Europe's still a wimp
at 12:20pm
on Thursday, 17th July 2003
Giscard's draft constitution has failed to give the EU the platform it needs to flex its muscles on the world stage, says Robert Lane Greene, and the US remains the world's only superpower.
He may be right that the convention has been a largely inward-looking exercise, and that the constitution does not really address Europe's role in the world. But as both Robert Cooper and Theo Veenkamp et al have argued, Europe is unlikely to project its power and influence in conventional ways. Cooper sees a route to security not simply through military power but through the creation of a "post-modern" world order, in which traditional nation-state strategies are broken down through investment in mutual interference, surveillance and interdependence amongst nation states. Veenkamp et al argue for a New European Commonwealth project to take forward the task of extending the post-modern world created by the European Union beyond its borders, by building new social, cultural and economic relationships between the EU and the countries in its backyard.
Giscard's draft constitution has failed to give the EU the platform it needs to flex its muscles on the world stage, says Robert Lane Greene, and the US remains the world's only superpower.
He may be right that the convention has been a largely inward-looking exercise, and that the constitution does not really address Europe's role in the world. But as both Robert Cooper and Theo Veenkamp et al have argued, Europe is unlikely to project its power and influence in conventional ways. Cooper sees a route to security not simply through military power but through the creation of a "post-modern" world order, in which traditional nation-state strategies are broken down through investment in mutual interference, surveillance and interdependence amongst nation states. Veenkamp et al argue for a New European Commonwealth project to take forward the task of extending the post-modern world created by the European Union beyond its borders, by building new social, cultural and economic relationships between the EU and the countries in its backyard.
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