(AP) February 2003 anti-war demonstrations in Italy.
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The idea of Europe was born in the ashes of World War II, a continent was ruined, the main antagonists -- Germany and France -- decided enough was enough and began to build an idea of a Western Europe growing together. Sheltered from the east wind blowing behind the Iron Curtain by America 's military might, the continent revived itself.
But the Iron Curtain came down and in the post-Cold War era the idea of Europe is now evolving as a counterpoint -- some would say a rival to its old ally the U.S. This has created tensions. These tensions have escalated dramatically during the Bush presidency, according to Nicole Gnesotto of the Institute for Security Studies. "There was the case of Iraq. Today the United States is a dividing factor among the Europeans."
More than three million people in Europe demonstrated against the war in February 2003, and most were not left-wing students. They were middle-class, many of them the equivalent of suburban soccer moms. Some commentators saw in this mass opposition to American policy the beginning of the idea of a "European identity."
This may explain why President Bush chose to make his first post-election overseas visit to Europe. Clearly his administration understands the need to mend fences.
President Bush was received politely, but he has a long way to go to win over European opinion. A view commonly held but stated most boldly Fred Halliday of the London School of Economics. "The United States suffers from the lack of credible leadership," he says, and adds both sides of the Atlantic have to grow used to a new political equation in international affairs. "Europeans have to accept that the United States we have to live with is George Bush's Republican America with all its moral certainties. The United States has to accept it has a president and a moral agenda which is repugnant to most people in the world and most thinking people in Europe, and which has virtually zero credibility outside the United States."
It is not just a question of style that is at the heart of European antipathy towards George Bush. There is a fundamental difference of method between the U.S. and the nations of Europe in international affairs. The growth of the European Union is an example of how soft power can be used to bring nations round to democracy and free-market capitalism. Remember, as recently as the 1970's several countries in Western Europe were still run by right-wing military dictatorships. Spain , Portugal and Greece were able to make the transition from fascist dictatorship to transparent, open democracy via the E.U. To join the club they needed first to be democratic, then to harmonize their economic infrastructure with the rest of members. Democracy was a process of negotiation not imposition.
Fred Halliday points out another key difference between Europe and the U.S.: a different method of organizing capitalist society. "On the issue of whether the state is needed to provide a significant welfare system and whether the state is needed to provide significant and at times punitive regulation of the market, I think there's a lot to be debated between Europe and the United States."
(AP) European Union flag.
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The idea of Europe, the power of Europe, is at the moment overwhelmingly a construct of professionals in government ministries and think tanks. In the street it is still a very new concept and it troubles people that the professionals seek to define Europe against the U.S.
Paris is a center of Yankophobia if you believe everything you read in the press or hear on the radio, but at street level thoughts about Europe and America are very complex and sophisticated. In a Paris bar on the day George W. Bush was sworn in for his second term I asked a young man whether he felt more European or French. He said, "I feel European by opposition to the United States but I don't feel really European. I feel French because Europe is young and not very powerful Europe does not give to Europeans an image of what they should be." He added he thought it was a bad idea to define Europe as being something the United States is not.
The power of the European idea, a place where capitalist societies are also places of social cohesion and greater economic equality, grew out of the harsh experience of centuries of war. It is real, and its benefits are tangible. The power of Europe as a political entity is a long way from being realized. Europe has to be more than the "un-America" if it is going to make people forget they are French or German or English or Italian. There is still a long way to go before the vision of Winston Churchill, more than half a century ago, is realized.
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