One Europe, One Market : Europe’s strongest response to a world in transformation

A rapidly deteriorating international environment is exposing Europe to successive shocks, from tariffs and increasingly aggressive trade practices to energy crises, supply chain disruptions and growing security tensions.

The response has been immediate, but largely reactive. The reflex has been to deploy emergency tools. Necessary, at times unavoidable. But ultimately insufficient. Because what Europe is facing is not a sequence of temporary crises. It is a systemic shift.

The global economy is increasingly shaped by continental-scale economic blocs, where competition is driven by size, integration and strategic coordination. In this context, Europe’s core weakness is clear. It remains fragmented. And this fragmentation carries a growing cost. It is visible in Europe’s sluggish economic performance.

Companies face higher capital costs, limiting their ability to scale. Energy markets remain insufficiently integrated, keeping prices high and volatile. Digital markets are still segmented, preventing the emergence of global players. Across sectors, Europe operates below its potential. But the implications go well beyond economics. In a world where economic scale translates directly into geopolitical clout, our internal fragmentation marginalises Europe in global decision-making processes and increases our dependencies in critical technologies and strategic resources.

This is precisely the gap that the One Europe, One Market agenda seeks to address. Presented to EU leaders in Alden Biesen and formally endorsed by the European Council in March 2026, it offers a strategic response to this new reality: completing the Single Market to unlock Europe’s full potential and strengthen its strategic autonomy. It is intended to complement the Single Market Strategy already presented by the European Commission. While the Strategy focuses on the main barriers within the Single Market, the One Europe, One Market agenda aims to complete it by broadening its scope and deepening EU economic integration.

The choice is increasingly stark. Either Europe deepens its integration and equips itself to compete at continental scale, or it accepts a gradual loss of relevance.

Strategic autonomy and global competitiveness cannot be engineered through short-term fixes. They require the structural conditions in which they can emerge: deep and liquid capital markets, integrated energy and infrastructure systems, and a genuinely unified economic space. In other words, a true European Market.

This is Europe’s most powerful asset in an increasingly contested world. It allows the Union to remain faithful to its core principles, openness, multilateralism and cooperation, while acting from a position of strength. It enables European firms to grow and compete globally, sustains the social market economy, and equips the Union to manage interdependencies without retreating from the global system.

In a fragmented world, scale is power. And for Europe, scale can only come from unity.

This work is the result of a joint effort bringing together the Jacques Delors Institutes, in Paris and Berlin, AREL Single Market Lab and Friends of Europe.