THE CORONAVIRUS EMERGENCY AND SOLIDARITY IN EUROPE: IS IT TIME FOR A EU TAX?

The article is inspired by the observation of the difficulties in which the EU is struggling for some time: the traditional vulgate of the EU as a den of technocrats, enslaved to the logic of international lobbies and far from the needs of the citizens of the Member States - if not in contrast with them - has evolved over time into more refined forms of ideological elaboration, which describe the evils of the EU integration as risks for the freedom and well-being of national societies. Yet this seems rather surprising: the European Communities, before, and the European Union, today, have granted the continent decades of peace, prosperity and economic growth. Then why populism? Why the criticism of Europe's inefficiency and remoteness from the "real" problems of civil societies? There is a series of critical points that now are again in the spotlight during and after the pandemic crisis. These points put in evidence that the EU is still an unfinished construction and this incompleteness, preserved by the Member States to protect their sovereignty, must be urgently overcome today. From a philosophical point of view, the tax is at the crossroads of all those characters which are now too weak in the EU system: solidarity, sense of belonging, social rights. Then, if a own tax would be attributed to the EU, a multitude of objectives could be pursued at once: granting the EU sufficient resources to respond to the current crisis avoiding vetoes by the Member States; allowing citizens to "feel" their responsible participation to a supranational community; making finally clear that the economic sacrifice is imposed not for gaining some personal benefit, but to finance the EU policies to the advantage of the weakest persons, whichever State they belong.