????如今的歐洲已經不再是幾年前那個毫無希望的人。但一點點經濟增長、一大堆債務、大批失業的年輕人和歐元懷疑論不斷升溫，歐盟往好了說也仍舊困難重重。

????如果上面這些還說得不夠清楚，換句話說，歐盟還需要一位強大的領袖。

????理論上歐洲有一個最高職位，一位真正的領袖可以在這個位置上施展權威，廓清迷霧，行使絕對權力——這個職位就是歐盟委員會（European Commission）主席一職。

????但事實上，歐洲根本沒有這樣一個職位。這可以解釋為什么只有他的直系近親與布魯塞爾的幾位官員明確知道目前的歐盟委員會主席到底是誰。（他就是若澤-曼努埃爾?巴羅佐，葡萄牙前總理，法學教授，曾在美國喬治敦大學求學。）

????由此，人們將目標投向了國際貨幣基金組織總裁克里斯蒂娜?拉加德，2014年《財富》全球50位領導力榜樣排行榜排名第13。有些人希望，今年晚些時候現任歐盟主席結束第二個5年任期后，拉加德能成為候選人，負責管理歐盟立法和執法機構。

????顯然，德國總理安吉拉?默克爾就是這樣的一位支持者（默克爾在《財富》全球50為領導力榜樣榜單中排名第二）。報道稱，她力推拉加德競爭這個職位。

????Europe is not quite the basket case it was a few years ago. But with low-as-you-can-go-growth, mounds of debt, throngs of unemployed youth and a rising tide of Euroskepticism, the European Union, to put it kindly, is still in a tough spot.

????As if the above didn’t make it obvious already, it’s also in need of a strong leader.

????In theory, Europe has a spot at the top in which a real leader might sit and wield some gavel of authority, clarity, and resolute power—and that is the high office of President of the European Commission.

????In reality, Europe has nothing of the kind. Which would explain why few but his immediate family and a handful of bureaucrats in Brussels know precisely who the current holder of that office is. (For the record, it’s Jose-Manuel Barroso, a former Prime Minister of Portugal, law professor, and one-time student at Georgetown.)

????All of which brings us to Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and No. 13 on Fortune’s 2014 list of the 50 World’s Greatest Leaders. There are some who now hope that Lagarde will emerge as a candidate for the European Commission presidency—whose role is to oversee the body that proposes and enforces EU laws—when the current office-holder’s second five-year term ends later this year.

????One such booster, apparently, is Angela Merkel, Germany’s well-regarded Chancellor (and No. 2 on Fortune’s World’s Greatest Leader list), who reportedly pressed Lagarde to run for the job.