Identity and the EU
Could there be a “national identity” of Europe? Would this help the ongoing project of the European Union, and in what way? What would be the components of such an identity?
While the EU is not sufficiently hated in its member countries for there to be major popular movements to opt out, the central government is an elite organisation that Europe's population does not identify with. This is an element holding the EU back from acting more positively in global affairs. As the international legitimacy of the US declines and the emerging economies grow in influence, the rules for international negotiation/cooperation/conflict are being rewritten. There is an opportunity for the EU to establish a reference frame for international interaction based on principles of peaceful cooperation and common interest. It will only take this opportunity, though, if it has a sufficient mandate to act more boldly. For this to happen, Europe's people will have to start feeling "European" - but right now noone knows what that is. I've been putting together a few thoughts though.
It was at around the time of the big “no” votes on the EU constitution last May that I first thought seriously about this topic, and it’s come back to me again recently because of some stuff going on at work which unfortunately remains, for the moment, under wraps. It’s a fascinating topic, for a few reasons:
* Nationalism: Europe gave the world nationalism, and it was one of the major political influences of the past couple of centuries. However Europe is arguably doing the most to override nationalist sentiment in the present day, as it is unique in the world in the extent to which national governments have externalised powers to a supranational body.
* The EU as an experiment: The extent of voluntary cooperation between sovereign states in the EU is unprecedented. This makes much of its development something of a leap in the dark, meaning there’s plenty of scope for different ideas, for things to go drastically wrong, but also drastically right.
* The post-superpower world [an expression I got off my boss]: Everybody knows that the world’s geopolitical landscape is going to be reshaped over the coming decades by the emerging economies of China, India and possibly others. But the way that international action, cooperation, negotiation and conflict is going to be conducted in the new world remains unclear. With the diminishing legitimacy of the US as a world policeman, who’s going to move ahead with a way of doing business that remains palatable to everyone? The EU offers a model of peaceful cooperation that has a lot of promise, and people around the world see it as a positive influence. But if it’s going to play a role in shaping the post-superpower world it has to start acting with more confidence and more coherence. Where will that come from?
The notion that political organisations were best arranged around a homogeneous ethnic group with a shared culture, values, traditions, etc., gained credence in Europe sometime upward of 150 years ago. This notion has been important in a number of political changes in the past couple of centuries, including the World Wars and decolonisation. It was always problematic though, because governments run countries or cities or regions or other entities defined by area, while any substantial area has never been likely only to contain a single type of people. Sometimes different groups have lain claim to the same bit of land; sometimes unavoidable movements of people have resulted in several groups occupying the same bit of land more or less peacefully. Governments will thus necessarily rule over mixtures of people, an issue that has been dealt with in many different ways over time, from genocide to power sharing to nation building.
Nation building is an intriguing notion. There are cases in the past of nations having been discovered dormant and reformed, like Frantisek Palacky did with the Czechs. He researched their history, culture, myths and legends, and gave the Czech nation a reason to believe it should rule itself. Such people get to be called fathers of nations. I don’t know a great deal about Palacky and the Czechs, but one wonders whether they were there to be discovered or in fact it was all a big illusion. At any rate, if it was an illusion then it’s certainly not now, as the existence of a country called the Czech Republic goes to show.
Something of a digression, but it doubles neatly back to where Europe is right now. It’s not a popular project, with “popular” standing both for “of the people” and “liked by the people,” definitions that are somewhat interdependent. People don’t buy into the EU emotionally because they don’t see why Europe needs a central government. If they somehow came to believe that certain things bound the people of Europe (be they immigrants or not) together, this would conceivably give the government in Brussels greater legitimacy. A further optimistic step is that this would give it the confidence to act more positively on global affairs. As alluded to earlier, this might be beneficial to the world. The EU has spare foreign policy capacity, and it could use it for good.
Ignoring for the moment the many debatable things brought up above, the question I’d like to address is: if a “national” identity were to be developed for Europe, what would its parameters be? I have a few ideas…
Values: It’s essential for any country joining the EU to be a democracy, and this is a fairly good political value to start with. Tolerance of others is an important, positive principle to have with so many different people getting along together, and with substantial ongoing immigration (which is the only thing stopping the population declining after all) it's essential.
Culture: That’s what the Americans come over for right? There are strings of fabulous museums, architecture, theatres and opera houses across the continent. Every country has contributed some of the artists, writers and composers who fill them all up, and everyone should be grateful to share in the legacy of all of them. Perhaps a few stand out – Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Mozart, Beethoven, J.S. Bach, Van Gogh, Cervantes, Picasso, Monet… While individual nations might want to claim their own for themselves, we shouldn’t forget that most of them were great because they learnt from each other, especially in the case of painters who travelled across Europe to study under the masters of the day.
Food and drink: We all love it. No doubt, one of the greatest pleasures of travelling throughout Europe is the quality of the local cuisine and the pride people take in it. It’s a mutual enthusiasm, and although it’s different stuff everywhere, everyone’s passionate about it. Apart from the British, who import all their food. British people love drinking though, and they make a hell of a lot of great beers and wines on the continent, which we quaff without complaint.
Sport: Europe gave the world football, rugby, golf, tennis and cricket. As for events: the Olympic Games, the World Cup, Wimbledon and Roland Garros, the Tour de France, etc. The most popular football leagues worldwide are all here, as well as the world’s highest quality club competition, the Champions’ League. European sport is uniquely popular at the world level; Europeans should know this.
History and language… probably best not to go there. Europeans spent centuries perfecting the art of killing each other, started the two World Wars, oppressed other cultures and civilizations throughout the world through colonialism, and all speak different languages. Each country thinks its language is best too, especially Britain and France. Perhaps just Britain and France, actually. But there you go.
While the EU is not sufficiently hated in its member countries for there to be major popular movements to opt out, the central government is an elite organisation that Europe's population does not identify with. This is an element holding the EU back from acting more positively in global affairs. As the international legitimacy of the US declines and the emerging economies grow in influence, the rules for international negotiation/cooperation/conflict are being rewritten. There is an opportunity for the EU to establish a reference frame for international interaction based on principles of peaceful cooperation and common interest. It will only take this opportunity, though, if it has a sufficient mandate to act more boldly. For this to happen, Europe's people will have to start feeling "European" - but right now noone knows what that is. I've been putting together a few thoughts though.
It was at around the time of the big “no” votes on the EU constitution last May that I first thought seriously about this topic, and it’s come back to me again recently because of some stuff going on at work which unfortunately remains, for the moment, under wraps. It’s a fascinating topic, for a few reasons:
* Nationalism: Europe gave the world nationalism, and it was one of the major political influences of the past couple of centuries. However Europe is arguably doing the most to override nationalist sentiment in the present day, as it is unique in the world in the extent to which national governments have externalised powers to a supranational body.
* The EU as an experiment: The extent of voluntary cooperation between sovereign states in the EU is unprecedented. This makes much of its development something of a leap in the dark, meaning there’s plenty of scope for different ideas, for things to go drastically wrong, but also drastically right.
* The post-superpower world [an expression I got off my boss]: Everybody knows that the world’s geopolitical landscape is going to be reshaped over the coming decades by the emerging economies of China, India and possibly others. But the way that international action, cooperation, negotiation and conflict is going to be conducted in the new world remains unclear. With the diminishing legitimacy of the US as a world policeman, who’s going to move ahead with a way of doing business that remains palatable to everyone? The EU offers a model of peaceful cooperation that has a lot of promise, and people around the world see it as a positive influence. But if it’s going to play a role in shaping the post-superpower world it has to start acting with more confidence and more coherence. Where will that come from?
The notion that political organisations were best arranged around a homogeneous ethnic group with a shared culture, values, traditions, etc., gained credence in Europe sometime upward of 150 years ago. This notion has been important in a number of political changes in the past couple of centuries, including the World Wars and decolonisation. It was always problematic though, because governments run countries or cities or regions or other entities defined by area, while any substantial area has never been likely only to contain a single type of people. Sometimes different groups have lain claim to the same bit of land; sometimes unavoidable movements of people have resulted in several groups occupying the same bit of land more or less peacefully. Governments will thus necessarily rule over mixtures of people, an issue that has been dealt with in many different ways over time, from genocide to power sharing to nation building.
Nation building is an intriguing notion. There are cases in the past of nations having been discovered dormant and reformed, like Frantisek Palacky did with the Czechs. He researched their history, culture, myths and legends, and gave the Czech nation a reason to believe it should rule itself. Such people get to be called fathers of nations. I don’t know a great deal about Palacky and the Czechs, but one wonders whether they were there to be discovered or in fact it was all a big illusion. At any rate, if it was an illusion then it’s certainly not now, as the existence of a country called the Czech Republic goes to show.
Something of a digression, but it doubles neatly back to where Europe is right now. It’s not a popular project, with “popular” standing both for “of the people” and “liked by the people,” definitions that are somewhat interdependent. People don’t buy into the EU emotionally because they don’t see why Europe needs a central government. If they somehow came to believe that certain things bound the people of Europe (be they immigrants or not) together, this would conceivably give the government in Brussels greater legitimacy. A further optimistic step is that this would give it the confidence to act more positively on global affairs. As alluded to earlier, this might be beneficial to the world. The EU has spare foreign policy capacity, and it could use it for good.
Ignoring for the moment the many debatable things brought up above, the question I’d like to address is: if a “national” identity were to be developed for Europe, what would its parameters be? I have a few ideas…
Values: It’s essential for any country joining the EU to be a democracy, and this is a fairly good political value to start with. Tolerance of others is an important, positive principle to have with so many different people getting along together, and with substantial ongoing immigration (which is the only thing stopping the population declining after all) it's essential.
Culture: That’s what the Americans come over for right? There are strings of fabulous museums, architecture, theatres and opera houses across the continent. Every country has contributed some of the artists, writers and composers who fill them all up, and everyone should be grateful to share in the legacy of all of them. Perhaps a few stand out – Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Mozart, Beethoven, J.S. Bach, Van Gogh, Cervantes, Picasso, Monet… While individual nations might want to claim their own for themselves, we shouldn’t forget that most of them were great because they learnt from each other, especially in the case of painters who travelled across Europe to study under the masters of the day.
Food and drink: We all love it. No doubt, one of the greatest pleasures of travelling throughout Europe is the quality of the local cuisine and the pride people take in it. It’s a mutual enthusiasm, and although it’s different stuff everywhere, everyone’s passionate about it. Apart from the British, who import all their food. British people love drinking though, and they make a hell of a lot of great beers and wines on the continent, which we quaff without complaint.
Sport: Europe gave the world football, rugby, golf, tennis and cricket. As for events: the Olympic Games, the World Cup, Wimbledon and Roland Garros, the Tour de France, etc. The most popular football leagues worldwide are all here, as well as the world’s highest quality club competition, the Champions’ League. European sport is uniquely popular at the world level; Europeans should know this.
History and language… probably best not to go there. Europeans spent centuries perfecting the art of killing each other, started the two World Wars, oppressed other cultures and civilizations throughout the world through colonialism, and all speak different languages. Each country thinks its language is best too, especially Britain and France. Perhaps just Britain and France, actually. But there you go.
posted by Peter at 16:50
9 Comments:
Does the EU’s role in the world depend more on a common identity among its demos or the will of its technocrats and, more importantly, the will of governments running its member-states? Is there sufficient agreement among member-states as to what the EU’s role should be in the world? Similarly, the degree of Euro-skepticism in member states may also be caused by national governments hijacking the EU’s successes and attributing their own national failures to the EU.
It seems that for people to truly identify with an ‘imagined community’, they must find themselves outside of it. For example, a Frenchman does not feel French until he goes to the UK or Germany. More importantly, a Brit and a Frenchman do not often find they have much in common until they find themselves in China or the US. The shared European-ness only becomes obvious when two Europeans find themselves outside of Europe. How can we transpose this feeling within Europe?
Erasmus seems to be a good start, and the programme should also develop a greater ‘international’ (ie- non-EU) scope. I have also read (French magazine interview with Bronislaw Geremek) that the EU Parliament may be permanently moved to Brussels and an EU University would be created in its Strasbourg facilities. These seem solid bridges to demystifying European’s views of other Europeans. It may be lengthy but creating identity is typically a generational project.
I do not know if Europe is taking measures to ‘override nationalist sentiment’ so much as it is struggling to define the ‘bad elements’ (the exclusionary elements which led us to war in the past) out of national identities.
It also seems important to let Europeans know that just as they have a gender, ethnic, religious, local, and national identity, they can also have a European identity. In other words, becoming European does not mean becoming less Polish or less Spanish, it does not replace the nation but comes in addition to it. It would be even better if identifying with the EU could become an essential part of each member’s own national identity. Thus, being Greek would imply European sensibilities. This requires a new terminology for European identity…rather than ‘national’ identity, should it be something of ‘regional’ identity?
Values, culture ( including food/drink), sport…good start. Seems that sport may be the most ‘popular’ way to begin but teams should not be nationally defined ( we do not want national rivalries). History should emphasize the shared aspects, such as the values of the Enlightenment, and notions of human rights. As for the wars, we should study past wars in great detail (the peace dividend of Europe is all-too-often overlooked) and not seek to blame one nation or another for ‘starting’ a war but should study the causes of war. Nor should we attribute victory to one nation or another…the achievement of peace should be a shared success.
Language is a difficult one, though English will undoubtedly become the lingua franca , national languages must be preserved.
Perhaps the EU education system should be changed so that the emphasis is not on the national language and a foreign language but so that each child must learn 3 languages. One is very likely to be their national language, the other will be English (except in the UK, which has a net advantage here), and the other could be another European language. This would be in primary school. In secondary should, more options (Chinese, Arabic…) would become available.
Just some thoughts…
I didn't get past the first couple paragraphs before the fundamental assumptions struck me as worth further consideration.
What do you mean when you say "the international legitimacy of the US" is declining? The link is to a one-question poll that asks only whether people think the country referenced has a "mainly positive" or "mainly negative" influence on the world. I don't see the connection between that and legitimacy. What are the missing premises? You later reference that legitimacy again by way of saying the US's role as world policeman is in decline. That seems a debatable assertion at least, and a dubious one at most.
In what sense are the rules for international negotiation/cooperation/conflict being rewritten? Are you suggesting something fundamental about human interaction viz. states has changed? Does anyone seriously believe that we have abolished human nature and big guns will no longer be a necessary ingredient in foreign policy? Are Europeans ready to make the commitment to buy themselves the big guns they'll need to back up their economic blandishments?
In what way is there an opportunity for ANYONE, let alone the EU, to revolutionize the way human beings interact internationally? To set up a new "reference frame"? Isn't the belief that the EU can establish a new "reference frame for international interaction based on principles of peaceful cooperation and common interest" awfully close to Kellogg-Briand or the League of Nations? Which is to say, doesn't that border on being as dangerously naive as Chamberlain was in the 1930s?
Thanks for these comments. I recognise that the main point of the post is preceded by plenty of stuff that really requires more space to go into; perhaps it's worth a post of its own in the future. Briefly though: I think it's valid to extrapolate "legitimacy as a world policeman" from "positive"/"negative influence in the world." If people in other countries thought that the United States' actions had a positive effect, this would give them legitimacy. While it may not be a perfect measurement, it's more than a finger in the wind and substantially more than a flawed interpretation of dodgy intelligence reports as a justification for action.
Further, the main point is that the European project internally has moved beyond threat-based diplomacy towards a common-interest model. If Europe were to take a more major role in the world, this might involve having some military force of its own, however the majority of its actions would be characterised by the framework it currently uses in relations with its neighbours... TBC.
With the understanding that the response may be extended later (hence the TBC), still more questions arise.
Is the poll you referenced really more than a finger in the wind? How so? Further, what are the missing premises that connect the initial premise, that many people do not think the US's involvement in the world is "mainly positive", with the conclusion that the US's legitimacy is in decline? Absent those missing premises, I don't think a claim for validity (or even cogency) could be sustained.
Second, the EU could undertake the sort of foreign policy you recommend, but in doing so would it not risk consigning itself to being "good cop" to the US's "bad cop" (as with Iran)? That is, without the big guns, the EU wouldn't have power, only influence (calling it "soft power" doesn't make it more than it is). In a world where broad-spectrum effectiveness requires both carrots and sticks, the threat of economic deprivations just aren't enough. Thus, the EU might find itself very effective with friends and even the mildly recalcitrant, but resourceless against grave threats. Which seems to me to be status quo ex ante, giving rise to the question of whether the EU needs to do anything more coherent than it already does with respect to foreign policy.
It is not about 'good cop - bad cop'. Nor can we deny that the carrots ( and lack of sticks) of the EU were the major external force which stabilized the post-Communist transitions. Such radical, numerous, and relatively peaceful transitions are unprecedented; especially when their effectiveness is compared to that of externally driven coups and forced ‘regime’ changes.
The benefit of the EU is that it can provide huge carrots while its members provide the sticks. To date, the EU has been unsuccessful with Iran not because of its lack of sticks but because US was brandishing its sticks and would not participate in the talks. The US, not the EU, poses an existential threat to Iran, I do not see how adding to this threat would help stop the Iranian military nuclear programme (if such a programme exists).
In terms of changing human behaviour…the EU does not create something in humans which did not exist before but provides a stable foundation for certain human characteristics (compromise and understanding) to thrive…the US and Iran have not had a stable relationship since the hostage crisis, France and Germany became partners a few years after one had occupied the other for the second time in a couple decades…THAT, my friend, is the non-negligible force of ‘soft-power,’ and THAT is the strength of the EU.
As for the link with legitimacy...firstly, legitimacy is not like GDP, it cannot be directly measured. I personally believe that if most people see the US as the biggest threat to world peace and see the US as having a mainly negative influence, the USs legitimacy as the self-declared 'globocop' is challenged and undermined...whether the US cares about its legitimacy vis the world, however, is doubtful...
Though I quite enjoy the conversation I think we have digressed…
Our conversation may be a digression, but if it is I think it's a rather important one. Why? Because if we can't establish a need for or the feasibility of more muscular foreign policy from the EU, then any conversation about how to achieve that end would be obviated.
In a great surprise to me, Germain's comments actually buttress my argument. First, I agreed earlier that the EU's present and past foreign policy can be effective with friends and the mildly recalcitrant, but is resourceless to fight grave threats. The post-Communist transitions are a great example of that -- not a counterexample. Where the defense posture of western European countries was to hold off a Soviet invasion long enough for the Americans to arrive, they were well positioned (in an entirely separate phenomenon) to help with the transitions. I can't see what you could possibly mean, however, in suggesting their "lack of sticks" had anything to do with success there.
As for its members providing the sticks, it's precisely my point that they have too few sticks to be relevant in most cases. The exception would be the UK, who has the military force to defend herself, but surely can't be saddled with stretching that force over the entire EU. And sure, France's armed forces can go get involved in a skirmish or two in sub-Saharan Africa, but it's not capable of sustaining any serious military deterrence or retaliation to its own greatest threats.
If you want to make the argument that the lack of U.S. participation in the multi-party talks is what caused the breakdown in the EU's talks with Iran, I'm open to such argument (which is to say you've not made a compelling case so far), but take care that you don't accidentally reinforce my claim, i.e. how will you make that argument without simultaneously buttressing the argument that the EU lacks power and that the U.S. still has solid 'legitimacy' (however defined)?
I don't understand your argument about soft power -- the one where you contrast the U.S. and Iran with Germany and France.
I'm still open to an argument about legitimacy, but again I'd like to see the missing premises that would have poor faring in a poll entail declining legitimacy. The argument isn't self-evident.
Well we are running a multi-tiered debate here which has little to do with EU Identity.
1) Peter’s post does not refer to making a more ‘muscular’ foreign policy but ‘an opportunity for the EU to establish a reference frame for international interaction based on principles of peaceful cooperation and common interest.’ Threats and hard power do not figure in this formulation. Even this point digresses from the actual point of the post, EU Identity. Foreign policy is not the sole, or even the primary, factor driving the argument in favour of an EU Identity, there are many quite significant factors relating internal features of the EU.
2) By ‘lack of sticks’ I meant that the EU did not say ‘democratise or we will invade you’ (such threats often embolden nationalist sentiment) but rather ‘democratise and we will welcome you.’ When you imply that post-communist transitions did not have the potential to become grave threats, you forget the lessons relating to the explosion of WWI, and you minimize the importance of those who would suffer (or are suffering, as in Iraq) from an outburst in sectarian violence if not out-right civil war. To these people and their neighbours, such internal conflict is a ‘grave threat.’ My argument is that the EU is partially responsible for keeping these transitions from escalating into ‘grave threats’ and was therefore successful; much more than, say, the US invasion of Iraq was successful in addressing the ‘grave threat’ of terrorism. If nothing else, I think the inhabitants of Madrid and London would agree with me here…
3) On the British vs French military analysis, your position seems to be inspired by the ‘coalition of the willing’ but I think military experts, even in DC, would agree that France’s military is not a negligible force as you seem to imply. Also know that the French combat strategy is quite different from that of the British (and probably the US) which is one reason why those who seek to create an EU military (which I do NOT) are facing so many tactical and strategic difficulties. I would also like to know what you think are France’s ‘own greatest threats’ because, as someone living in France, the greatest threat perceived at the moment seems to be liberalism and job insecurity.
4) I do not have to convince you about the potential significance of the US’s willingness to candid dialogue with Iran in resolving the issue, I can simply point you to North Korea (another member of the Axis of 02) to witness their insistence on US anti-aggression ( ‘security’) clauses. The point with Iran does nothing to discredit my case, the US is threatening Iran, the EU is not. Therefore, Iranians want security guarantees from its aggressor not from the group of states more than willing to have relations with it. IF the EU thought that threatening a country as nationalistic as the US is patriotic would be effective, maybe your proto-critique would be relevant, but the EU continues to believe (and not simply in rhetoric) in diplomacy. The problem for the EU is that it cannot overtly remove the threat of the use of force because of its (Britain’s) alliance with the US, but I seriously doubt the EU (as the EU) would ever intervene in Iran unless it was to help Iranians (the people) clean up someone else’s mess…the EU is excellent as a peace-keeper and the biggest donor of humanitarian aid (that is something for Europeans to be proud of!! )
5) My argument about ‘soft power’ is based on the notion of economic and strategic interdependence as the foundation for two ‘historical’ enemies to find the will to co-exist.
6) On US Legitimacy…I believe that legitimacy is different from ability or capacity. Thus, the US has the capacity to be ‘globocop’ but not the legitimacy, why? Well, if we believe in democracy, legitimacy rests on the approval of the people a given decision has an impact on. It is quite difficult to consult all those impacted by US policy throughout the world, though the poll we are referring to begins to do so… maybe we should turn the question around, in what way is the US legitimacy no declining and on what is that legitimacy based?
Should we open a new post on topics related to this discussion so that this one can remain the domain of EU Identity?
Yes Germain, I think it's time for a new post. Perhaps one of us should write something summarising the arguments expressed here, and the other could put up an alternative post on a softer issue. EU identity could have been a softer issue but I chose to be a little provocative in the intro... It's been entertaining; my apologies for not entering the debate more but it's been a hell of a week over here. We've had to produce a batch of 12 press releases for distribution next week - "Trust in the Media" across 10 countries.
About EU Identity itself...I think that the shared values in Europe are probably underplayed. Firstly, Europeans (for the most part) believe in some kind of Welfare State/Social Democracy and they tend to support 'progressive' values (though other Europeans share regressive xenophobia). Europeans - the people rather than their governments - tend to be non-interventionist. Though Europeans may share these values with Canadians as well, these remain, nonetheless, shared values in Europe.
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