2025 will see a fight to “Make Europe Great Again”, where Europe can find its own voice and define its own interests
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This article is a part of the essay series “Budapest Edit”
The trajectory of 2025 will be defined when Donald Trump will be inaugurated for the second time in late January. With his “America First” agenda and the enormous domestic challenges he and his administration have to face, one can hope that the US will focus on internal affairs. Stability is not to return anytime soon; tectonic changes are usually very messy, loud, and slow.
For Europe, there are three major questions: 1) whether Europe can find its own voice and define its own interests; 2) whether it will have the political capital and willingness to pursue these interests; 3) whether Europe can implement this in a way that aligns with the already changed reality in the global order. Looking at the new European Commission one tends to be pessimistic, but the fight to "Make Europe Great Again" (MEGA) continues. And just as “Make America Great Again” is reforming the US from within, MEGA aims to reform Europe from within. It fights for a Europe which is a proud defender of its traditions, is a constructive and respectful player in world affairs, and leaves behind that kind of moral imperialism and hypocrisy that has plagued European foreign policy for the last decades, or rather ever since the EU had a voice in foreign policy.
A multipolar world means more stability as well: if the costs associated with uncertainty are high, then all the actors tend to be more cautious. The next decades will be defined by this ambiguity, as we cannot expect the new order to crystallise overnight. As long as uncertainties remain, everyone must think twice before acting. And even though the last weeks of 2024 were a lesson in recklessness on many accounts, hopefully, they only marked the end of the beginning, and not the beginning of the end.
Márton Ugrósdy serves as the Deputy State Secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister’s Political Director in Hungary.
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Márton Ugrósdy serves as the Deputy State Secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister’s Political Director in Hungary. He previously directed the Institute for ...
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