Will EU stabilizing plan be enough to save the euro?
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Many believe the euro zone countries will not be able to completely avoid further turbulence unless they find a way to regain their economic competitiveness.
The current global economic crisis hit Europe harder than other major economies. The economy of the euro zone contracted 4.1 percent in 2009, and was expected to only grow by a meager 1 percent this year.
In comparison, the United States, where the crisis originated, saw its economy dip just 2.4 percent. The U.S. economy this year was expected to grow at a faster rate of 3.1 percent.
EU President Herman Van Rompuy warned on Monday that the European countries could no longer afford their social welfare programs if they fail to generate more robust economic growth.
"With 1 percent growth, we can't finance our social model any more. With 1 percent structural growth, we can't play a role in the world," he said at a World Economic Forum regional meeting in Brussels.
Some observers hailed the EU stabilization plan as a huge step for closer intergration of the European countries but others warned the plan could have unpredicted effects on the euro and inflation.
Others also worried the plan, which would effectively bail out any troubled government, could exacerbate the debt problem in the future.
Ultimate way out of trouble
It will be a long and painful process for the euro zone countries to implement structural reforms and fiscal austerity measures to bring down public debt from runaway levels.
The recent indecision over the Greek debt crisis by the euro zone countries also illustrated the lack of proper crisis response mechanisms.
The euro zone, which came into being 11 years ago, has a lot of hard work to do to build internal mechanisms.
From a global perspective, the Greek debt crisis underlined the same problem that created the global financial crisis: inadequate financial regulations.
European leaders have blamed speculators for the fall. But nearly two years after the outbreak of the global financial crisis, the world has yet to find a way to properly regulate complex financial derivatives like the Credit Default Swap, trades of which were believed to have played a role in pushing Greece to the brink of collapse.
And then there are the powerful yet unregulated credit rating agencies.
A European diplomat has complained in private that it was just a matter of time before another crisis could break out if the credit rating agencies were not properly supervised.
