But tongue in cheek, I formed my opinion very early on when you introduced David's overall framework:
"The book frames Europe’s future around three challenges.
1. Confront the centrifugal forces of right-wing populism.
2. Come to terms with US dominance.
3. Cooperate with — but constrain — China."
I would argue that the latter 2 points are self-evident. If not, European leaders would need their heads examined: what would be alternatives: challenge the US and appease China, or challenge both?
So that leaves the first point, which in its pure simplicity serves as a perfect "Emperor-without-Clothes" metaphor for what ails all of European-elite hand-wringing:
The spectre of "right-wing populism" is an EU establishment evergreen.
But what about left-wing/green populism, which lies at the heart of Europe's atrocious energy policies and costs, its ever-expanding welfare state (now qixoticly including immigration as well), its static regulatory and competition policies (still waiting for that fully GDPR compliant EU social media platform), etc. And yes, the ECB adopting a yield-capping framework, thus accepting fiscal dominance, is another brick in that wall.
These are all highly debatable policies that, however, have been ruled offside by establishment political parties, who largely frame them as "right-wing populism."
David accepting that framing in his first point does not augur well--but you convinced me to read the book nevertheless.
Nicely put, and you know from my posts that I agree with you. The fact that right-wing populism is the only populism (or extremism) that can be mentioned in polite conversation amuses me and irritates me in equal parts. What I, and I think you, would consider left wing/green populism or extremism is deemed a moderate and sensible position. I think what David focuses on is the fact that it is right wing movements that sometimes support 'secessionist' positions. The left wing and green varieties much prefer to keep the EU together and use it to push their agendas.
But, David lays out clearly where Europe fails and what it needs to do, unlike many European commentators who prefer to argue that (almost) all is well. And his advice is the kind that just might get a hearing in European policy circles -- though I remain highly skeptical.
Well... You can probably guess the immediate, monosyllable answer the question in your title triggered here.
I will read David Marsh's book but from your review it seems to suffer from the usual short-sightedness of such works: they consistently seem unwilling to zoom out far enough. From a sufficiently long historical perspective, even Europe’s decisive post-World War II decline — not to focus even more on the recent bickerings such as Brexit — is only a speck in a much longer arc. Europe enjoyed an extraordinary civilizational run for millennia. There is no reason why that dominance should be assumed to continue indefinitely.
You are probably ungenerous when you state that European businesses are unable to scale internationally. We have several examples of European business world leaders — Airbus, SAP, Schneider Electric, Saint Gobain, Siemens, Novartis. The real point is that those companies are unable to translate their business success in a national/European business and institutional movement that scale with those giants. And they are not the ones to blame. Europe has world-class enterprises. What it lacks is a political-cultural reflex for turning their success into national confidence. Again and again, what I feel here is that there is no pride among governments about these businesses' success. As they scale, European multinationals become political orphans: part of the enemy, of the caste, ungracious, ungrateful traitors because, for example, they dare to source their capital somewhere else. This happens in the US as well (think about the suicidal Biden's Inflation Reduction Act that has introduced a national preference for American businesses' national preference. The difference is that America is a much better place to do business and while the government occasionally organizes very public spanking of large businesses but it also understands that those companies are strategic assets. Not to speak of China...
So Europe doesn't appear to be able to convert wealth and business success into risk capital, industrial success into geoeconomical, geopolitical leverage. It seems slow, defensive, tired. The deeper cause may be that Europe is living through the late phase of an exceptionally long civilizational cycle, one in which Merkel's wavering leadership, Macron's imperial gestures, the friction between a monetary union that kind-a-works and an inexistent fiscal unity, are mere splinters of a fundamental exhaustion.
Great and gracious review Marco!
But tongue in cheek, I formed my opinion very early on when you introduced David's overall framework:
"The book frames Europe’s future around three challenges.
1. Confront the centrifugal forces of right-wing populism.
2. Come to terms with US dominance.
3. Cooperate with — but constrain — China."
I would argue that the latter 2 points are self-evident. If not, European leaders would need their heads examined: what would be alternatives: challenge the US and appease China, or challenge both?
So that leaves the first point, which in its pure simplicity serves as a perfect "Emperor-without-Clothes" metaphor for what ails all of European-elite hand-wringing:
The spectre of "right-wing populism" is an EU establishment evergreen.
But what about left-wing/green populism, which lies at the heart of Europe's atrocious energy policies and costs, its ever-expanding welfare state (now qixoticly including immigration as well), its static regulatory and competition policies (still waiting for that fully GDPR compliant EU social media platform), etc. And yes, the ECB adopting a yield-capping framework, thus accepting fiscal dominance, is another brick in that wall.
These are all highly debatable policies that, however, have been ruled offside by establishment political parties, who largely frame them as "right-wing populism."
David accepting that framing in his first point does not augur well--but you convinced me to read the book nevertheless.
Nicely put, and you know from my posts that I agree with you. The fact that right-wing populism is the only populism (or extremism) that can be mentioned in polite conversation amuses me and irritates me in equal parts. What I, and I think you, would consider left wing/green populism or extremism is deemed a moderate and sensible position. I think what David focuses on is the fact that it is right wing movements that sometimes support 'secessionist' positions. The left wing and green varieties much prefer to keep the EU together and use it to push their agendas.
But, David lays out clearly where Europe fails and what it needs to do, unlike many European commentators who prefer to argue that (almost) all is well. And his advice is the kind that just might get a hearing in European policy circles -- though I remain highly skeptical.
Great points! And I do have a soft spot for optimists!
Well... You can probably guess the immediate, monosyllable answer the question in your title triggered here.
I will read David Marsh's book but from your review it seems to suffer from the usual short-sightedness of such works: they consistently seem unwilling to zoom out far enough. From a sufficiently long historical perspective, even Europe’s decisive post-World War II decline — not to focus even more on the recent bickerings such as Brexit — is only a speck in a much longer arc. Europe enjoyed an extraordinary civilizational run for millennia. There is no reason why that dominance should be assumed to continue indefinitely.
You are probably ungenerous when you state that European businesses are unable to scale internationally. We have several examples of European business world leaders — Airbus, SAP, Schneider Electric, Saint Gobain, Siemens, Novartis. The real point is that those companies are unable to translate their business success in a national/European business and institutional movement that scale with those giants. And they are not the ones to blame. Europe has world-class enterprises. What it lacks is a political-cultural reflex for turning their success into national confidence. Again and again, what I feel here is that there is no pride among governments about these businesses' success. As they scale, European multinationals become political orphans: part of the enemy, of the caste, ungracious, ungrateful traitors because, for example, they dare to source their capital somewhere else. This happens in the US as well (think about the suicidal Biden's Inflation Reduction Act that has introduced a national preference for American businesses' national preference. The difference is that America is a much better place to do business and while the government occasionally organizes very public spanking of large businesses but it also understands that those companies are strategic assets. Not to speak of China...
So Europe doesn't appear to be able to convert wealth and business success into risk capital, industrial success into geoeconomical, geopolitical leverage. It seems slow, defensive, tired. The deeper cause may be that Europe is living through the late phase of an exceptionally long civilizational cycle, one in which Merkel's wavering leadership, Macron's imperial gestures, the friction between a monetary union that kind-a-works and an inexistent fiscal unity, are mere splinters of a fundamental exhaustion.