Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Europe as the Tide of the Future

Here's an article by a German professor, Ulrich Beck, on why the EU disbanding of the Nation is what all humankind must do. The English is a bit ponderous (he's a German professor...) but it's a good, concise presentation of the thesis.

Totally unconvincing to my mind, of course, but then I don't generally go to The Guardian to be convinced, I go for the entertainment. Two quick comments: he postulates that the lessons of WW2, Nazism and the Holocaust are the relevant lessons for all time; I would argue that already today, a mere 60-some years later, the real challenges facing Europe (and the rest of us) are quite different, and require a different set of responses - and given Man's ability forever to come up with new perversities, there's nothing particularly surprising about this.

His second assumption is that the world must learn from Europe, because what is good for Europe is good for everyone. Hogwash, of course, a remnant of the 19th century age of Imperialism (though nowadays it's called Colonialism), sounding even worse than usual when it comes from a German, whose colonial past has absolutely nothing redeeming about it - unlike that of the British.

Ah, and his final sentence, of course, is pure nationalistic jingoism:
Move over America, Europe is back.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Over here in America many view the EU or EUSSR as rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. We don't care one way or another how the Europeans manage their descent.