The Wizard of Oz

Well, European Union accession has come and gone. The all–night parties, the rousing nighttime singing of Beethoven’s ‘Ode to Joy’, the EU hymn, have all subsided. And no one on this side of the ocean noticed, even to stifle a yawn.

Is this because, as so many Europeans are apt to think, Americans are stupid? (The corresponding American view of those who disagree with them is that people are evil). Is it because America, in its lofty, wrong – headed disdain for the rest of the world, misses the essential amid the clutter of its culture? Or is it because, at least among those who think about these things, America correctly perceives a psychological flaw at the heart of general European thinking about Brussels.

In my daily dealings with EU and European decision–makers, I am constantly struck by the word choices they make to describe the European project – “post–modern”, “post–national”, “beyond the Westphalian system of nation–states”, “forward–looking and future–oriented”. In other words, Europeans think they are on to something, something big. In fact, as these phrases indicate, many Europeans think that the EU, and the supranational approach that it champions, is very much the future, with the archaic, fusty, somewhat old–fashioned Americans representing national sovereignty, a dying form of politics.

The American view could not be more different. When I think of the EU, I think of much of its architecture – monstrous, cumbersome, and very 1970. Statism may have been in vogue then – it certainly isn’t now. As Walter Russell Mead so perceptively points out, Americans visualise further European integration as being like doomed passengers on the Titanic, groping at each other ever more closely as the waves subsume them.

European decline has economic, military, and political dimensions. Economically, the center of the eurozone (France, Germany, Italy) cannot create a private sector job. In early 2004 unemployment stood at 8.7% in Italy, 9.6% in France, and 10.7% in Germany. GDP growth also remains sub–par, with France set to grow by 1.7% in 2004. The German economy actually shrank (minus 0.1% of GDP in 2003). The reasons for this stagnation are as obvious as they are politically intractable. The demographics of Europe make the continuation of its crippling safety–net (overly generous pensions, unemployment benefits, labor rigidities) and lifestyle (how many weeks vacation?) wholly untenable.

Diplomatically, to put it kindly, Iraq illustrated that on critical issues relating to war and peace, there is no sign of any common foreign and security policy in Europe. Initially, the United Kingdom stood shoulder–to–shoulder with the United States. Germany’s militant pacifists were against any type of military involvement, be it sanctioned by the United Nations or not. France held a wary middle position, stressing that any military force must emanate from UN Security Council deliberations.

It is hard to imagine starker and more disparate foreign policy positions being staked out by the three major powers in Europe. Seemingly, national interests remain alive and well – France, Germany, and the UK’s manouevres regarding Iraq can only be explained by this old–fashioned (though seemingly not outdated) notion. In fact, the most underreported diplomatic story regarding Iraq is not America versus Europe … it is Europe versus Europe, at least at the governmental decision–making level.

Militarily, despite a collective market that is slightly larger than that of the United States, Europe presently spends only two–thirds of what the US does on defense and produces less than one quarter of America’s deployable fighting strength. Likewise, besides the UK and France, all other European countries are presently incapable of mounting an expeditionary force of any size anywhere in the world without resorting to borrowing American lift capabilities. Given the moribund state of the European economies and the proclivity of European publics to eschew significant defense spending, there is absolutely no empirical evidence to suggest that this trend of relative military decline will change in the long–term. Military weakness, economic stagnation and political disunity – this is the reality that confronts American decision–makers today when looking at Europe. This is not the pretty picture many Europeans are used to looking at when thinking of their future.

Almost every foreign policy difference between us hides this 180–degree difference in perception about the future of Europe. To Europeans, Americans look like absent–minded bullies, overlooking the rising power of a Europe that demands to be taken seriously. To Americans, European federalists look like the wizard in L. Frank Baum’s Oz, all talk and no action, with a highly inflated opinion of their importance. The worst of it is that so few of us on either side of the Atlantic discuss this 400 pound elephant in the corner of the room – the very different perceptions Americans and Europeans have of the European project.

Is the EU the past or the future? Given the above empirical realities, it seems the onus of proof is, for once, not here in Washington.