The European Union has experienced a series of disasters over the last 10 years, each one of which has posed a major threat to its stability. First, there was the fallout from the 2008-9 financial crisis and the arguably ill-judged imposition of austerity on the Union’s southern members. Combined with the migration crisis, this encouraged the rise of populist anti-EU movements.  And then, there was the British vote to leave the EU altogether.