The Sound of Economics Where can Europe be independent?
Feb 25, 2026
Margrethe Vestager, former European Commission competition chief and current DTU board chair, talks EU competition, industrial policy and tech regulation. Ditte Brasso Sørensen, director at think tank EUROPA, leads STOCKTAKING EU and focuses on competitiveness and green/digital transitions. They discuss reducing strategic dependencies, state aid and incentives, anchoring European tech, critical raw materials and lessons from Denmark on balancing sovereignty and integration.
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Europe's Dependencies Have Been Weaponized
- Europe faces weaponized dependencies in gas, critical materials, security and technology that threaten its prosperity and social contract.
- Margrethe Vestager warns this makes competitiveness asymmetrical and requires stronger European coordination across security, defense and industrial policy.
Push Harder To Complete The Single Market
- Prioritise deeper single market integration, not just low-hanging regulatory simplifications, to unlock significant growth and capital flows.
- Ditte Brasso Sørensen stresses this needs political willingness as it touches insolvency, capital markets and national 'darlings'.
Focus EU Industrial Policy On Few Strategic Technologies
- Build a targeted European industrial policy that focuses scarce common funds on a few innovative technologies instead of spreading support thinly.
- The report recommends dropping some existing supports (eg. certain solar subsidies) to free resources for strategic sectors.