A Cabinet Type Approach to Resilience: The EU after the Euro Crisis

The ratification of the Lisbon Treaty was considered a big stride towards further integration of Europe as it promised a more active and efficient external action on the part of the EU in world affairs. Yet, another recent development, the Euro crisis, has raised doubts on EU’s prospects of becoming ever closer Union. When Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece were hit by the Euro crisis, the resilience of Europe as a unified and integrated entity was called into question because the domino effect of collapsing governments in some of the EU member states highlighted the possible impact of the economic crisis on political stability at the national level. Using a database that identifies government structures in European parliamentary democracies over the period of 1998 to 2015, this paper analyzes the medium and long range implications of the Euro crisis for the stability of governments (in terms of both government durability and government termination). The paper further analyzes the impact of the Euro crisis on executive-legislative relations and vis-à-vis the power of national parliaments. Preliminary findings show that the Euro crisis has been reshaping the cabinet map of EU member states with a movement from relatively stable coalition cabinets to unstable coalition cabinets and from relatively stable single party cabinets to unstable coalition cabinets, a decrease in cabinet durability and an increase in cabinet termination due to irregular means. The findings have implications for growing Euroskepticism and also for further economic and political integration.