Cross-border interoperability can help build a better EU

Lack of Cross-Border Interoperability Undermining the EU

The EU is a complex multinigual bloc, but it should still be able to function harmoniously. Here's how.
Cross-border interoperability can help build a better EU

We want to point you to an important publication – the EU eGovernment Action Plan 2016-2020, that targets cross-border interoperability out of necessity in what is a dysfunctional European Union. This comes somewhat late, after many years of lobbying from many stakeholders that include ourselves – indeed we have written many posts on this issue!

Cross-border interoperability is the main prerequisite to tackle the most burning challenges of the EU.

Such interoperability will help build a great EU. In fact, the lack of it is costing the EU a fortune in consulting fees on obtaining specific legislative and operational information that is actually already available in EU repositories. It is a big business to package and serve the EU their own information. Cross-border interoperability is the main prerequisite to tackle the most burning challenges of the Union, which can only be solved by working closer together. Instead, citizens are currently experiencing the opposite. The lack of cross-border interoperability plays into the hands of Eurosceptics such as the Brexit campaigners.

The Action Plan calls for interoperability and cross-border by default: “public administrations should make relevant digital public services available across borders and prevent further fragmentation to arise, thereby facilitating mobility within the Single Market.”

As stated in previous posts here, this can be achieved with multilingual knowledge systems (MKS). A great example of an MKS is TMClass. The EUIPO has created an MKS which enables business to register intellectual property for forty-nine countries. National administrations for intellectual property are thus fully interoperable, regardless of language. TMClass is probably the largest cross-border interoperability asset in the world.

Public administrations in EU countries are often more similar than they appear, but there are differences and they naturally work in their own languages. An MKS provides the means to search across multiple languages and to link and explore the knowledge structures which relate the different concepts and meanings. This makes it possible to map across different domains in national public administrations, as well as different countries. Cross-border interoperability will help us to move closer to progress on the European vision of being united in diversity.

*Feature Image: Business photo created by onlyyouqj – www.freepik.com

Gudrun Magnusdottir
Gudrun Magnusdottir

Gudrun is co-founder of Coreon GmbH and a Chief Strategy Officer. She brings the team a passionately innovative and strategic mindset, entrepreneurial spirit, and a long term experience in marketing to global corporates, organisations and institutions.