Recovery Strategies in Europe

The restrictions imposed to combat the COVID-19 pandemic have led to a pronounced drop in production, a steep rise in unemployment and public debt. As a result, profound social distortions have arisen. Further, the pandemic has also revealed the strong dependence of Europe’s economy from the production of vital products beyond the continent. Accordingly, national governments as the EU have had to devise wide-ranging programmes to support and revive the economy.

The development of these “recovery” programmes is taking place at a point in time when the European economies are at a crossroads. They are faced with meeting the immediate challenges stemming from social and ecological transformation and digitalization. As result, there is significant pressure to ensure that the measures to implement economic revival to do not lead to a restructure of the pre-pandemic status quo. Instead, the countries should seize the opportunity of massive public spending programmes to start the transformation of the economy and society towards climate neutrality and social equality.

A series of reports from several European countries analyse their respective national recovery plans and assess them in view of meeting the complex challenges. A synopsis offers a comparative perspective by interpreting and classifying the events and individual measures introduced in the individual countries. The aim is to develop policy recommendations that not only meet the long-term structural challenges faced by the EU-member states, but also to combat the immediate effects of the pandemic.

Country reports from: Finland, Portugal, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Greece and Cyprus will be published during the first half of 2021.

Visit our project site where we have collected all the published reports and have more information on the project in German. 

Country reports:

The recovery plan in Sweden
Setting the course for a climate-neutral and digital future? [in English]
Stockholm, 2021

Schwedens Recovery-Strategie 
Auf dem Weg in eine klimaneutrale und digitale Zukunft? [auf Deutsch]
Stockholm, 2021