By Carlos Carnicero Urabayen
The EU is at an extremely decadent moment in its history – so much so that it is hardly recognizable to citizens. Europeans must to be capable of fighting and working together for a different Europe.
The European Union has failed to unite its citizens and stir their consciences – even after being savagely attacked by maniacs with suitcases loaded with explosives and nails, killing dozens and wounding many others permanently. Europe is not the only victim of terrorism (57% of the attacks since the beginning of this century have been concentrated within Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nigeria), nor should we expect any cherry-picking of targets by those who last week showed they were willing to lose their own lives to kill.
But the truth is that, this time, the victim was the European Union, embodied in the men and women who work in its institutions or its surrounding environment, live in the capital, or were simply there on that terrible 22 of March. The problem is that nobody, beyond certain elite circles, can find the EU on the map because it is becoming increasingly less identifiable for its values and more for its inability to provide solutions.
There is no sign of the European Union in the collective imagination. The EU right now is at such a decadent point that even when up in flames it is hardly recognizable to its own citizens. Its flag, a blue background with yellow stars in a circle, was absent during those critical hours, except, of course, on official buildings. Hardly anybody has put that flag in their profile photo on Facebook, as happened with the French flag after the attacks in Paris. Nor, at least for the time being, has any large demonstration been organised to bring European citizens together to express rejection of what happened: yet another sign that the Union is in retreat and on the defensive. If at one time it organised bail-outs, it is now the EU that needs one.
Brussels’ Ground Zero, the place where the people gather together after the attacks, is far from the European district and the airport, the locations which were attacked. At the stock exchange building, a landmark for sit-ins in the centre of the city, in coloured chalk people have written messages of support to victims, love for the city – and peace; they have organised spontaneous concerts and given hugs to anyone that needed one. They have also hung the flags of all the European countries and some beyond. On the only blue flag with stars that I was able to find a few days ago could be read: is this our dream?
There is no glimmer of hope on this continent. Nor positive messages about the way to deal with the crisis. Making adversity into an opportunity is something alien to what we have been seeing in Europe since the fall of Lehman Brothers in September, 2008. Rather, a re-deployment across national borders. Dipped headlights. National speeches and no collective vision of the future. With these members it is unlikely that an organisation can survive the multiple, simultaneous and complete crises which are creeping up on it: anaemic economic growth, nationalism, xenophobia, emerging populist parties, a massive influx of refugees and the emergence of Islamist terrorism in capital cities.
Refugees are willing to die trying to reach Europe but Europeans do not seem to want to do a great deal to save them. If Europe is a dream, it is especially so for those who cannot reach it. It is still “very chilly outside the Union” and there is no shortage of candidates to get into it, such as Turkey, deeply entrenched in a drift towards authoritarianism, and which has signed an agreement to take charge of refugees who have come to Europe to escape from the very people who planted the bombs in Paris or Brussels – but will be returned to Turkey in exchange for an acceleration in negotiations over accession.
The worst of all this is that with the evils that are pursuing the refugees, these attacks in the heart of Europe do not seem to be raising any greater awareness among Europeans. Quite the contrary.
If, in terms of values, the European Union – at one time referred to by some authors as “legislative power” (due to its identity, since its foundation, of sponsoring democracy and scrupulous respect for human rights and international law) – is now at its lowest ebb. Not even at the most pragmatic level is it doing much better. The Brussels attacks once again reveal a half-baked EU whose leaders do not want to complete or cannot do so, even at the cost of not being able to prevent attacks like Paris or Brussels.
While terrorists have no borders and take advantage of the freedoms of the very Union they want to destroy, opposing them are a number of police forces and intelligence services that continue to operate at the national level, with no shared data bases or critical information available to all 28 capitals. It makes one angry to hear the president of the European Commission, Jean Claude Juncker, the day after the attacks: “If the Member States had implemented the plans we approved [proposed after the attacks in Paris in November] we would not be in this situation today and perhaps we would not be witnessing such tragic events.”
If the European Union is not able to create the necessary mechanisms to enable citizens to live in safety is it worth defending it against the attacks by those who assure us that the EU makes no sense and should be dismantled? This is a legitimate question that without doubt many disconcerted citizens are asking at this time.
The fact that leaders of national governments are not reacting and remain steeped in the mire of their domestic policies sine die, until Europe, that great ship, finally sinks, does not rid the leaders of the Commission and MEPs of their responsibility. Their resignation, as suggested by a recent editorial in El Pais, does not speak too well of those who are called to speak in representation of the Union, and probably save it.
It is nothing new that Europe requires a gripping adventure that would make it into something identifiable and valuable for the people of this continent, but at these so acutely bitter moments this is something which simply cannot be put off any longer. It is worth looking again at the speech on Europe which Bono gave in Dublin just two years ago. “Reforming treaties or approving directives is important but does not define us … it is our emotions that define us” said the U2 band leader . “Europe, a thought, must become a feeling. We would be a lot better off if our union was not just economic but affective…” he concluded.
I cannot think of any more difficult scenario – but also one more conducive to injecting enthusiasm for Europe – for a more affective Europe, more effective and recognisable. If some leaders who, until a couple of years ago, were at war, were able to plant a great seed of peace in opposition to the hatred that only causes death, should we Europeans today not be able to stand up together against everything that is waiting to attack us? Let’s dream about and fight for a really different Europe.
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