Dinner speech by Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, at 2025 ECB Legal Conference “Building Europe’s Autonomy: Law, Institutions, Cooperation” in Frankfurt, Germany

Frankfurt, 1 September 2025

It is a real pleasure to join you tonight at the 2025 ECB Legal Conference. This year’s theme raises one of the defining questions of our time: how can Europe advance its autonomy while remaining committed to multilateral cooperation and the rule of law?

Throughout the day you have been discussing the many ways in which Europe is trying to build its capacity to respond to the major challenges of our era – whether in the area of defence, the economy or technology. Yet I understand that behind these specific issues lie deeper questions that cut across them all.

Three key questions come to mind.

First, how is “European autonomy” defined in EU law in particular? Second, how can the EU’s pursuit of geopolitical and geoeconomic autonomy coexist with its commitment to multilateral…