Everyone in Europe seems to be talking about competitiveness. Over the last two years, the problem of the declining competitiveness of the European Union (EU) has been recognized, with increasing urgency, as its over-arching economic policy priority. This was the message of, in quick succession, the Letta Report (April 2024), the Draghi Report (September 2024), and the European Commission’s “Competitiveness Compass” (January 2025), the latter of which identified competitiveness renewal as the EU’s “North Star” for the coming years. 

Even just yesterday, EU leaders gathered for an informal European Council summit behind the walls of a Belgian castle for a frank discussion about how to boost the EU’s declining competitiveness. The two former Italian PMs who were the authors of the above eponymous reports, Enrico Letta and Mario Draghi, were on hand to share their ideas with the assembled leaders about how to confront this question. 

What emerges from this debate is that the question of how to boost EU competitiveness is a “wicked” – that is to say, complex and multidimensional – problem. It is a problem that will require not just focused political attention and ample resources, but knowledge. 

It is in this spirit that DCU is launching a new project to research EU competitiveness called COMPETE (Competitiveness, Opportunity and Money: Promoting the Economic Transformation of the EU). COMPETE is a 3-year Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence funded by the EU’s Erasmus+ programme, located at the Dublin European Law Institute (DELI). COMPETE brings together DELI’s in-house expertise in EU law, politics, and economics to examine how to reform the EU’s regulatory, fiscal, and financial frameworks to boost competitiveness and spur economic transformation.

COMPETE focuses on three core drivers of competitiveness: Regulation, Public Money, and Private Money. First, the EU needs to reform its regulatory framework to close the gap with its global competitors, such as China and the United States. This is not just a matter of cutting red tape but taking positive actions for business that will reduce barriers within the Single Market, such as instituting the 28th legal regime, and industrial policy measures such as a “European preference” to protect strategic autonomy in key sectors of the economy. Second, the EU must deploy its substantial fiscal powers to achieve its competitiveness goals. Not only should it repurpose the EU budget (the Multiannual Financial Framework) for this purpose, such as through the creation of a European Competitiveness Fund, but through joint borrowing, building on the successful experience of the NGEU post-pandemic recovery fund. And third, the EU must enact policies that would unlock private investment on a massive scale, most notably through the Savings and Investment Union (aka the Capital Markets Union), to enable European businesses that can compete globally.

This coming Monday will mark the formal launch of COMPETE, with an event at the DCU Helix. It will feature a keynote address by Enrico Letta, fresh from yesterday’s meeting in the Belgian castle, who is expected to deliver the same urgent message that he gave to the European leaders. 

It will also feature a keynote address by Thomas Byrne, Irish Minister of State for European Affairs and Defence. This is a propitious intervention, given that Ireland will assume the Presidency of the Council of the European Union in the second half of 2026. The promotion of EU competitiveness is expected to be one of Ireland’s key policy priorities for its Presidency. In addition, a high-level policy roundtable will consider how governments and businesses can translate these priorities into practice, followed by a panel of DCU experts presenting their research on European competitiveness, 

The launch of COMPETE comes at a propitious moment, as it is crucial that the EU should obtain the policy knowledge, grounded in expertise and high-quality research, that it needs to address the key economic challenge of our time.

The COMPETE Launch with Enrico Letta is free and open to the public. The full programme and registration information may be found here. 

Dr Ian Cooper is Research Coordinator of COMPETE.

Prof Federico Fabbrini the Principal Investigator of COMPETE and the Director of the Dublin European Law Institute (DELI