European Institute

Holding the EU’s rotating presidency for the first six months this year, Spain has laid out an agenda that highlights two themes: implementing the Lisbon agenda and helping Europe emerge from the economic crisis.

Spanish ambitions in the EU realm, however, are likely to be strongly colored and perhaps even skewed by the national challenges of reassuring its partners in the euro zone and world markets that Madrid can regain control of its worsening budget gap.

Obama, in Tampa, Will Cite Economic and Environmental Benefits

High-speed railways – an established feature of public transport in Europe – are finally on their way to existence in the U.S. in a long overdue move finally taken by the Obama administration.

Sovereign Debt Liable to Overwhelm System in the EU’s Five “PIIGS”

As Greece teeters on the edge of national financial default, its plight dramatically illustrates a widening economic threat to the euro (and even to the euro zone) unfolding in the wake of the global crisis. A half-dozen weaker member states in the euro zone now pose a threat to the European Union’s vaunted single currency. It is the most severe test of the European system since it was launched a decade ago.