The EU and remembrance of glories past

A perceptive essay from The Economist:

Pascal Lamy, a European commissioner from France, recently mused publicly about why some members of the European Union are more awkward to deal with than others. “We have to recognise”, he said, “that there are some countries which remember that they were once great world powers and which believe that this was not an accident—that they still have special qualities that deserve recognition: France, Britain, Spain, Poland”. . .

The remarkable thing about the European Union is how many of its 15—soon to be 25—members once had a crack at world, or at least continental, power. A shared sense that they have seen greater days is now a big psychological link between EU members. . .

The Netherlands, Portugal and Belgium may just be small-to-middling European countries today. But within living memory the Dutch controlled Indonesia, the Portuguese large chunks of Africa and the Belgians ran the Congo, a country the size of western Europe. . .

Hungarians know that their country was once three times its current size, until it was dismembered after the first world war. The Poles and Lithuanians recall medieval times, when their joint empire stretched from the Baltic to the Black Sea. And just wait for the Turks, who can recall an Ottoman empire that once came close to the gates of Vienna. . .

The relationship between awareness of national decline and a desire to be in the European Union is complicated and varies from country to country. Germany's bid for world power ended in disaster and disgrace; for modern Germans Europe represents an effort to transcend traditional realpolitik, so the EU is associated more with peace and prosperity than with power projection. The French sometimes complain that “the Germans just want Europe to be a big Switzerland.” They, by contrast, want the European Union to be a big France.

Posted by David on October 28, 2003 8:52 PM