Eurozone - A crisis waiting to happen?

French colleagues around at the time report that General de Gaulle was a man of few words; one of them being "Non" But he wasn't averse to soundbites: "How can you govern a country which makes 146 types of cheese?"

Imagine how much harder it is for the European Union with a domain stretching from the Baltic to the Aegean. Election results in France and Greece demonstrate there is no longer an appetite for austerity and despite scolding from Chancellor Merkel, the days of the complete Eurozone could be numbered, with some members taking an early exit.

It started well; after World War II the desire was to co-operate not fight. We had the ECSC, EFTA, then the EU: lots of initials, little actual co-operation. So how could the venerable ideal of a European Union become so unstuck?

No one seems to have been doing the horizon scanning; what worked for Bonn, now Berlin, might not cut the mustard or garlic on the shores of the Med. This story is less about political differences and more about economic realities. The elephant in the room in the EU has always been there are two Europes in terms of economic drive; even in one country. Italians in the heartland of the north term people in the south as the Mezzegiorno, not much happens in the afternoon.

If corporate Crisis Management were to be applied to the collective governments of the EU, we would ask the following questions: Was the Euro resilient enough and where was the mitigation strategy in case things went wrong? Could the potential dismantling of part of the Eurozone have been avoided? Shorthand, yes. But it needed much more in the way of what we in LINK would define as: Collect the data, identify then manage the issues, and try to avoid the tipping point into crisis; things the Eurozone clearly did not do enough of.

Is your corporation doing enough now to plan for the risk scenario which now looks high likelihood and high consequence in the breakup of the Euro?

LINK Associates International offers the privacy to practice crisis management and crisis communications in two purpose built multi-room management training facilities: Ivory House, London, and   Trent House, Derby.