The Euroquestion.

This article is the final one of a series of reports called "The Euroquestion" where we explored the individual future prospects of the leading nations in the European Union. This article now delves into the collective prospects of the EU as a bloc and explores its destiny.

The European Union has been widely touted as the largest integrated single market in the world. It has served as a role model for economic cooperation organisations around the world, on how effective and efficient economic integration can be achieved on a bedrock of cooperation and consensus. Although it has seen its fair share of problems, the general consensus is that the EU as an economic entity has achieved relative success.

With a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of US$20.3 trillion, counting the EU as a single entity, it is the 3rd largest economy in the world after the US and China. A wide variety of exports, free economic and political movement between member states, and a heavily integrated, centralized bureaucracy, the once great European Union, now suffers from overregulation, excessive red-tape, and a growing discord both at home and with its primary patron across the pond.

The current geostrategic situation in its backyard in Ukraine, has now forced the European Union to take tough decisions regarding internal security matters. This is also prevalent at a time when the most radical change in administration in a long time has materialized in the US, jeopardising the axis of power across the Atlantic, in one fell swoop thanks to the rhetoric of the Trump administration.

Never since the Cold War has Europe as a continent faced a greater security threat, and even during the Cold War, the EU had a blank cheque from across the pond. Now at a time where the era of blank cheques have ended, and the era of loans have begun, how the EU will navigate this radical shift in policy may dictate the extent of its very survival. Much has been said about the internal undercurrents with regards to member state sovereignty and regulatory balance, which adds fuel to the Eurosceptic fire that has engulfed it by means of parties such as the Brothers of Italy, Alternative for Germany, and the National Rally of France. Many in Europe are of the opinion that the EU as an organisation, should change its fundamental nature from purely economic to a more security and politically oriented union, in order to ensure its survival against any future flux of power that may take place in the emerging world order.

Today, Europe is in a strategically ambiguous position. It lacks the requisite security capabilities to stand as one of the poles of the emerging multipolar order, lacks cooperation among its members to formulate a singular and clear foreign policy, and stands vulnerable from any flux within its member states' economies. It is on a partner hunting spree with the EU sending feelers towards China as well as more recently, the EU commission touring India and meeting the Prime Minister, to discuss a future free trade agreement.

However, due to Europe's history of geostrategic ambiguity, neither the existing powers, nor the emerging powers of the new order, are willing to take the EU as an entity, very seriously on the global stage. This has resulted in the gradual erosion of the little relevance of the EU in the world order, and its historic positions with regards to emerging economies, likening them to a "jungle" of sorts, it has only made things much more difficult for itself. The European Union's future now seems more under question than ever, and how or whether the EU swallows some tough, but much needed pills of reality, will determine its future course, relevance and/or its entire existence.