The Real Value of the EU for Britain is Geopolitical

Ulrich Speck

Ulrich Speck is a foreign policy analyst based in Heidelberg and Brussels. He is currently a Visiting Scholar at Carnegie Europe in Brussels and writes a foreign policy column for a Swiss newspaper, Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Speck worked for a number of German media outlets, was head of the newsroom at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague, and a DAAD fellow at the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies (AICGS) in Washington, DC in 2006. His articles have been published by the New York Times, the Financial Times, CNN.com, RealClearWorld, Open Democracy, and leading German newspapers and journals. Speck has coedited books on the Revolution of 1848, on American Empire, and on Modern Antisemitism. He holds a PhD in Modern History from the University of Frankfurt/Main. Speck is fluent in German, English, and French. Speck’s research interests are German and EU foreign policy, transatlantic relations, and global order.

In this recent analysis originally published by the European Council on Foreign Relations, Ulrich Speck examines British membership in the European Union. Due to the mounting uncertainty surrounding the common currency, which has also called the continent’s economic future into question, many in Britain are calling for an end to UK membership in the union. However, as Mr. Speck explains, the benefits of membership to the UK far exceed the purely economic arena, and leaving the union would carry a hefty geopolitical price tag.

Ulrich Speck is a foreign policy analyst based in Heidelberg and is a frequent AGI contributor, as well as a former DAAD/AGI Fellow.

“The real value of the EU for Britain is geopolitical”, by Ulrich Speck, originally published by the European Council on Foreign Relations

The views expressed are those of the author(s) alone. They do not necessarily reflect the views of the American-German Institute.