Europe's banking system has been in a state of systemic fragility since 2007-08. The current phase is marked by a sequence of interactions between sovereign problems and banking problems, resulting in gradual contagion to more countriesand more asset classes. The banking and sovereign crises are...

Jean Pisani-Ferry and André Sapir call for more focused guidelines in Lisbon 2, an explicit methodology for evaluating National Reform Programmes, and better ownership of these programmes to encourage national debate on key areas of underperformance in member states. This paper, prepared at the...