THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Towards a new legislative term

95 In the first half of 2022, many people – including Vladimir Putin – would not have bet on the EU member states staying together. The Russian government was clearly betting on driving a wedge between the Member States by cutting energy supplies and raising prices in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. But well- meaning people had their doubts too. However, the EU has stuck together. A number of initiatives have been set in motion that seemed difficult to implement only a short time ago, such as the joint purchase of gas. So is everything fine, then? Unfortunately, that is not the case either. Centrifugal forces are becoming much more apparent. The disputes and tactical manoeuvring around the vote on the nature restoration law in the EU Parliament in the summer of 2023 provide a fore- taste of this. We are probably only at the beginning of this debate. Tensions will increase. On the one hand, there seems to be no end to reports of record tempera- tures, storms and forest fires. Climate policy has been neglected for far too long with the result that massive The member states have to make some far-reaching decisions: What can a common European industrial strategy look like in the climate- neutral age? What principles should guide their external energy and trade policy? Claudia Detsch