Menu
The European project has put an end to bloody and fratricidal conflicts, ensured the general prosperity of its citizens, developed a social model unparalleled in the world (social expenditures within the Union account for 50 percent of the total on a global scale), mitigated inequalities compared to the rest of the world, protected minorities and promoted culture and artistic heritage, and today Europe manifests ambition to find an answer to climate change.
Yet the collective European adventure has gradually given way to resentment, regression, divisions and doubts, to the point of discovering the flank, almost everywhere, to the advance of the far right, anti-system forces and ethno-nationalist groups.
In short, Europe has lost its driving force. Can we blame unpredictable external factors? Undoubtedly. The financial crisis that came from the United States, the challenge of migratory flows, and anxiety about the abrupt changes produced in our societies by globalization and new technologies have eroded the confidence that European citizens had in building an increasingly compact and fraternal Union.
"The European idea is indisputable, but unfortunately Europe has become administration, and people confuse idea with administration," director Wim Wenders effectively summed up. But at the same time, we must acknowledge the responsibilities of the selfishness of national governments, which are incapable of imagining effective solutions and equipping themselves with the right tools to respond to historical, socio-economic, environmental and cultural changes, in other words, civilization.
In a planet where one billion more human beings live today than twelve years ago (twice the population of the EU) and considering the growth of new enterprising players starting with China, the impotence of the old European states has turned into widespread hostility toward the ruling classes, intermediate bodies and now also toward Europe, which has become for public opinion synonymous - not without justification - with bureaucracy, vague and plethoric institutions, as well as all too easy a scapegoat.
But where does this immobility that extremists march to come from?
Today the situation is paradoxical: since 1957, the construction of the Union has made enough progress for citizens to perceive it as a reality and demand results, but at the same time it does not have sufficient powers (which remain basically in the hands of national governments) to deliver on its promises, and among other things, it does not enjoy the democratic legitimacy necessary to act. This ambiguous position is likely to prove fatal.
Does anyone really believe that a single state in the Union is capable of regulating international finance? Does anyone really imagine that internet giants would agree to submit to national laws when their turnover exceeds the GDP of Belgium, Austria or Denmark? How can we defend social rights and cultural exception or address climate and migration challenges by entrenching ourselves behind outdated national borders?
Unable to meet these challenges, the national governments have lost the support of the people, who manifest all their distrust of political representatives, institutions and democracy in general.
Europe is a collateral victim of this process, the lightning rod for all recriminations and unfulfilled hopes. Toward Europe, this generalized distrust has multiplied because it is basically nothing more than the sum of the inabilities of different national governments. For a long time we believed that after the wartime and totalitarian tragedies of the 20th century, the path to ever closer unity was well on its way. Unfortunately, the setbacks of history remind us that Europe is a human construction, by its very nature fragile.
"European federation is not something that will happen by magic because there is a certain logic to it," Altiero Spinelli warned. "The federation is a construction that men must do and it is a thing of our time."
Today, Europe is the condition of politics. Without union, we will have no chance to regulate globalization and global finance, to secure the means to defend our social and cultural model, to fight effectively against inequality, to reduce poverty, to deal calmly with the challenge of migration, to seek a solution to conflicts, and to have a say in the decisions to be taken to combat climate change.
But greater integration would be worthless if it were merely the product of necessity, economic calculation and utility, because the edifice would remain fragile and risk collapsing at the first headwinds. Europe must assert itself first, fundamentally and viscerally, as the expression of a collective will, a feeling of common belonging, a shared identity and imagination. It is time for the European people to take their destiny into their own hands.
It is time to reclaim a patriotism that is based not only on the false, unhealthy and deadly concepts of ethnicity and blood, but on the shared values of democracy, solidarity and the economic, social and environmental model we have inherited from our common past.
Due to its nature, its variety, its diversity of languages, origins, cultures, religious and secular views, European patriotism will inevitably be a new form of internationalism.
Thomas Piketty's contribution
The people of Europe exist and consist first and foremost of the millions of Erasmus students who have been living Europe for 30 years, recognizing its historical wounds and placing their hopes for a prosperous and fraternal tomorrow in it.
They are a vanguard, the first in history to be born "European."
It is up to them, privileged witnesses, to embody the European ideal, mobilize, organize and invent the democracy of the future.
It is up to the Erasmus generation to rediscover the audacity, courage and ambition of the founding fathers of the European project, to create new forms of democratic action and engagement to fill the gap between political representatives and citizens.
It is up to them, ultimately, to restore a soul to Europe. Certainly the existing student networks, reminiscent of the links between universities in the Middle Ages, must be strengthened. But it will also be necessary to create others, increasingly effective, structured, and capable of mobilizing people.
Today we have the urgency to respond, going beyond appeals, beyond actions of mere testimony, beyond resignation, to make the many scattered initiatives converge.
Europeans, starting with the Erasmus generation, must act together, discuss together, structure their efforts together.
Their task is to imagine and build the future.
For this reason EuropaNow! Will work in 3 directions:
EuropaNow! campaign on CNN
EuropaNow! campaign on CNN