Ursula von der Leyen — Europe Must Learn to Act
Her vision is no longer simply of a greener or more integrated Europe, but of a Union capable of defending its interests, financing its industries and acting as a geopolitical power.
THE PEOPLE SHAPING EUROPE | Ursula von der Leyen has transformed the presidency of the European Commission. Under her leadership, the institution has moved beyond regulation and market integration towards an embryonic European executive authority—borrowing, procuring and coordinating on behalf of the Union.
When Ursula von der Leyen became President of the European Commission in 2019, her central project was the European Green Deal. Europe would use regulation, public investment and technological transformation to become the first climate-neutral continent. That ambition has not disappeared. But the world surrounding it has changed.
A pandemic exposed Europe’s dependence on external supply chains. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine turned energy, defence and industrial production into matters of security. Competition with China and the United States revealed how difficult it was for European companies to scale. Meanwhile, technological sovereignty moved from the margins of policy debate to the centre of European strategy.
“Europe must choose its best option: Union.”
Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission
Von der Leyen adapted. Her second Commission is therefore not merely a continuation of the first. It represents a different understanding of what Europe must become.
From transformation to power
Von der Leyen increasingly presents Europe as a continent that must acquire the capacity to act.
Her political guidelines for 2024–2029 combine competitiveness, defence, economic security, technological capacity and democratic resilience. The underlying diagnosis is clear: Europe has values, knowledge and capital, but too often lacks the institutional architecture required to convert them into industrial scale and geopolitical influence.
Her second Commission is not merely a continuation of the first. It represents a different understanding of what Europe must become.
Apparently separate initiatives now form part of the same political direction. The Clean Industrial Deal connects decarbonisation to industrial competitiveness. Readiness 2030 links defence expenditure to European production capacity. The Savings and Investments Union seeks to move private savings towards productive investment. Stronger grids, European cloud and AI capacity, an Industrial Accelerator Act and a proposed 28th legal regime all attempt to reduce the fragmentation that prevents Europe from operating at scale.
These ambitions follow concrete precedents. During the pandemic, member states authorised the Commission to negotiate vaccine contracts on their behalf. Through NextGenerationEU, the Commission became a major capital-market issuer, borrowing hundreds of billions through EU bonds. After Russia disrupted Europe’s energy system, AggregateEU allowed European gas demand to be pooled and matched with international suppliers.
These were emergency instruments. But together they established something more permanent: the expectation that Brussels should not merely regulate European markets, but organise collective European action.
The politics of convergence
Von der Leyen’s principal strength is her ability to bring different policy domains into one strategic frame.
Climate policy becomes industrial policy. Industrial policy becomes security policy. Capital markets become instruments of sovereignty. Research, energy, digital infrastructure and defence are no longer treated as separate administrative portfolios, but as interdependent layers of European power.
Climate policy becomes industrial policy. Industrial policy becomes security policy. Capital markets become instruments of sovereignty.
This is why she is valued by supporters as a leader who has made the Commission more political and more visible. During successive crises, she has repeatedly positioned Brussels as the place where national interests must be assembled into a European response.
Her method is rarely ideological in a traditional sense. It is adaptive. The Green Deal becomes the Clean Industrial Deal. Open markets become de-risking. Fiscal restraint makes room for joint investment when strategic necessity demands it. That flexibility allows Europe to move. It also creates uncertainty about which principles remain fixed.
The centralisation problem
The criticism of Von der Leyen is not primarily that she lacks ambition. It is that her ambition has concentrated decision-making around the presidency.
This is more than a question of personal leadership style. It reflects a deeper institutional tension. The Commission is increasingly expected to behave like an executive authority, yet this expansion of executive capacity has not been matched by an equivalent strengthening of European parliamentary politics.
The European Parliament can scrutinise the Commission, approve legislation and ultimately dismiss the College. Member states retain decisive control through the Council. But crisis decisions, financial instruments and industrial initiatives are often shaped within compressed timelines and through negotiations dominated by executives.
Critics describe a Commission in which important files are increasingly controlled by a small presidential circle, leaving commissioners and parliamentarians reacting to decisions shaped elsewhere. Disputes over omnibus legislation and the EU budget have consequently raised questions about consultation, transparency and institutional balance.
The criticism of Von der Leyen is not primarily that she lacks ambition. It is that her ambition has concentrated decision-making around the presidency.
The controversy surrounding Von der Leyen’s text messages with Pfizer’s chief executive reinforced this concern. The question was not simply whether vaccine procurement had been necessary, but whether executive speed had displaced the transparency required of a public institution. A European court found that the Commission had not adequately explained why it could not provide the requested messages.
The political contradiction is difficult to avoid. Von der Leyen argues that Europe must become more democratic and sovereign, yet the machinery used to create that sovereignty can appear increasingly presidential, technocratic and distant.
The architecture of necessity
Von der Leyen’s importance lies in recognising that European integration can no longer rest primarily on rules. A continent facing military pressure, technological dependence and industrial competition requires capital, production capacity and institutions capable of execution. But recognition is not the same as delivery.
Von der Leyen is building Europe through architecture rather than constitutional declaration: one fund, industrial instrument, joint procurement mechanism and strategic framework at a time.
The Commission can design strategies, issue debt, coordinate funding and propose new instruments. It cannot by itself create political unity, deepen capital markets or persuade member states to surrender control over defence, taxation and national industrial interests.
Von der Leyen is therefore building Europe through architecture rather than constitutional declaration: one fund, bond programme, industrial instrument and joint procurement mechanism at a time.
The question is whether this cumulative approach will produce a Europe capable of acting—or an ever-larger collection of ambitions that its institutions still cannot execute.
Her legacy will ultimately depend on that distinction.
This article is part of The People Shaping Europe, an Altair Media series examining the ideas, ambitions and contradictions behind Europe’s institutional leadership—and the different visions of the continent they are attempting to build.
Credit: Altair Media / OpenAI
Caption: Ursula von der Leyen and Europe’s evolving institutional architecture—from regulatory power towards industrial coordination, strategic capacity and collective action.
