Thomas P.M. Barnett :: Weblog

Could again it be that Europe self-absorbtion will lead the world to catastrophe? When your real societal ambition is to be a cafe society and live on RENT as opposed to EARNINGS then you can survive only with the consent of others. Sometimes peasants with sharpened pitchforks live outside the castle.

The USE has been just talk for quite a long time. Europe's elites don't trust their people and they've been riding the whole political beast on backroom deals in defiance of popular will for a very long time. The bill is likely to come do within our professional careers and without the massive public bribery of the current social system, a very different EU is likely to emerge.

I disagree that they will be irrelevant. I think that they will be relevant but not in a good way. Will the blue state alliance with continental european elites go away just because they turn paranoid, racist, and xenophobic? I don't think so. The EU gets less integrated but, in backsliding, it also becomes more interesting because it becomes more violent and more active.

[insert obligatory plea for elaboration of backsliding, how and why it happens]

Great post, I see racial self-segregation all the time, and I want to investigate the issue more thoroughly.
I always find something new and interesting every time I come around here - thanks.

The best reason to oppose Turkey's membership in the EU, besides the questionable ability of Europeans and Muslims to handle each other now, is that Ukraine is a better candidate anyway. If the EU can only handle one more large member in the medium term, I'd go for Kyiv over Ankara.

Rent, not earnings? There's only one continental-scale developed economy with a giant trade deficit, and it ain't Europe...

It will take a long time for there to become a USE. It is much easier to build a country bottom up than top down. We started with States early in the cycle and built on that. In Europe you have countries that evolved from tribes that have socio-economic rule sets that while similar have evolved differently. While the tribes turned into countries, the tribal mentality still prevails between countries.

Also, in the issue of Turkey joining the EU, I think that all of the EU FDI going into Kurdistan will be the EU trump card that forces Turkey to keep their hands off of the Kurds.

"When your real societal ambition is to be a cafe society and live on RENT as opposed to EARNINGS "

Excluding the tech bubble, I fail to see how this differs from the US over the last three decades.

Is "Whether or not to admit Turkey" the EU's real problem, though? From what I've heard over the years, it's more like "What criteria do we establish for entrance?". They've had that criteria in the past, but been inconsistent in employing it, so that prospective members don't know whether they're on the right track or not. Without that consistency, Turkey won't be the only prospective member Europe risks losing.

Hi Tom,

As a European, I thought this was quite a hurtfull post. To Europe, but also to me personally, as a regular reader of your weblog. What happened to your next generation ideas, you so much like to push regarding the US and China?? Don't you think this ain't happening in Europe?? Don't you think that the next leaders of Europe are getting an education all over the world?? Not all of Europe is asleep you know... may be the politicians who currently run the show.. or should I say ruin?? :P

But then again... that's also happening in the US .. as well as China... so we'll see whether we are strategically irrelevant.. and who will succumb to fear.
Mind you, some of my best friends in this world (Europe) are from turkey, and from china....

Anyways,
as allways,
best to you,

Greetz from Holland,

Erwin

Erwin,

All feedback speaks to the provider more than the target. I feel incredibly let down by Europe in a strategic sense, and hope for better over time, but I'm not seeing those leaders arise--yet.

But Chirac's replacement could be a big impulse all on its own.

Erwin - The US has a political problem in that the system has been gamed so that political parties just don't die anymore as they used to do at the beginning of the Republic. This is a multi-decade phenomena that has led to the rotten state of our current parties. The EU seems to have this "game the system" problem even worse than we do with cross-party elites insisting on repeated votes until the people "get it right" and other such nonsense.

It is that elite europe that seems least likely to change, the last to change long after everybody else has "gotten it". Frankly I don't see a solution that's going to be any smoother than the rise of the Jacksonians and that's not going to be fun for the EU.