52 of 58 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Cool Europa, November 11, 2005
This review is from: Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century (Hardcover)
The title of this book is misleading because no one believes Europe will run the 21st century, including the author himself. Mark Leonard is not saying Europe will have the biggest economy or the most powerful military, rather the European way of doing things will be the model of change in the coming century.
In the late 1990's, Leonard was the founder of Tony Blair's think tank, the Foreign Policy Centre, and he was also one of the young turks responsible for the making and the marketing of "cool Britannia." He is currently the head of the Centre for European Reform, and in this slim volume he is attempting to do for the European Union what he did for Great Britain.
Leonard reminds us that the European Union is not a superstate, nor is it a federation or empire. It is more like a decentralized network. He compares the EU to Visa, a company whose logo appears on half a billion credit cards and employs only 3,000 people. Visa is actually owned by the 21,000 financial institutions that use it. The EU, like Visa, is basically an enabling institution rather than an overbearing bureaucracy.
The attraction of the European Union for its members or potential members is its transformational power. It does not threaten with military power, instead the threat of being excluded from the world's largest single market is its most potent weapon. To become a member, a country must transform itself from within and comply with the 80,000 plus pages of law written in Brussels - laws that cover everything from human rights to product development.
Critics will say that this is a superstate, and an undemocratic one at that. Leonard disagrees with this characterization. Not only has the EU rationalized commercial policies and provided a common currency, it has given small and medium-sized countries a voice in an increasingly globalized world. Under the aegis of the EU all the member countries have a say in international negotiations.
Likewise, Leonard claims that on important internal issues such as taxes, pensions, healthcare, and education, Europeans still make decisions on the level of the nation state.
But what about the recent rejection by France and the Netherlands of the EU constitution? No big deal, says Leonard. Europe is always in crisis and it's always debating its future identity, it's just another day at the office. One of the lessons learned from this rejection, however, is that the EU will require more debate and more democracy in the future. For example, on any future expansion of the EU there will be a referendum. If Turkey or the Balkan states want to join, they will not only have to meet all the legal and human rights requirements, they will also have to be accepted by the voters of the member countries. As they famously say, there will have to be a deepening before there can be a widening.
As an optimist and booster of the EU, Leonard is dismissive of the numerous long-term problems that lie ahead. Europe has an overgenerous welfare system that will become even more burdensome as its population ages and declines. And as we have seen recently, many European cities have large pockets of unassimilated immigrants whose numbers are increasing rapidly. Moreover, the high taxation and high regulation stifle business formation and expansion. As he glosses over these issues, Leonard exudes confidence that the European model of law and negotiaton will find a way to solve these problems.
This is an excellent book to familiarize oneself with the European worldview, it is a worldview sharply different from those who still live in the Hobbsian world of power politics.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good book, quick read, May 29, 2007
This review is from: Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century (Hardcover)
This is a much shorter book than the many others on the EU's power but just as informative. It seems that each EU book takes a different (refreshing) path towards explaining why the EU is going to be the dominant force in the 21st century. The common theme throughout is the focus on community and the belief that together we can build something great for everyone. Their methods for negotiating contracts, treaties, etc. is something the US should learn and take note of. Overall, this is a great, quick read that won't disappoint.
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Enlightenment versus narrow self-interest, April 3, 2007
The author argues that Europe consists of a commitment to a set of ideas and values, not a political state. America used to strongly attract others, but it increasingly commands and dominates; while Europe attracts and persuades. Europe has reinvented itself in this way after the world wars of the twentieth century, while America has shifted toward market fundamentalism in economics and a triumphalist attitude in foreign policy.
My main criticism is that the book is, admittedly, a polemical piece, written to encourage Europeans to persist in their social model. So it is a bit sugar-coated and uncritical.
This is an important topic for Americans. Another good book on the new culture in Europe is "Postwar" by Tony Judt.
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