16 january 2010, no way out

Saturday 16th January 2010

An old legal colleague, phoebus athanassiou, has just published a paper on withdrawal and expulsion from the eu and emu. Before the new lisbon treaty came into force, there was an endless argument about whether a member state could actually leave the eu. Of course they could, the uk would always note: greenland actually did in 1985. Lisbon introduced a formal “exit clause”, bringing a small semblance of order to the process. Phoebus confirms (as I did earlier, seep11) that a member state could not leave the euro without leaving the eu. Practically, the problems of leaving the euro would be monumental and far outweigh any gains, but it is good to see sound legal reasoning that “the only way to withdraw from emu is to withdraw from the eu”. Phoebus (who is greek) also addresses whether a member state could be expelled from emu by others; his answer again being no. Interestingly, he doesn’t discount the possibility that a country that leaves the eu could in practice keep on using the euro - as several non-eu countries already do (see p87 for an excellent article I helped write). Interesting stuff for buffs...