This is the cover of the October issue of The American Enterprise journal. Obviously, the main topic is Red America vs Blue Europe. A not-so-subtle insinuation is that the Red Conservatives triumphed in the USA, however narrowly and controversially the Bush elections were decided, and now it is time for a standoff between rightly Red America and lefty Blue Europe. You just look at the titles of feature articles on the online version to erase all doubts about partiality of contributions. It looks like an invitation for a crusade.
In particular, the journal apparently includes Mathias Doepfner’s European “cowardice” drivel. Here I comment the articles of Karl Zinsmeister and Olaf Gersemann, available online. I will review and freely quote them.
Surely, they have to address deep differences between America and Europe before assessing imposition of the conservative American model upon Europe. One obvious issue is the legendary anti-Americanism of Europeans. Evidently, TAE see it as persistent manifestation of European jealousy and resentment, independent of America’s stand. Anti-Americanism certainly didn’t begin on Bush’s watch, and it won’t end any time soon, as you can read in the summary of feature articles.
They try to assign anti-Americanism and stubborn ideology to European “elites”;, but they easily run into self-contradictions. For example, Zinsmeister states that nearly one third of young Germans say that the US government ordered the 9/11 attacks, that many Europeans name the US as the biggest threat to world peace (as often as North Korea and Iran, 53 percent). Yet, with the next breath he says that this anti-Americanism is most virulent among Europe’s elites, that ordinary Europeans tend to be more appreciative of American culture and economy. When he talks about policies that would not survive the test of popular opinion, he gives examples of “majority supported” ideas like direct election of mayors or the death penalty, blocked by authorities.
They say Europe brims with bright, well-raised people, potent corporations, and an elaborate physical infrastructure, but then it is disappointing that few Europeans tend to accept the verdicts of “recent economic history”, many simply refuse to consider any dramatic alteration of ingrained welfare-state habits. So only neo-conservative elites from Washington can help Europeans to deal with depressing resistance to reality and deep zero-sum mentality (?!).
Predictably, the authors bemoan that Gerhard Schroeder got into trouble for “wrong reasons”, just as the French (and the Dutch) rejected the EU constitution not because economy is too centralized and manipulated but because they wanted it to be more statist than even Brussels allowed. Therefore, right leaders like Tony Blair or perhaps France’s Nicolas Sarkozy are desperately needed.
European foreign policy is bashed, you bet. Europe is nearly irrelevant to the great issues of the future in today’s conflict zones, it no longer even attempts a serious and constructive foreign policy, obstruction of the US is more important than making progress in the world’s most dangerous flashpoints… Can’t we have an opinion that the US is just wrong with the intervention to Iraq? Are the consequences a bit desirable? Were earlier American engagements not instructive? The EU may just admit that it feels fine with diffused foreign policy, but the US “leadership” cannot be followed unreservedly.
Even Red state moral values are imposed on Europe. Nothing can be worse than suicide clinics, infant euthanasia (??), legalized prostitution, collapse of birthrate… So Europeans have a wasting disease in the realm of the human spirit, but why do they feel so good then? Pro-evangelist ballyhoo culminates with the conclusion that the growing divide between Europe and America is a divide between theism and atheism. (Hence, how do we get America back forward?)
But the strongest phrases are dedicated to European economy: miserable performance, economic malaise, economic trauma, slow suicidal stagnation, financial funk, suffocated domestic markets, and then it’s underperformance stupid, romance for statist economics, dancebands on the Titanic…
Again, you can find cute self-contradictions: The good news is that much of what ails Europe economically today would be fairly easy to fix, given a little foresight, courage, and patience, but then in reality, there is not much hope that continental Europe will catch up economically any time soon. The economic woes of large parts of Europe are so serious that no quick fix can cure them. Eventually, the real reasons for the problems have not been understood fully even among reform-minded Europeans, despite a quarter century of never-ending debates.
They say Europeans sense that their economic systems are failing; they have noticed that the beloved welfare and regulatory systems no longer provides the economic security they used to. But then even if reformers would push hard for comprehensive economic changes, they would meet overwhelming resistance from a majority of Europeans. Things may have to get even uglier before the majority realizes the depth of their countries’ stagnation. Can we ask those scribes to follow some elementary logic?
So what are the biggest European economy traumas? That must be most shocking unemployment rates and anemic economic growth of only a little over 1 percent. How shocking is that compared with apparently increasing toughness of the climate change and coming oil peak?
Some 12 percent unemployment must be the biggest disaster imaginable, with no incentives for people to become more self-reliant via private enterprise, with shrinking economic opportunity, broken ladder of upward mobility, particularly harsh effects on immigrants and the newcomer young, “surely” with much personal heartache, notably pinched lives and social unrest. That’s Europe producing the unemployed by the millions versus America close to full employment. But why do the numbers differ just by the factor 2 more or less? After all, the Netherlands and Denmark just made some sensible policy changes, still maintain fairly high unemployment benefits, and their unemployment rate is already at or below U.S. levels! Does Europe really need all drastic American measures?
How scandalous is European lower consumption? Germans are shying away from buying houses, even reluctant to buy cars… Does the government have to intervene and blow larger bubbles? Is that where we have to allocate all resources and human talents? Can’t people have other priorities than having whatever low paid job and consuming more than Americans?
Gersemann does cite Paul Krugman, who stated that the big difference between American and European economies is in priorities, not in performance. But the misrepresentation is: The income gap is not the result of lower efficiency in Europe…, pretending that the income leadership must be a foremost priority anywhere. So Krugman is basically right – GDP per hour worked is about the same in the US and in Europe, but working Europeans like to have more good time, with their families as well. Highest productivity gains are not of primary concern for many Europeans.
Much noise is made of Europe failing to keep pace with mushrooming achievements of less heavily bridled American and Asian competitors. As they say, within a generation, Americans will enjoy twice the economic status that Germans do. Europeans are now also being outstripped by Latin American countries that have embraced globalization. Europe’s share of world GDP shrank from 34 percent to 20 percent over the latest lifetime. However, should comparative economic realities be necessarily decisive? Does the experience of 25 years of Reagan/Thatcher revolutions offer enough confidence that the policy works throughout all economic cycles? Is it too crazy to be skeptical about the ultra-liberal trends? Is it wrong to look for stable alternatives, or to have your own view of just world? Why would American conservatives worry so much specifically about Europe’s position, couldn’t they be just as happy with more developed Asia or, say, Africa?
European economy is not in upheaval, but unemployment and inert domestic markets are pale problems compared with apparent instability of energy markets and uncertainty of climate change. As Gersemann admits, the eurozone still runs a persistent trade surplus, and Germany is the world’s biggest exporter. It is amusing to argue that the big three (Germany, France, Italy) are not healthy for years despite producing three fifths of the eurozone’s economic output, that they can not possibly survive any further social-economic direction. Where is historical evidence for that? Would the welfare systems go into deeper debt than currently the US national budget? Is more stressed social life a sign that some parts of Eastern Europe are healthier than the European norm?
The Red conservatives are very aggressive with imposing their faith based economics, fear based politics, economical social policies and science demeaning initiatives. In the US they succeeded to gather a coalition of corporate interests, cultural conservatives and supremacy ideologues. The think tank conservatives hope to repeat this success in Europe and beyond. Idle opposition is their best friend, as we see in Washington D.C. Progressive Europe should be prepared for the assault. We should know European strengths and sore points, and people in different EU countries. There should be confidence that open empirical arguments and moral responsibility can overcome aggressive dogma. Europe has rich intellectual history. Rational experience in economics and politics serves pretty well presently as well.
[Crossposted at European Tribune.]
