"There are two superpowers in the world, and the other is Europe"
I think they mean the EU, but still - an interesting article which follows on from Tony Judt's NYRB article extracted here, looking at a few new books about the Euro-American relationship.
Europe has power: not military power, but all the other kinds. It has the euro, a rival currency. Its economy is as large as America's (about $11 trillion), and its population is larger. It has the regulatory power and market clout to humble the likes of General Electric and Microsoft. It has many of the world's biggest and best companies, including (writes Rifkin) 14 of the world's 20 largest commercial banks and six of the top 11 telecommunications companies. It has a growing membership, a new constitution, and 25 United Nations votes. Reid quotes Romano Prodi, a former president of the European Commission: "Europe's time is almost here. In fact, there are many areas of world affairs where the objective conclusion would have to be that Europe is already the superpower, and the United States must follow our lead."
To bipolarists, Europe is also, just as importantly, a social pole: a rival model of how best to organize society and the world, and even human life. "The European Dream," writes Rifkin, "emphasizes community relationships over individual autonomy, cultural diversity over assimilation, quality of life over the accumulation of wealth, sustainable development over unlimited material growth, deep play over unrelenting toil, universal human rights and the rights of nature over property rights, and global cooperation over the unilateral exercise of power." Europe, writes Leonard, "can offer the best of both worlds: a synthesis of the dynamism of liberalism with the stability and welfare of social democracy." Thus "the European way of life will become irresistible."Irresistible. Inevitable. Back here in Washington, it's tempting to say we've heard this before from Marxism, but that would be a cheap shot. Unlike communism, the E.U. seems to represent not an enemy of liberal capitalism, but a new and possibly improved version of it.
Well, maybe; but we've heard that before, too.
Worth a look, and it's not too long, which is always a plus. (Via Political Theory Daily Review)
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