Europe is the future

[imomus]

032c is a magazine based in Berlin. The summer 2006 issue is entitled "Europe Endless: The propaganda campaign for an old new continent", and it's fantastically interesting and inspiring. The subject: nothing less than the future of Europe. The issue contains visuals by Lucy McKenzie, Rem Koolhaas, and Matthew Barney, as well as interviews with Linder and David Adjaye, and ruminations on the work of 13 Japanese photographers snapping their impressions of Europe. But the theoretical meat (and some dynamite) lies in a core of articles, interviews and transcribed lectures by Navid Kermani, Tony Judt and Mark Leonard. I thought I'd gloss some of the arguments these thinkers are making, because this is important stuff. And because I'm, personally, very proud to be a European.

Historian Tony Judt: "There is this sense now that America is no longer a model society... From World War II until 1989, the US was unique because it was the most powerful country in the world. But also it had passed its power through all these international institutions beginning with the UN, the IMF, what was going to become the WTO, the World Bank... America and international governance were somehow mixed up together in people's minds. The United States has incredibly stupidly insisted on separating those in the public image so that it is now against all these international agencies... with the result, I think, that America's much weaker and its legitimacy is much reduced... America is the true third world country, in a way, with a fantastically wealthy, skilled, educated, powerful elite and a desperately, increasingly poor, medically undercovered, badly educated, increasingly ignorant and unskilled mass working population."



Mark Leonard says that, far from being in "crisis", as journalists like to say, the EU is effecting a sneaky -- and extraordinary -- sort of triumph:

"When we stop looking at the world through American eyes we can see that many of the elements of European weakness are in fact facets of this extraordinary... transformative power... The rise of the European Union is the first time in history that a great power has arisen without provoking other countries to unite against it. What's extraordinary about the EU (unlike the British Empire, the French and Spanish Empires, the Germans and Japanese in the 20th century -- or even America today) is that the more powerful the European Union becomes the longer the list of countries that want to join it. It's a magnetic force that people want to unite with rather than balance against."

The EU is passive aggressive, Leonard continues; it doesn't invade anyone. The worst thing it can do is refuse to let other nations join it, cut them off. Regime change is being effected on a scale never seen before in human history, but without a shot being fired. There are 450 million citizens in the EU, but another 1.5 billion in 80 countries "umbilically linked" to the EUzone by trade. Columbia can never join the US, but Serbia can join Europe. The difference is legal frameworks, Europe's secret weapon:

"Each country that joins the EU has to absorb 80,000 pages of laws in 31 volumes that govern everything from gay rights to food safety." Turkey, enticed by the prospect of joining, has already abolished the death penalty and given minority kurds their own TV stations. And this European model is influencing other regions, like East Asia, Latin America, Africa. Even the Arab League is looking at ways to make an Arabic version of the EU. For this reason, Leonard thinks we'll see "a new European century".

Navid Kermani is also looking at the EU's vitality at its periphery. "Whoever wants to discover how valuable this overly bureaucratic, apathetic, fat, indecisive body known as the European Union actually is need only travel to where it stops," he says. And so he speaks to Moroccans who have tried to enter the Eurozone by boat. Have they considered that they might die in the attempt? "Sure... but it's not any worse than life here... The Europeans think all Arabs are suicide bombers. Yes, they're right, all of us here are suicide bombers," joke the Moroccans. "The paradise we're giving our lives up for is called Schengen."

Comments

[33mhz.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty enthusiastic about the EU. I think it has enormous promise.

[http://users.livejournal.com/__aglamourgirl/]

I am also kind of proud to be born & living in the EU. Actually one can't call it proud. Rather happy and I dunno, maybe in love with it's countries. Just this spring I went to the Czech Rep. and it's nice to see how everything developes. It kinda brings us together (although there are many people who are against the EU, too.)

[imomus.livejournal.com]

"The new European close-up has two browser windows: Google and Easyjet," says Matt Saunders in the article about the Japanese photographers' snaps of Europe. "You can't convince a Frenchman that France's glories are instead Europe's, but you can offer him citizenship in a union that includes the Tatra mountains and the most exotic parts of old Islamic Spain."

[(Anonymous)]

Are you more proud to be a European than, say, a Scot? I'm a Scot, and feel very comfortable with that, it's a definite part of my identity, but I cannot relate at all to the idea of being a "European". It seems so unspecific. Even geographically.

[http://users.livejournal.com/__aglamourgirl/]

i think it just depends on how you were raised and how you think of everything and also the way you look and compare.
lets say you live or grew up in a specific town in scotland. so you feel like a resident of that town if you compare yourself to a resident of a different scottish town. at them same time you are a scot if you're talking to someone from, lets say france. and it goes on like that...

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Are you more proud to be a European than, say, a Scot?

I have a cunning way to resolve that glocal question. I'm from the East Coast of Scotland (school in Edinburgh, university in Aberdeen), and whereas the Glaswegians tend to look culturally to America, the East Coast is more European. Edinburgh is "the Athens of the North", home of Eastward-looking bands like Josef K, and so on.

As soon as the visa barriers in Europe came down, I was out of the UK, off to live in Paris. Later, living in New York, I became (quite happily) part of that city's "Eurotrash". (The Bar I used to drink in, run by Eurotrash, had a jokey sign up saying "No Eurotrash served".)

Now, living in Berlin, I feel again this secondary identity of Europeanness becoming a primary identity. I hardly ever go to Scotland, and I'm not living in "Germany".

Oddly enough, the place I feel most Scottish is Japan. Because there I'm a foreigner, and when people ask what sort of jin I am I say "Scotlando-jin". I don't even know how to say "European" in Japanese, and it would certainly seem too vague an answer to give a Japanese person: Watashi-wa Europa-jin!

[bostonista.livejournal.com]

"America is the true third world country, in a way, with a fantastically wealthy, skilled, educated, powerful elite and a desperately, increasingly poor, medically undercovered, badly educated, increasingly ignorant and unskilled mass working population."

That's going a bit far. America is mostly middle-class. There are poor people, sure, but they aren't the vast majority as Judt suggests. He's exaggerating to make a point.

I do like your post, though, and agree with most of it. And the addition of the EU to the world stage doesn't have to be a bad thing for America, certainly. The more the merrier - especially if "more" means peaceful and liberal.

[ex-newironsh15.livejournal.com]

Size of Middle Class (More):

Japan 90.0%
Sweden 79.0
Norway 73.4
Germany 70.1
Switzerland 67.2
Netherlands 62.5
Canada 58.5
United Kingdom 58.5
United States 53.7

Go America!

http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/8Comparison.htm

[(Anonymous)]

Reading your post reveals how elitist a body the EU is - not dissimilar to the mafia in it manipulation of trading rights and extortion of its citizens.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Why do you come here, right wing libertarians? With your weird metaphors comparing government to the mafia? Do you have a ranch, or a compound?

[(Anonymous)]

This is quite off topic, but I find it hilarious that the nation doing the next best job of implementing EU directives (behind Denmark) is Norway, which isn't even a member.

[desant012.livejournal.com]

Is Europe still run by a genetics-obsessed nobility? If so, I don't think they'll ever make it too far.

I remember an old friend of mine, of Southern Italian decent and fluent with that accent, went to Italy to work ... and he was blocked because of his slight mixed Southern and American accent (they requested American English only in that case).

The same goes with France ... even French-born people who develop some sort of quirk in their accent from living abroad, they experience cultural blockages. Because of a slight accent. Social problems. Germany you can't *ever* become a true member of their society unless you were born and raised in Germany as an ethnic German (no matter what "good" relations say between Germans and Turks).

Europe is as anti-international and anti-globalist as it gets - it refuses cultural change, and won't let others join in. It'd be nice to have more power sharing going on in the world (to you know, actually stop uniliateral invasions), but Europe is so far from that role it's crazy

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

you are right. "we" - germany - still don't admitt that we have to become an immigration country, if only to make up for our low birth rate.
foreign workers were invited to germany, because they were needed, so, a first rush of "guest workers" from italy came in the 50ies, followed by the turks in the 60ies. they made germany the center of their economical existence, and this for the good of our country. yet, the government supposed they would eventually go back to their home countries, when not "needed" anymore, even though they raised their children here. thus, for far too long, no real efforts were made to integrate especially turkish communities into german societies. they did, anyway, but by sticking together and developping a parallel turkish society, that is only slightly germanized. there are turkish banks, insurance agencies, lawyers for those who only speak turkish here.
it is a big problem that naturalization here is still based on blood relations, so children of turkish immigrants born here are not automatically german, but people in russia with german ancestors, but no base in germany at all, are considered german.
i see no real efforts by our government to change that situation. but politicans are allways happy to attack the turkish communities for not being willing to integrate, while at the same time cutting educational programs supposed to develop this. learn our language, but don't bother us how to.
this attitude of the state is similar to the approach of the problem of more and more young people in the eastern part of germany joining neo nazi organisations and voting for the extreme rightwing parties. there are frequent outcries of politicans about this "we have to do something now!" - and what they will do, is cut financing on social workers and institutions, especially in the "problem areas".
but it might be a good thing for our government, thus to allow "bad", isolating muslims and neonazis to stay "evil", so they can be considered the problem and not the fact that the government doesn't really have to offer anything for those frustrated with the developpement of our economical system, which is still rich as ever, but sharing less and less by needing less and less workers, and paying them less and less. which will lead to financial losses, eventually, because germany depends on in-country consumption of its products, too ...
so, i see the possibility of living very cheap and independent as an artist in berlin as two-sided. i love my life(style), but if i would live in zurich, i would need much more money, but also earn much more with the stuff i'm doing.
so, the cheap berlin life is the avantguarde situation, and a preview for an unhealthy and unnecessary economical developpement in germany, and europe in general - see, for an example, the "unbureaucratic", sort of half-legal situation allowed for illegal immigrants in spain, because they provide cheap workers the spanish industry wants.

[(Anonymous)]

What does genetics-obsessions has to do with accents?

What kind of job did your friend applied for? Do you think - or is there any data supporting the fact - that in the US non - native speakers or people with foreign accents can obtain high profile jobs more easily?

Speaking of genetic obsessions, I'd rather assume that Americans tend to think much more of European nationalities in genetic terms (i.e. "My parents are both French. I'm ethnically French") which is very naïve when you think about the incredible mish-mash of populations the continent witnessed before the idea of modern nationality wasn’t even born

[(Anonymous)]

Currião or Momildo?

[(Anonymous)]

Europe's future:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Slideshow/slideshowContentFrameFrag.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/10/07/weekpix.xml

[akabe.livejournal.com]

those 14 photography books, while having something similar to ebisu gardens, or tokyo dysney sea about them, are beautiful and interesting. like an imaginary, idyllic future european photography. many of those photographers (honma for one) have assimilated a lot of european photography and to see that turned back onto europe and conversly, seing the light, colorful stuff we know from so many volumes of recent japenese photography pulled down to earth is fascinating indeed

[imomus.livejournal.com]

European Eyes on Japan (http://www.eu-japanfest.org/english/press/jt_photocollection.html) is also interesting. It's like everybody traded places.

[sparkligbeatnic.livejournal.com]

America is the true third world country, in a way, with a fantastically wealthy, skilled, educated, powerful elite and a desperately, increasingly poor, medically undercovered, badly educated, increasingly ignorant and unskilled mass working population.

The odd thing, or perhaps not so odd, is that the most highly educated of the elite often do not have long histories in the USA. America depends on immigrants not only for its pool of unskilled labour but for the highly educated and for those willing to invest years in graduate school or in low-paying but high-status, intellectual pursuits.

[(Anonymous)]

Increasingly Europe and America will be competing to attract precisely those hi-flying immigrants to their countries. Will the brilliant young software engineer from Bangalore choose San Jose or Düsseldorf?

[cerulicante.livejournal.com]

The best part of the EU is that no one has to rise against it, the millions of unassimilated Middle Eastern immigrants can do a perfectly fine job of ruining it from the inside! Or, if they're not up to the task, the dwindling number of taxpayers supporting the social services of the entire continent can pretty much have the same effect.




France's little riot fracas over laws that would help its economy was just a small glimpse of what's to come if the EU doesn't get its act together.

[(Anonymous)]

nice little breakdown of this entrepreneurial spirit and a handy US tax dollar map....

http://www.warresisters.org/piechartFY2007.pdf

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

I'm simultaneously skeptical and curious: How self-sufficient are the sociopolitical and economic systems at work in the EU? Are they sustainable, or are they an anomaly, the result of the Cold War's forty-year custody battle, a side benefit of not having to fund a military for half a century, thus freeing up considerable funds to pump into lavish social programs that by many measures are now on the decline? If the latter, that is quite a sneaky (albeit short-lived) triumph. And what might Europe's sociopolitical landscape be like were it not for these unchic, broad-bottomed, sensibly-shod American tax dollars that funded a good deal of its security and prosperity over the past sixty years? I freely admit that the EU would be far more compelling if it turned out these sytems can in fact thrive on their own, and were not just hothouse flowers, but are able to replicate themselves in various permutations.

I think the idea that any of us in the West will be culturally or politically running the show at century's end is highly suspect. My money's on China, and when they really hit their stride, I have a feeling that many are going to miss the comparatively quaint days when America was considered The Dark Empire. Personally I think we're merely a placeholder, an historical ellipsis between "interesting times."

European economic models

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

However... (http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/articles/060731ta_talk_surowiecki)

[(Anonymous)]

America and Europe both have poverty and alienation to deal with in their societies. But there's a difference. In America the alienation is pretty well purely economic. If the most alienated African or Latino American in south central or east LA suddenly wins the lottery, his alienation will pretty well cease. He'll behave exactly like other wealthy Americans. But if people from the alienated groups in Malmo, Rotterdam or Bradford suddenly become prosperous will they effect a similar transition? The alienation of Mohammed Bouyeri, or Mohammad Sidique Khan, or Abu Laban, or the 25 people recently jailed for plotting to blow up the Eiffel Tower is not economic. Basically they reject and despise the cultural values of Europe - while choosing to live there - because they think God does too. Solving this one is one of Europe's biggest challenges.

[(Anonymous)]

"In America the alienation is pretty well purely economic."
http://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/IncomePovertyWelfare/HighPoverty/

If the alienation is economic, then it's also partly racial by default, if you look at the statistic. It's interesting that you chose winning a lottery as an example of someone being able to escape poverty. Upward social mobility for some racial groups in the US is not as much of an option as some would like us to believe. I also wonder about the respect for the cultural values of the US as expressed through the race riots in L.A. or in interviews with some of the Katrina victims in New Orleans.
Comparing Rotterdam and Bradford is not that easy. I remember reading an article just after the banlieu riots by someone who was gleefully waiting for the riots to spread throughout Europe. How someone can compare the situation of a young Algerian in Paris, say, to a Turk living in Kreuzberg is beyond me. There's a colonial history between France and Algeria, and people in the banlieus will get out of there as soon as they make some money (win a lottery), whereas a Turk living in Kreuzberg would reinvest in his or her community. I know, that's a simplification, but it's just not possible to talk about Europe without taking those differences into consideration.

-flux

[(Anonymous)]

"Each country that joins the EU has to absorb 80,000 pages of laws in 31 volumes that govern everything from gay rights to food safety." Turkey, enticed by the prospect of joining, has already abolished the death penalty and given minority kurds their own TV stations. And this European model is influencing other regions, like East Asia, Latin America, Africa. Even the Arab League is looking at ways to make an Arabic version of the EU. For this reason, Leonard thinks we'll see "a new European century".

I really can't see what's so fantastic and inspiring about Europe becoming again the new center of the world, since they weren't so great in it the first time. Why not wish a world where nobody is forcing others to change theirs ways in return of economic gains?

re: nice

[(Anonymous)]

Nice site... Well done
good luck