Euro and the three Cs - competition, competitiveness, convergence

The article argues that neither the EU member states, nor the EU candidate states give enough attention to the requirement of maintaining a high economic performance of their economies by convergence and competitiveness strategies, so that they could have "the capacity to cope with competitive pressures and market forces within the Union" and ensure the proper functioning of the single currency. Instead, by the synergy of internal market and single currency, coupled with a populist nationalistic policy at the level of most EU member states, ideal conditions were generated so that factors distribution spontaneously acts, as proved consistently and more visible during the latest financial and economic crisis, by the so-called countries' specialization, deindustrialization and a North-South rupture.