What living with a German, a Norwegian and a Hungarian taught me about Europe: a SWOT analysis of the EU

Margherita Elisia Ventriglia
4 hours ago
5 min read

Photo credits: Jane Barlow | PA Images via Getty Images

My name is Margherita Elisia Ventriglia, I currently live in Ithaca, New York, a town best known for hosting Cornell University. I share a house with three fellow CEMS students: a German, a Norwegian, and a Hungarian.

Seemed to me the best setting to reflect on how we each perceive the role of the European Union in international relations. To spark the conversation, I asked them to do what management students do best: a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) of the EU.

Their answers turned out to be an almost perfect echo of Mario Draghi’s recent speech at the Meeting di Rimini in August 2025 (Draghi, 2025) and his Report on European Competitiveness, presented to the European Commission in September 2024 (European Commission, 2024).

Strengths

One strength that stood out is the large single market of 450 million consumers, the world’s second-largest economy. Draghi himself highlighted this in Rimini as a key asset.

Another strength is the EU’s regulatory power, which has enabled it to set global standards in areas such as privacy (GDPR), sustainability, and product safety. In his report, Draghi called this regulatory influence a competitive advantage Europe must preserve.

Lastly, Europe can count on a highly skilled workforce. In Rimini, Draghi stressed the need to elevate this strength by introducing a fifth freedom of the single market, dedicated to research, innovation, and education.

Weaknesses

The first weakness is slow decision-making, often paralyzed by member states’ right of veto. Draghi put it bluntly in his speech at the European Parliament in February 2024 (Eunews, 2024): “You cannot always say no. Do something.”

Another weakness is low productivity compared with the United States and China, the result of Europe’s persistent innovation gap. Europe also faces troubling technological dependence: in semiconductors, AI, and cloud computing, where European providers account for just 2% of the EU cloud market (European Commission, 2024b). Moreover, of the world’s top 50 tech giants, only four are European (European Commission, 2024a). Without a coordinated plan for R&I and AI, Draghi warned, Europe risks being left behind.

Opportunities

The green and digital transition could be led by Europe if competitiveness and decarbonization are pursued together. Draghi further argued that the common European debt instrument pioneered with NextGenerationEU should become permanent, financing joint investments in defense, infrastructure, and innovation.

The declining reliability of the US security guarantee also underscores the urgency of building a European defense policy, a crucial step toward strategic autonomy. Finally, EU enlargement and the already mentioned fifth freedom could provide further momentum to strengthen Europe’s foundations.

Threats

The war in Ukraine and the loss of Russian energy have deepened Europe’s geopolitical instability, underscoring the need for a common energy and gas policy.

Another looming risk is demographic decline, with shrinking working-age populations undermining economic sustainability.

Internally, the EU also faces political risks: rising euroscepticism and democratic backsliding, which Draghi warned could paralyze collective action.

Analysis and strategic proposal

At first glance, one might think that if a few management students can identify the same points Draghi emphasized, these must be obvious. But that is not the case. The real difference lies in the fact that while we diagnosed the issues, Draghi, like the best consultants, proposed detailed, actionable solutions.

He stressed the urgent need to reverse the slowdown in productivity, in part by vertically integrating artificial intelligence into Europe’s industrial base, particularly in sectors where it already leads globally, such as pharmaceuticals and automotive.

His report further called for the creation of a Union for Research and Innovation and the launch of a European Research Action Plan, doubling the funding of the European Research Council (ERC) and introducing new “EU Chairs” to attract and retain top scholars in Europe.

At the same time, Draghi urged the EU to make common debt a permanent tool, issuing safe European assets to finance strategic joint projects — from energy interconnectors to defense procurement to innovation. Finally, he proposed a joint decarbonization-competitiveness plan to lower energy costs, which remain two to three times higher for electricity and four to five times higher for gas than in the United States (IEA, 2024). This plan would also curb excessive speculation in energy markets while strengthening Europe’s clean-tech industry and reducing dependence on China.

The present challenge: independence from China and common security

In 2023–25, the EU has taken concrete steps to reduce its dependence on China and to strengthen collective security:

- Critical Raw Materials Act (2023): aims to source at least 10% of strategic raw materials domestically and diversify imports so no single country provides more than 65% (European Commission, 2023).

- European Chips Act (2023): €43 billion plan to boost semiconductor production within the EU and reduce reliance on Asian suppliers (European Council, 2023).

- Foreign investment screening: tighter rules to monitor Chinese acquisitions of strategic European assets.

- Strategic Compass for Security and Defence (2022): a roadmap for EU defense cooperation, including a 5,000-strong rapid deployment force by 2025 (EEAS, 2022).

- European Defence Fund (EDF): financing collaborative defense R&D projects across the Union.

These measures are a significant step forward. Yet the question remains whether they are sufficient. Europe has begun to diversify supply chains, invest in its own technology base, and coordinate defense policies. But challenges persist: China still dominates global processing of rare earths, and Europe continues to rely heavily on the United States for military protection through NATO.

Draghi’s call for courage is therefore still relevant. Europe must act faster and with greater unity if it wants not only to reduce dependency but to turn strategic autonomy into reality.

Conclusion

For my housemates and me, the exercise began as a simple SWOT analysis. In the end, it became a reminder that the European project, with all its imperfections, remains one of history’s boldest experiments: a continent choosing unity over division. Draghi’s warning resonates: Europe cannot afford to remain a spectator. It must act, and act together, if it wants to shape its own future rather than be shaped by others.