  • Climate Change
  • Political Risks
  • Trade barriers
Subscribe to the newsletter

All the news from Philippe Waechter’s blog in your mailbox


Loading

Le magazine d’experts d’Ostrum

ABOUT OSTRUM AM
  • About us
  • Media room
  • Our publications
  • Cookie Policy (EU)
FOLLOW ME ON
EXTERNAL LINKS
  • Economists
  • Think tank
  • Central banks
  • Blog roll
©Ostrum AM 2025
An affiliate of : Plan de travail 2

Input your search keywords and press Enter.

Manage Cookie Consent
We use cookies to optimize our website and our service.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}