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by Colman Right, enough dwelling on what our neo-liberal overlords and their free-market sycophants have to say about the EU and the need for “reform”. They are right, of course, when they say that the EU has to change and adapt to changing circumstances, though their tendency to pretend that an entity that has reinvented itself every twenty minutes or so has ever stood still is laughable. What do we think the EU should be doing over the next fifty years? Where do we want it to be and what reforms are necessary to get there? To start with, I’d like to concentrate on external affairs, mostly because Matt in NYC raised it Jérôme’s thread and because I was worrying about Africa in the shower this morning, following on from Nomad’s diary on setting GM mosquitoes against malaria.
It is my belief that soft power - the EU’s favourite kind - is only effective if you have a reasonable reputation for integrity: witness the decline in US soft power associated with the declining US reputation for integrity. We’ve all seen recently the limits to hard power: military force is only capable of achieving limited goals in the modern military environment. It can only destroy, not build. The EU can lead, but it needs to lead by example. I believe that we need an external policy based on integrity, pursuing solutions that serve the interests of the people involved, not just the leaderships or local lobby groups, negotiation and enough military power to ensure that we can’t be coerced by the less scrupulous. Our current policy, of tagging along behind the US except when we absolutely can’t stomach it does not server our interests, those of our foreign partners, or even of the US. Concrete reforms required?
What’s this got to do with Africa? Many of that continent’s problems are the result of negative feedback loops which are driven externally. Debt, corruption, poor governance and military conflict have all been the direct results of or assisted by the policies of external powers including many of the EU member states and their corporations. By resolving to act in the long-term interests of the African people we can assist them in building a prosperous, peaceful continent capable of being helpful partners in the interesting times we seem doomed to: it would be nice if they could afford to deal with the consequences of climate change themselves, for instance. Part of our vision for the next fifty years should be an EU that spreads peace and prosperity outside her borders: we will benefit in the long term, as will everyone else. |
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The next fifty years: external affairs. | 16 comments (16 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
The next fifty years: external affairs. | 16 comments (16 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
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