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May 08, 2005
The End of EU-Topia?
Richard Bernstein looks at the future of the EU as seen by Europeans. And finds they're pretty nervous. Why? Because it means more capitalism! At a forum, in France, Jacques Chirac was trying to sell the EU:
The response of the young people was strong and persistent skepticism, and, perhaps more important, pessimism. "I have the impression," one of them said, "that a little something is being hidden in this text, and that is that the text follows a liberal logic." By "liberal" the young person did not mean American-style liberalism, à la Edward M. Kennedy. He meant liberal in the European sense of an unregulated free-market economy of cheap labor competition that will cause Europe to jettison its social protections. The implication was that "liberalism" is what the bureaucrats in Brussels, the European Union's capital, want, and what the citizens of the individual nations like France must protect themselves against.
Get it? The French are afraid of the EU because they think it will be too conservative!
The European Constitution will prove to be the bridge too far. The EU has accomplished some significant things: the Common Market, the Euro and easy border crossings. But the idea that all of Europe should have a common government was always something of a pipe-dream.
Posted by pat at May 8, 2005 10:29 AM
Comments
It's difficult indeed to imagine a one-government Europe because, for all the progress in recent decades, old rivalries are hard to forget. I cannot imagine a similar effort in the Americas, for example, of a central government making decisions for the U.S., Canada, Mexico and possibly countries in Central America. It's ludicrous, and I think the Europeans are finally waking up to the fact that their sovereignty (something we Americans are criticized for protecting) is in danger of disappearing once and for all.
Posted by: Pam M. at May 9, 2005 12:38 PM