While I do agree with most of the points in your analysis, I cannot stop from thinking that all this complex analysis, including the comments that I read so far, start from the fundamental assumption that violence was, is, and will be a given for humanity. This begs the question: for how long? The answer is not what we would like:
1. Until we learn, as a species, that violence is not in our advantage (though we are quite far from that target by all means) or,
2. We self-annihilate when our technological capabilities exceed our ability to control their usage in beneficial purposes (we may already be at that point).
The conclusion is dire: even if we are not on the brink of self-destruction, we will be soon (technology advances almost exponentially while our humane side does not visibly evolve at all at the time scale we measure these changes). The worst aspect is that it does not take a statistically large number of evil people to bring the civilization down. The critical mass is probably very low, due to the human nature itself. Decent and moral people usually stay out of politics or, if getting there, are either pushed aside, blackmailed, or even killed before they can accomplish anything meaningful - unless they get themselves corrupt as well. Democracy fails when harsh conditions knock the society out of its comfort zone of stability. People become more radicalized, disinformation creates dissensions, the equilibrium breaks.
Another real danger of constantly being in conflict rather than cooperating with each other (up to the highest level) is the enormous waste of resources and lack of coherent effort to pursue a clean and truly renewable energy source. Fossil fuels are running out and we still burn them to kill each other more efficiently. I start having doubts that our civilization has enough time (at the current rate of change in the right direction) to get past the fossil fuel exhaustion moment (compounded with climate change and war). The so-called renewables are not as sustainable as we may wish. I am an EE engineer and looking to understand what would be a feasible path towards a stable and prosperous society past the fossil fuels age. Honestly, I did not find any broad study that demonstrates how we will make progress in this direction. We have wonderful technologies, but the required material resources to keep them running are also limited and recycling efficiency is sometimes low and requires a lot of additional energy. So far the worst (and quite probable) future is a population overshoot (due to shrinking resources, war, massive migration and mostly food scarcity) that results in a societal collapse. If we keep fighting each other, we will enter the catabolic phase much sooner than expected (i.e., before we make a successful transition to clean energy). And don't yet bet on fusion, it's not here and it may not be for some time.
Bottom line:
How can we avoid conflict altogether? Is it even possible? What would it take? Where should we start? Education? An entirely different political and economic system?
As Mark says, you touch on 20 different topics that each need a very long post (and I’m working on most of them). Quick thoughts:
- I don’t worry about sustainability nearly as much. Cheap energy is very doable already today. Recycling is a function of energy and AI, which also gets better. In the long term, we have other planets or even our own flying bodies.
- I fear population shrinking more than booming
- Fossil fuels are a good step in between. We don’t run out of it. As it gets more expensive, we discover sources harder to get.
- The ROI for violence is indeed dramatically changing
- But violence will exist as long as it is positive in some areas. It’s not psychology, it’s a rational local maximum.
Humans vary from not wholly rational to mostly irrational therefore the rationality or otherwise of violence must also vary? I also think individual violence is a very different thing from group violence.
Bad Vlad seems to have regained his composure and we no longer see Mad (angry) Vlad. This is hopefully a good thing from a nuclear perspective (unless the rumours of him having cancer have some substance), but suggests that he is pretty confident of achieving his goals whatever they may be.
Uncharted Territories is about answering the questions you pose, see The Rise and Fall of Civilisations for some discussion.
Tomas, I submit the above post as evidence for my thesis around the eleventh and twelfth days of Christmas. There is a serious imbalance between individualism and collectivism in the world, so the balance between conflict and co-operation gets out of kilter. The best way I can think of to rebalance is to encourage those who are most likely to cooperate rather than fight. Perhaps then we might learn how to get better at peace.
The problem this article is trying to address, also has a connection to your "violence is not the solution" path. Multiculturalism is a duct tape solution to a long-term problem of cultural barriers, beliefs, mannerisms, and subconsious bias of which Turkey, and Muslim European countries face in acceptance from the average EU citizens, resulting in vague and deflecting answers once confronted by it, or by vague acceptance of migrants from another cultural sphere.
Another problem is that, a drastic reduction in violence approaching zero, requires a single universal language, a universal justice system, and a universal basic belief or cultural bases upon which society builds upon.
The crux of it is, that it will smack of imperialism, and dregge up WW1&2 PTSD for most western countries who have experienced what happens when old kingdoms and empires use technological progress, to compete in imposing their own Universal Language, Law, and Values.
Makes creating any of the above, a subconscious rejection for any culture of sufficient historical practice. Much less for the entire human race.
1. Thank you for being equally "fair" to US, UK, and Russia. There's a whole lot more that can be said about terrible US policies domestically and internationally. Sunset time.
2. I totally agree with you that Europe/EUR CAN navigate this crisis and play both sides US/UK and China/Russia (and India... check that UN vote scorecard...). Literally >75% of hedge fund folks in the public blogosphere are onto chess "match" that the pigeon is stumbling into since 2014 quite directly, with respect to US$ hegemony and the subsequent moves Putin/China have at their disposal.
3. Some of these folks are however not calling this for Europe, far from it. European financials seem to be taking it on the chin... Few are seeing that Germany/France can and will pivot back and forth, because they cannot afford to separate from China/India in the future.
That's just something some us feel is happening... so good call, amigo.
Sure seems that even though Trump was the first US president to not START any new wars in many administrations, he still shat all over the geopolitical chessboard with his chest out and turned all the other countries completely off from aligning with US in the future.... and there's some payback for WW2 and siding with Nazis against communisms all over the geopolitical chessboard for DECADES. Bloody and ruthless pigeons, ey. (Subconsciously Americans voted against Hillary in 2016, cause Maidan was fresh enough).
Best case scenario, China and US renegotiate the new techno/metaverse P2E ponzi economy, but sure seems that US just steps on gas the closer it gets to that wall. But there's just no way that Europe follows US/UK into the oblivion. Macron in fact senses the opportunity to at least "play" a more leading role along with Germany. BUT for the time being, they're playing the US/UK side, before "gridlocking" back into a stalemate that sides with the Asian/multipolar future.
Finally a little Ukrainian joke from 2014 days: "Americans and Russians will fight each other until the last... Ukrainian"... I don't think Hillary understands. She doesn't play chess, she plays NYT crossword puzzles and bingo perhaps.
"According to one study, the U.S. performed at least 81 overt and covert known interventions in foreign elections during the period 1946–2000.[6] Another study found that the U.S. engaged in 64 covert and six overt attempts at regime change during the Cold War.[1]"
1. Technology shapes policy and ideology narratives, in my humble opinion.
2. CIA/Twitter had that Arab spring experiment... but clearly it was a pandora's box and they didn't study Marshall McLuhan enough about communication mediums.
3. Luckily or unluckily nuclear powers do matter, thus it IS/WAS a multipolar world for that reason alone. ("MAD" to assume otherwise... Game, set, match, without touching on new mediums of communication, web3, ideology/politics)
Great comments. The only thing I have to add is that the UN vote scorecard probably isn't as important as the Russian SANCTIONS scorecard.
The countries sanctioning Russia are limited to the US and its Five Eyes (UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand), Europe (except Serbia and Hungary), Japan, South Korea, and to a limited extent Singapore.
All the other countries in the world are staying out of the conflict, including all the BRICS (Brazil, India, China, South Africa) and even NATO member, Turkey.
I always take great comfort in your crisp analysis Tomas - however I can't seem to reconcile it with humans’ innate tribalism. Our species has such an overriding need to form like groups to fulfill our relational needs and maintain our fleeting identities. In his book, Descartes’ Error, Damasio declares “We are not thinking machines. We are feeling machines that think.” The US/EU rapid change of intervention policy last week was at its core a deftly rationalized change of heart. I agree that the EU/NATO will be unified by this threat for some time and may act more coherently in other areas but historically the profoundly emotional power of identity always bats last.
I agree. Human psychology is a given and you can’t change it. But you can play it to your advantage. That’s what capitalism does, for example: converting greed into production.
And that’s really what I’m suggesting here: nation-building for the EU. As it has happened with so many other nations before (and today)
What corrupted capitalism has done is to manipulate human psychology for the benefit of a a small percentage of the population. It has directed the focus of Western society towards overconsumption, greed and money using soft power psychological tools. But not all humans are innately greedy, the 10% have spread their values way into the other 90%. Unless we learn how to improve how we deal with human group psychology then as Catalin P says, the risk to human and planetary wellbeing is high: lots of conflict with unprecedented destructive power at our disposal.
If something is not easy to change that does not make it impossible to change. First you need to understand it, then learn ways to modify it in the direction of your goals and put them into practice. Believing that we have no free will or control over something means certain failure, but individuals have been modifying their own psychology for thousands of years. If group psychology can be manipulated for unhealthy purposes then there is no reason it can't be unmanipulated to free people. I don't think even think major changes to human psychology are needed, just rebalancing what is already there
Can the EU become a superpower at the same time than Internet and the blockchain are weakening nation states, and there is a strong (even if still early) tendency to decentralize in the West ?
If the EU wish to do so, it will have to control its technological foes, which means reducing freedoms.
Or can the EU allows SEZs and free private cities as experiments on its territory, in order to reap the many benefits that will come from them ?
Yes, but at the same time the whole point of your article is that, in order to be a superpower, the EU needs to stop being just supra-national, and needs to build a nation :
"Only when they build a European identity stronger than the regional ones will Europe be ready to unite. Will they become a true nation."
So it goes contrary to the trend you highlighted in your articles about the weakening of nation-states.
If it doesn't, please point to me how the weakening of nation-states doesn't counteract the goal of creating a EU "true nation".
Because, if the nation-states of the EU become weaker (specifically, are less able to raise taxes and keep their wealthy citizen inside their borders at the same moment their costs and debts are skyrocketing), how the "EU as a true nation" made of them will be stronger at the same time ?
These are trends that are not binary and take decades.
Many forces undermine current nation-states. Some eliminate state power and place it at the individual level (Eg Bitcoin). Others go across geographies (Eg communities of interest). Yet others go at the supranational level. Climate change activism or woke are 2 examples. A movement for the universal rights is another. It just so happens that this last one has also a geographic overlap with Europe.
So you can see nation-states losing power to the EU (and other players) in a way that the EU is more powerful than today, while European nation-states are weaker, but where the sum total of power between EU and nation-states is lower in the future than it is today or was 20 years ago.
In other words: nation-states lose power to many players, one of them being Supra-national organizations, which will thus be more powerful than they are today but not as powerful as existing nation-states.
I've argued with many jaded friends that our generation (I was born in 1977) may end up being the most fortunate and prosperous generation, in general, in the history of our species, especially in the West.
Brilliant passages like the following really reinforce that core belief:
"But violence is always there, even when you don’t see it."
I've been really, REALLY lucky in my life to have not had to deal with true violence. Same goes for many of my peers as well.
Seeing the vaporization of the prospect of that phenomenon continuing through the second half of my time on this Earth has really been the most core-shaking experience these last two weeks.
Vague concepts and fantastical descriptions of what 'could be' if our comfortable geopolitics destabilize are now fast becoming real and significant PROBABLE outcomes.
I fear that my generation is not emotionally or psychologically equipped to actually DEAL with this shit. That fact might scare me the most.
People become complacent. For instance, in the century after the Napoleonic wars when there were no major long-lasting wars in Europe. Then WWI happened.
There were major wars in Europe between the Napoleonic wars and WWI, involving the same parties France, UK, Germany (Prussia then), Russia etc: Crimean War 1856-1859, Franco-Prussian War 1870-1871. That last one was a factor in the chronic Franco-German conflicts and underlying tensions leading to WWI. Only the EU post-WWII stopped conflicts between France and Germany for nearly 7 decades now (but the EU hasn't stopped war on the European continent: Balkans in the 90s, Crimea & Ukraine in the last decade).
Thanks for explaining your interpretation of major, which is different to mine: where I come from (I'm French, married to a German citizen, living in the UK for a quarter of a century) we look at the impact of wars on the political and historical consequences (in addition to the number of deaths which is certainly important and obviously tragic). In that respect the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 lasted only 6 months with half a million dead, and it accelerated the creation of a unified Germany: the end of the Franco-Prussian War was signed (in Versailles) with the creation of the German Empire and the proclamation of the first German Emperor. This was a major shift in European power dynamics in the 2nd half of the 19th century, and created conditions that played a part in the lead to WWI. This however goes beyond the topic of Thomas' article, and so I'll leave it here.
I let this article go without a comment... But it is actually because I share each and every one of the elements of your analysis, and your conclusions, hopes, doubts. Short of an "it goes without saying" on my part, but upon reflection I think it goes even better said, and with emphasis.
Language is a big barrier for sure (maybe rapid improvements in machine translation tech will be a gamechanger in that regard). But also, creating a federated state is an unnatural process, in the sense that national elites must willingly cede power to a global elite, and people in top positions in power hierarchies tend to be power maximizers. Federations are typically created in wars, or through the threat of wars, and as shocking the war in Ukraine is, Russia is not a serious threat to the EU as long as it is under US protection.
But there will always be crises. If not with Russia, with China maybe. Every new crisis, the EU will be closer culturally. So eventually it will probably unite.
The question becomes: can we accelerate it? The Overton window truly includes a United EU right now, which it never really did before. We should take advantage of it.
The EU is unstable because it is poorly designed. They have a weak political union BUT no fiscal union. One reason that federations work is that fiscal union allows countries to redistribute wealth from the rich regions to the poor regions. But there is no mechanism for this in the EU. And since the Maastricht Treaty, EU member countries no longer have control over their own monetary policies.
Finally, the EU isn't really democratic since all the real power lies with the European Commission and the ECB (European Central Bank)--both of which are UNELECTED.
I agree that Putin's error may be the best thing that happened to EU, but also to NATO.
Countries who looked partly towards Russia and enviously towards the EU will now swing hard towards the EU. Those that fear Russian control will apply to join NATO. (NATO is only a defensive organisation.)
It is quite possible that Russia will now dismantle its corrupt leadership and even (wow!) become an ally of the West.
Apr 2, 2022·edited Apr 2, 2022Liked by Tomas Pueyo
China is an even likelier winner than NATO. Saudi Arabia has started to accept payment for its oil in Chinese RMB. India has made a deal to pay for Russian oil in Rupees AND bypass SWIFT. And Russia is now requiring payment of its gas in Rubbles. Could this be the beginning of the end for the USD as the international reserve currency???
Knowing that Sovereign Central Bank USD and Euros can now be seized, which countries will want to continue holding these currencies???
Western sanctions on Russia will blow back on us as INFLATION, which was already a problem due to supply chain problems arising from the pandemic. I fear a global recession is on the horizon.
The EU will be preoccupied with millions of Ukrainian refugees, the economic fallout from their sanctions, and wasting resources on building up their militaries.
And the US could be forced to pause their 'Pivot to Asia' and reallocate their military back to Europe--another bonus for China on top of discounted Russian energy.
Sadly I don’t think so. As someone stated earlier, humans are tribal and emotionally driven. They use their Amygdala as their prime driver in life. Power for protection and to control others are humans core drivers. Fear and greed take center stage. Humans bend everything that starts out decent into a perversion. From religion to economics to cultural diversity. Racism is who we are. In many ways Russia today is like Colombia, while not a narco state, it is a corrupted violence falsehood spreading freedom suppression government that as respect only for power. It is a complete opposite of the truth telling less violent side of humanity. In a simplistic comparison putin is Darth Vader and Russians are his storm troopers. Here in America it’s trump and his maga Putinites. Nothing to offer but hate, violence and suffering.
El artículo es un compendio de saber, como siempre, "pero" realmente me esperaba un milagro surgido de grandes mentes como la tuya Tomás y colaboradores. Una solución visible y rápida para terminar con esta masacre debida a la debilidad de todos que ha hecho que la fiera ataque. No hay milagros y aunque la explicación y posibles soluciones son muy claras, no sé si nos dará tiempo de lograrlo
I fear the only way to stop this would be to cut off the head of the snake. All reason seems to be lost in the upper echelons of Russia. Unless we are being heavily misinformed by the Ukrain-favorable press. But I doubt that.
Espero y suplico que sean los mismos rusos los que salven la situación porque el monstruo es inaccesible para las mentes de nuestro supuesto mundo desarrollado que ahora está desinformado por el pánico que produce a su alrededor
I am amazed to see the military spending figures. Russia is really small grit in comparison to EU and certainly to US. I would have like to have seen the nuclear weapons on a bar chart just to complete the picture. But obviously 1+1 being equal to 0 means nuclear weapons are imo not use-able except as a threat
Yes, Russia is not a great power outside of nukes. Russia is essentially 2 Iran's + a bunch of nukes (or Iran + Saudi Arabia + a bunch of nukes).
As military people who've followed the Ukraine invasion closely have noticed, the US, NATO or even just the EU (excluding the US and UK) would wipe the floor with Russia in a conventional war.
Mar 5, 2022·edited Mar 5, 2022Liked by Tomas Pueyo
It is not quite true. Iran's military force is impressive on paper (for a country its size), but is mostly composed of outdated material from the 70's and 80's. For example, they still use the F14 Tomcats they got at the end of the 70's, which were only slightly updated and have hopelessly outdated electronics compared to modern fighter jets.
Russia's military force is much more modern. But yeah, without nuclear weapons it would probably lose a war against just France and Germany united.
Follow the war in Ukraine. Russia has a few modern pieces, but they still have a lot of old junk. Most importantly, their military is terribly trained.
I'm against the invasion of Ukraine, but take the Western media with a grain of salt. Russia is fighting a NATO trained Ukrainian military AND is outnumbered by as much as 3:1. Yet they have achieved air supremacy and pinned down Ukrainian forces.
My reading is that Russia is using its Syrian approach to minimize civilian casualties AND destroy the Ukrainian army in eastern Ukraine. They're intentionally avoiding Kiyv to keep Zelensky alive so that he can implement the coming Russia-Ukraine agreement.
SEE: Ukraine Updates and Scott Ritter on Russia Military Strategy and Progress (Scott Ritter, Naked Capitalist, Mar 21, 2022)
Scott Ritter is a former Marine Intelligence Officer and former UN Weapons Inspector in Iraq.
I don’t think you can dismiss European nations’ sense of identity as merely pride. The distinctive languages and cultures of Europe are a rich treasure, and not something that Europeans will or should surrender lightly, even for the sake of being a superpower.
Europe needs to articulate and focus on its common values to make its unity in diversity work but I’m not sure that “human rights” are robust enough in themselves. They are a secularised version of Christian values, but lacking the narrative, imaginative appeal and teleology of a full-blooded religion capable of binding nations together.
Nobody says surrender. As Richard says, Chinese regions have a rich diversity. So do regions within European countries. You can keep them while at the same time recognizing that the higher level of sovereignty (and identity) is more important yet weaker.
I agree that the EU is bad at nation-building around universal rights. But I think it’s a communication issue, not a content issue. Do you disagree? What would you have instead?
Human rights can be a religion in itself, just as France's public secularism is.
And I understand Pueyo's argument. The Cantonese, Sichuan, Wu (Yangtze river delta where Shanghai is), etc. regions of China all have rich distinctive different cultures and languages, but nobody would argue that China would be stronger if it was split in to 31 different pieces (the number of provinces/autonomous cities/regions the PRC has) or even 11 (the number of major language branch areas it has; note that "Chinese" is as diverse as the Romance languages).
Fewer devastating wars. When Europe had a bunch of roughly equally powerful top countries, they fought wars with each other all the time (other than that century of peace between the Napoleonic wars and WWI). That's because states ultimately can't trust one another. When a hegemon dominates, you don't see that (hence why we talk about the Pax Americana and Pax Romana and why the golden ages in China are all when one dynasty lasts for a long time and acts as a regional hegemon). The US putting nearly all the countries west of Russia in NATO has made war between NATO countries inconceivable. And I'm dubious of your assertion that elites in a bigger political entity are farther away from it's people. Do you have anything to back that up? Were the rulers of the trillion or so tiny statelets in the Holy Roman Empire closer to their subjects than the rulers of a unified Germany now? What about the Papal States vs. a unified Italy now?
Wow, that's a pretty negative view of the world. I hope for your sake that you are referring to trust at the international level rather than trust at a personal level.
Do you think the Ukrainians fighting against Putin trust each other? I don't think anyone is forcing them to risk their lives.
I would come to the opposite conclusion. A system of trust that is based on coercion will ALWAYS fail eventually. In fact I would say that the statement is an oxymoron. Trust and coercion are mutually exclusive, the whole point of real trust is that it doesn't require the threat of force.
No one but a fool would trust Putin, so what we do agree on is that coercion or threats are required in some circumstances and that is why pacifism doesn't work. There have always been and probably always will be people who have no empathy for others and have psychopathic personality traits, but these people aren't that common. As Catalin mentioned in her post, the problem is that human leaderships contests often actively select for these traits!
I like your observations about the Pax Romana and Pax Americana, but the reality is that they eventually failed. To get better at peace, we surely need to understand why they failed.
See my reply to the naked emperor. Elites in a bigger political entity will by definition be geographically farther away from the people, but that does not necessarily mean that they are intellectually or emotionally further away though it does increase the risk. That risk requires active mitigation (e.g. political focus groups in democracies) but should be manageable with modern communication tools.
Exactly NATO and the EU meant fewer devastating wars. That is enough. Turning the EU into a superpower is unnecessary as the close cooperation over the last 40 years has shown.
The EU wanting to become a superpower is what drove the UK away and is what will ultimately be its demines.
You cannot compare the EU with the US, each country has a rich culture and history that people do not want to give up. They are happy to co-operate, trade and be peaceful however.
Mar 4, 2022·edited Mar 4, 2022Liked by Tomas Pueyo
NATO's not enough because the European countries are ultimately still dependent on big daddy USA to protect them and because there isn't much coordination of military purchases between countries, it's extreme inefficient. And because foreign policy isn't coordinated, it would still be pretty easy to divide up Europe.
Absolutely. Disconnection is the theme you are highlighting here (8th Day of Xmas TP) and it is a massive problem in all sorts of ways. Humans evolved successfully in the context of social connection and co-operation. The greater the distance between people the less connection there is with the result that there is little feedback.
Humans are generally emotional creatures so to get donations for a charity in Africa you need to show people starving and get others to feel connected to them. Do people around the world feel connected to Ukranians at the moment? You bet they do. But the ruling class and wealthy people (in fact people in general) have developed all sorts of techniques to avoid feeling any connection to the everyday citizen. The side effect of this disconnection is that communication breaks down. Good leaders find ways to keep listening to their followers and use that to maintain some balance (because there are advantages to being able see things from a distant and disconnected perspective).
So I would say that an EU with its own military isn't necessarily a problem. Disconnection between the Brussels bubble and the citizens IS a problem.
A large part of the reason that Putin invaded Ukraine appears to be his self-directed isolation from the rest of the world over the last few years. If you disconnect from the world it is hardly surprising that you become disconnected from reality and make bad decisions.
Ce n'est pas très intelligent de dire de faire l'anglais une langue co officielle pour tous les pays en Europe.
Je trouve inadmissible qu'à Londres personne ne peut parler français. Qu'en pensez vous ?
Je pense que le français ferait une bien meilleure langue pour l'union européenne. On ne peut avoir comme langue officielle celle d'un pays qui a refusé l'union européenne.
Ce sont des gens comme vous qui sont responsables du Brexit.
Le fait de ne parler qu'une seule langue a fait croire aux britanniques qu'ils étaient beaucoup plus proche des américains que des européens. Ils se sont enfermés dans une bulle idéologique et pensaient limite revenir au XIXeme siècle en reconstruisant l'empire.
L'unité linguistique que vous désirez est une vision appauvrie des échanges. On ne peut avoir une langue co officielle en Europe pour chaque pays, ça risquerait de blesser l'orgueil de beaucoup de pays européen.
1. Vous vous centrez beaucoup sur le RU. L’anglais deviendrait la langue véhiculaire non pour les plaire, mais simplement pour accepter la réalité: l’anglais est de très loin la langue la plus véhiculaire du monde, et c’est plutôt grâce aux US qu’au royaume uni
2. Vous dites que la barrière principale c’est l’orgueil. Je suis d’accord. On collabore et produit moins parce qu’on est orgueilleux. N’est-ce pas stupide?
3. L’anglais est déjà la langue officielle de plusieurs pays de l’UE: l’Irlande et Malté.
4. C’est aussi la langue la plus parlée de l’UE
J’ai écrit 2 articles sur le thème si ça vous intéresse:
Oui j'ai lu les articles c'est très intéressant et très fourni. Bravo pour votre travail. La force de l'américain est sa capacité à faire briller sa culture. Aujourd'hui peu importe où vous êtes vous entendrez parler anglais grâce à Internet.
Mais je pense sincèrement que faire de l'anglais une langue co officielle dans chaque état membre de l'UE ne serait pas une bonne chose. C'est une vision américaine du monde de vouloir n'avoir qu'une seule langue. Ça ne conduirait qu'à un rejet de l'union Européenne.
Personnellement en tant que français je trouve ça honteux d'accepter que l'anglais soit une langue de travail de l'union européenne et je n'accepterai pas ça!
Je ne vois toujours qu'une opinion. Je ne vois pas d'arguments rationnels qui démontrent que le monde (et la France) soient de meilleurs endroits sans l'anglais comme langue véhiculaire.
While I do agree with most of the points in your analysis, I cannot stop from thinking that all this complex analysis, including the comments that I read so far, start from the fundamental assumption that violence was, is, and will be a given for humanity. This begs the question: for how long? The answer is not what we would like:
1. Until we learn, as a species, that violence is not in our advantage (though we are quite far from that target by all means) or,
2. We self-annihilate when our technological capabilities exceed our ability to control their usage in beneficial purposes (we may already be at that point).
The conclusion is dire: even if we are not on the brink of self-destruction, we will be soon (technology advances almost exponentially while our humane side does not visibly evolve at all at the time scale we measure these changes). The worst aspect is that it does not take a statistically large number of evil people to bring the civilization down. The critical mass is probably very low, due to the human nature itself. Decent and moral people usually stay out of politics or, if getting there, are either pushed aside, blackmailed, or even killed before they can accomplish anything meaningful - unless they get themselves corrupt as well. Democracy fails when harsh conditions knock the society out of its comfort zone of stability. People become more radicalized, disinformation creates dissensions, the equilibrium breaks.
Another real danger of constantly being in conflict rather than cooperating with each other (up to the highest level) is the enormous waste of resources and lack of coherent effort to pursue a clean and truly renewable energy source. Fossil fuels are running out and we still burn them to kill each other more efficiently. I start having doubts that our civilization has enough time (at the current rate of change in the right direction) to get past the fossil fuel exhaustion moment (compounded with climate change and war). The so-called renewables are not as sustainable as we may wish. I am an EE engineer and looking to understand what would be a feasible path towards a stable and prosperous society past the fossil fuels age. Honestly, I did not find any broad study that demonstrates how we will make progress in this direction. We have wonderful technologies, but the required material resources to keep them running are also limited and recycling efficiency is sometimes low and requires a lot of additional energy. So far the worst (and quite probable) future is a population overshoot (due to shrinking resources, war, massive migration and mostly food scarcity) that results in a societal collapse. If we keep fighting each other, we will enter the catabolic phase much sooner than expected (i.e., before we make a successful transition to clean energy). And don't yet bet on fusion, it's not here and it may not be for some time.
Bottom line:
How can we avoid conflict altogether? Is it even possible? What would it take? Where should we start? Education? An entirely different political and economic system?
As Mark says, you touch on 20 different topics that each need a very long post (and I’m working on most of them). Quick thoughts:
- I don’t worry about sustainability nearly as much. Cheap energy is very doable already today. Recycling is a function of energy and AI, which also gets better. In the long term, we have other planets or even our own flying bodies.
- I fear population shrinking more than booming
- Fossil fuels are a good step in between. We don’t run out of it. As it gets more expensive, we discover sources harder to get.
- The ROI for violence is indeed dramatically changing
- But violence will exist as long as it is positive in some areas. It’s not psychology, it’s a rational local maximum.
Humans vary from not wholly rational to mostly irrational therefore the rationality or otherwise of violence must also vary? I also think individual violence is a very different thing from group violence.
Bad Vlad seems to have regained his composure and we no longer see Mad (angry) Vlad. This is hopefully a good thing from a nuclear perspective (unless the rumours of him having cancer have some substance), but suggests that he is pretty confident of achieving his goals whatever they may be.
Fabulous post, thank you.
Uncharted Territories is about answering the questions you pose, see The Rise and Fall of Civilisations for some discussion.
Tomas, I submit the above post as evidence for my thesis around the eleventh and twelfth days of Christmas. There is a serious imbalance between individualism and collectivism in the world, so the balance between conflict and co-operation gets out of kilter. The best way I can think of to rebalance is to encourage those who are most likely to cooperate rather than fight. Perhaps then we might learn how to get better at peace.
The problem this article is trying to address, also has a connection to your "violence is not the solution" path. Multiculturalism is a duct tape solution to a long-term problem of cultural barriers, beliefs, mannerisms, and subconsious bias of which Turkey, and Muslim European countries face in acceptance from the average EU citizens, resulting in vague and deflecting answers once confronted by it, or by vague acceptance of migrants from another cultural sphere.
Another problem is that, a drastic reduction in violence approaching zero, requires a single universal language, a universal justice system, and a universal basic belief or cultural bases upon which society builds upon.
The crux of it is, that it will smack of imperialism, and dregge up WW1&2 PTSD for most western countries who have experienced what happens when old kingdoms and empires use technological progress, to compete in imposing their own Universal Language, Law, and Values.
Makes creating any of the above, a subconscious rejection for any culture of sufficient historical practice. Much less for the entire human race.
Well done, Tomas.
1. Thank you for being equally "fair" to US, UK, and Russia. There's a whole lot more that can be said about terrible US policies domestically and internationally. Sunset time.
2. I totally agree with you that Europe/EUR CAN navigate this crisis and play both sides US/UK and China/Russia (and India... check that UN vote scorecard...). Literally >75% of hedge fund folks in the public blogosphere are onto chess "match" that the pigeon is stumbling into since 2014 quite directly, with respect to US$ hegemony and the subsequent moves Putin/China have at their disposal.
3. Some of these folks are however not calling this for Europe, far from it. European financials seem to be taking it on the chin... Few are seeing that Germany/France can and will pivot back and forth, because they cannot afford to separate from China/India in the future.
That's just something some us feel is happening... so good call, amigo.
Sure seems that even though Trump was the first US president to not START any new wars in many administrations, he still shat all over the geopolitical chessboard with his chest out and turned all the other countries completely off from aligning with US in the future.... and there's some payback for WW2 and siding with Nazis against communisms all over the geopolitical chessboard for DECADES. Bloody and ruthless pigeons, ey. (Subconsciously Americans voted against Hillary in 2016, cause Maidan was fresh enough).
Best case scenario, China and US renegotiate the new techno/metaverse P2E ponzi economy, but sure seems that US just steps on gas the closer it gets to that wall. But there's just no way that Europe follows US/UK into the oblivion. Macron in fact senses the opportunity to at least "play" a more leading role along with Germany. BUT for the time being, they're playing the US/UK side, before "gridlocking" back into a stalemate that sides with the Asian/multipolar future.
Finally a little Ukrainian joke from 2014 days: "Americans and Russians will fight each other until the last... Ukrainian"... I don't think Hillary understands. She doesn't play chess, she plays NYT crossword puzzles and bingo perhaps.
https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN2A22SN
Easy buddy.
"According to one study, the U.S. performed at least 81 overt and covert known interventions in foreign elections during the period 1946–2000.[6] Another study found that the U.S. engaged in 64 covert and six overt attempts at regime change during the Cold War.[1]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_regime_change
1. Technology shapes policy and ideology narratives, in my humble opinion.
2. CIA/Twitter had that Arab spring experiment... but clearly it was a pandora's box and they didn't study Marshall McLuhan enough about communication mediums.
3. Luckily or unluckily nuclear powers do matter, thus it IS/WAS a multipolar world for that reason alone. ("MAD" to assume otherwise... Game, set, match, without touching on new mediums of communication, web3, ideology/politics)
4. Democracy is a useful narrative, but "we" are a republic if you want it presented as a rotten peach. (http://www.gangsofamerica.com/gangsofamerica.pdf)...
Again, without getting into the nitty gritty dirty CIA ties.
Great comments. The only thing I have to add is that the UN vote scorecard probably isn't as important as the Russian SANCTIONS scorecard.
The countries sanctioning Russia are limited to the US and its Five Eyes (UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand), Europe (except Serbia and Hungary), Japan, South Korea, and to a limited extent Singapore.
All the other countries in the world are staying out of the conflict, including all the BRICS (Brazil, India, China, South Africa) and even NATO member, Turkey.
I always take great comfort in your crisp analysis Tomas - however I can't seem to reconcile it with humans’ innate tribalism. Our species has such an overriding need to form like groups to fulfill our relational needs and maintain our fleeting identities. In his book, Descartes’ Error, Damasio declares “We are not thinking machines. We are feeling machines that think.” The US/EU rapid change of intervention policy last week was at its core a deftly rationalized change of heart. I agree that the EU/NATO will be unified by this threat for some time and may act more coherently in other areas but historically the profoundly emotional power of identity always bats last.
I agree. Human psychology is a given and you can’t change it. But you can play it to your advantage. That’s what capitalism does, for example: converting greed into production.
And that’s really what I’m suggesting here: nation-building for the EU. As it has happened with so many other nations before (and today)
What corrupted capitalism has done is to manipulate human psychology for the benefit of a a small percentage of the population. It has directed the focus of Western society towards overconsumption, greed and money using soft power psychological tools. But not all humans are innately greedy, the 10% have spread their values way into the other 90%. Unless we learn how to improve how we deal with human group psychology then as Catalin P says, the risk to human and planetary wellbeing is high: lots of conflict with unprecedented destructive power at our disposal.
If something is not easy to change that does not make it impossible to change. First you need to understand it, then learn ways to modify it in the direction of your goals and put them into practice. Believing that we have no free will or control over something means certain failure, but individuals have been modifying their own psychology for thousands of years. If group psychology can be manipulated for unhealthy purposes then there is no reason it can't be unmanipulated to free people. I don't think even think major changes to human psychology are needed, just rebalancing what is already there
Can the EU become a superpower at the same time than Internet and the blockchain are weakening nation states, and there is a strong (even if still early) tendency to decentralize in the West ?
If the EU wish to do so, it will have to control its technological foes, which means reducing freedoms.
Or can the EU allows SEZs and free private cities as experiments on its territory, in order to reap the many benefits that will come from them ?
I don’t think either of these things are mutually exclusive. One of the powers that I mentioned is undermining nation-states is Supra-national
Organizations. The EU is the perfect example of that.
Yes, but at the same time the whole point of your article is that, in order to be a superpower, the EU needs to stop being just supra-national, and needs to build a nation :
"Only when they build a European identity stronger than the regional ones will Europe be ready to unite. Will they become a true nation."
So it goes contrary to the trend you highlighted in your articles about the weakening of nation-states.
If it doesn't, please point to me how the weakening of nation-states doesn't counteract the goal of creating a EU "true nation".
Because, if the nation-states of the EU become weaker (specifically, are less able to raise taxes and keep their wealthy citizen inside their borders at the same moment their costs and debts are skyrocketing), how the "EU as a true nation" made of them will be stronger at the same time ?
These are trends that are not binary and take decades.
Many forces undermine current nation-states. Some eliminate state power and place it at the individual level (Eg Bitcoin). Others go across geographies (Eg communities of interest). Yet others go at the supranational level. Climate change activism or woke are 2 examples. A movement for the universal rights is another. It just so happens that this last one has also a geographic overlap with Europe.
So you can see nation-states losing power to the EU (and other players) in a way that the EU is more powerful than today, while European nation-states are weaker, but where the sum total of power between EU and nation-states is lower in the future than it is today or was 20 years ago.
In other words: nation-states lose power to many players, one of them being Supra-national organizations, which will thus be more powerful than they are today but not as powerful as existing nation-states.
Incredible essay - bravo!
I've argued with many jaded friends that our generation (I was born in 1977) may end up being the most fortunate and prosperous generation, in general, in the history of our species, especially in the West.
Brilliant passages like the following really reinforce that core belief:
"But violence is always there, even when you don’t see it."
I've been really, REALLY lucky in my life to have not had to deal with true violence. Same goes for many of my peers as well.
Seeing the vaporization of the prospect of that phenomenon continuing through the second half of my time on this Earth has really been the most core-shaking experience these last two weeks.
Vague concepts and fantastical descriptions of what 'could be' if our comfortable geopolitics destabilize are now fast becoming real and significant PROBABLE outcomes.
I fear that my generation is not emotionally or psychologically equipped to actually DEAL with this shit. That fact might scare me the most.
People become complacent. For instance, in the century after the Napoleonic wars when there were no major long-lasting wars in Europe. Then WWI happened.
There were major wars in Europe between the Napoleonic wars and WWI, involving the same parties France, UK, Germany (Prussia then), Russia etc: Crimean War 1856-1859, Franco-Prussian War 1870-1871. That last one was a factor in the chronic Franco-German conflicts and underlying tensions leading to WWI. Only the EU post-WWII stopped conflicts between France and Germany for nearly 7 decades now (but the EU hasn't stopped war on the European continent: Balkans in the 90s, Crimea & Ukraine in the last decade).
Those aren't really major. Where I come from, a major war is one where millions die.
Thanks for explaining your interpretation of major, which is different to mine: where I come from (I'm French, married to a German citizen, living in the UK for a quarter of a century) we look at the impact of wars on the political and historical consequences (in addition to the number of deaths which is certainly important and obviously tragic). In that respect the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 lasted only 6 months with half a million dead, and it accelerated the creation of a unified Germany: the end of the Franco-Prussian War was signed (in Versailles) with the creation of the German Empire and the proclamation of the first German Emperor. This was a major shift in European power dynamics in the 2nd half of the 19th century, and created conditions that played a part in the lead to WWI. This however goes beyond the topic of Thomas' article, and so I'll leave it here.
I let this article go without a comment... But it is actually because I share each and every one of the elements of your analysis, and your conclusions, hopes, doubts. Short of an "it goes without saying" on my part, but upon reflection I think it goes even better said, and with emphasis.
Thank you Tomás.
I’m glad to hear! I just got some very good news on this topic. I hope to be able to share them in the coming months.
Language is a big barrier for sure (maybe rapid improvements in machine translation tech will be a gamechanger in that regard). But also, creating a federated state is an unnatural process, in the sense that national elites must willingly cede power to a global elite, and people in top positions in power hierarchies tend to be power maximizers. Federations are typically created in wars, or through the threat of wars, and as shocking the war in Ukraine is, Russia is not a serious threat to the EU as long as it is under US protection.
I fear you’re right.
But there will always be crises. If not with Russia, with China maybe. Every new crisis, the EU will be closer culturally. So eventually it will probably unite.
The question becomes: can we accelerate it? The Overton window truly includes a United EU right now, which it never really did before. We should take advantage of it.
The EU is unstable because it is poorly designed. They have a weak political union BUT no fiscal union. One reason that federations work is that fiscal union allows countries to redistribute wealth from the rich regions to the poor regions. But there is no mechanism for this in the EU. And since the Maastricht Treaty, EU member countries no longer have control over their own monetary policies.
Finally, the EU isn't really democratic since all the real power lies with the European Commission and the ECB (European Central Bank)--both of which are UNELECTED.
I agree that Putin's error may be the best thing that happened to EU, but also to NATO.
Countries who looked partly towards Russia and enviously towards the EU will now swing hard towards the EU. Those that fear Russian control will apply to join NATO. (NATO is only a defensive organisation.)
It is quite possible that Russia will now dismantle its corrupt leadership and even (wow!) become an ally of the West.
NATO is even a likelier winner than the EU!
China is an even likelier winner than NATO. Saudi Arabia has started to accept payment for its oil in Chinese RMB. India has made a deal to pay for Russian oil in Rupees AND bypass SWIFT. And Russia is now requiring payment of its gas in Rubbles. Could this be the beginning of the end for the USD as the international reserve currency???
Knowing that Sovereign Central Bank USD and Euros can now be seized, which countries will want to continue holding these currencies???
Western sanctions on Russia will blow back on us as INFLATION, which was already a problem due to supply chain problems arising from the pandemic. I fear a global recession is on the horizon.
The EU will be preoccupied with millions of Ukrainian refugees, the economic fallout from their sanctions, and wasting resources on building up their militaries.
And the US could be forced to pause their 'Pivot to Asia' and reallocate their military back to Europe--another bonus for China on top of discounted Russian energy.
Sadly I don’t think so. As someone stated earlier, humans are tribal and emotionally driven. They use their Amygdala as their prime driver in life. Power for protection and to control others are humans core drivers. Fear and greed take center stage. Humans bend everything that starts out decent into a perversion. From religion to economics to cultural diversity. Racism is who we are. In many ways Russia today is like Colombia, while not a narco state, it is a corrupted violence falsehood spreading freedom suppression government that as respect only for power. It is a complete opposite of the truth telling less violent side of humanity. In a simplistic comparison putin is Darth Vader and Russians are his storm troopers. Here in America it’s trump and his maga Putinites. Nothing to offer but hate, violence and suffering.
Great article. Thanks. This is spot on what I believe as well
El artículo es un compendio de saber, como siempre, "pero" realmente me esperaba un milagro surgido de grandes mentes como la tuya Tomás y colaboradores. Una solución visible y rápida para terminar con esta masacre debida a la debilidad de todos que ha hecho que la fiera ataque. No hay milagros y aunque la explicación y posibles soluciones son muy claras, no sé si nos dará tiempo de lograrlo
I fear the only way to stop this would be to cut off the head of the snake. All reason seems to be lost in the upper echelons of Russia. Unless we are being heavily misinformed by the Ukrain-favorable press. But I doubt that.
Espero y suplico que sean los mismos rusos los que salven la situación porque el monstruo es inaccesible para las mentes de nuestro supuesto mundo desarrollado que ahora está desinformado por el pánico que produce a su alrededor
I am amazed to see the military spending figures. Russia is really small grit in comparison to EU and certainly to US. I would have like to have seen the nuclear weapons on a bar chart just to complete the picture. But obviously 1+1 being equal to 0 means nuclear weapons are imo not use-able except as a threat
Yes, Russia is not a great power outside of nukes. Russia is essentially 2 Iran's + a bunch of nukes (or Iran + Saudi Arabia + a bunch of nukes).
As military people who've followed the Ukraine invasion closely have noticed, the US, NATO or even just the EU (excluding the US and UK) would wipe the floor with Russia in a conventional war.
It is not quite true. Iran's military force is impressive on paper (for a country its size), but is mostly composed of outdated material from the 70's and 80's. For example, they still use the F14 Tomcats they got at the end of the 70's, which were only slightly updated and have hopelessly outdated electronics compared to modern fighter jets.
Russia's military force is much more modern. But yeah, without nuclear weapons it would probably lose a war against just France and Germany united.
Follow the war in Ukraine. Russia has a few modern pieces, but they still have a lot of old junk. Most importantly, their military is terribly trained.
I'm against the invasion of Ukraine, but take the Western media with a grain of salt. Russia is fighting a NATO trained Ukrainian military AND is outnumbered by as much as 3:1. Yet they have achieved air supremacy and pinned down Ukrainian forces.
My reading is that Russia is using its Syrian approach to minimize civilian casualties AND destroy the Ukrainian army in eastern Ukraine. They're intentionally avoiding Kiyv to keep Zelensky alive so that he can implement the coming Russia-Ukraine agreement.
SEE: Ukraine Updates and Scott Ritter on Russia Military Strategy and Progress (Scott Ritter, Naked Capitalist, Mar 21, 2022)
Scott Ritter is a former Marine Intelligence Officer and former UN Weapons Inspector in Iraq.
Hi Tomas,
Just scrolling past your first graphic and stumbled… Did you intend, “Contiguous”?
I know, it’s a heavy burden I have borne all my life!
… /g
That makes sense. I will correct later. Thx!
I don’t think you can dismiss European nations’ sense of identity as merely pride. The distinctive languages and cultures of Europe are a rich treasure, and not something that Europeans will or should surrender lightly, even for the sake of being a superpower.
Europe needs to articulate and focus on its common values to make its unity in diversity work but I’m not sure that “human rights” are robust enough in themselves. They are a secularised version of Christian values, but lacking the narrative, imaginative appeal and teleology of a full-blooded religion capable of binding nations together.
Nobody says surrender. As Richard says, Chinese regions have a rich diversity. So do regions within European countries. You can keep them while at the same time recognizing that the higher level of sovereignty (and identity) is more important yet weaker.
I agree that the EU is bad at nation-building around universal rights. But I think it’s a communication issue, not a content issue. Do you disagree? What would you have instead?
Human rights can be a religion in itself, just as France's public secularism is.
And I understand Pueyo's argument. The Cantonese, Sichuan, Wu (Yangtze river delta where Shanghai is), etc. regions of China all have rich distinctive different cultures and languages, but nobody would argue that China would be stronger if it was split in to 31 different pieces (the number of provinces/autonomous cities/regions the PRC has) or even 11 (the number of major language branch areas it has; note that "Chinese" is as diverse as the Romance languages).
An EU with it's own military. One step closer to a global world order which has very little benefit to the everyday citizen.
No thanks.
It would probably be better for the everyday citizen. Why do you think it would be worse?
Because the further away the ruling class are from their people, the less they care about them. Why do you think it would be better?
Fewer devastating wars. When Europe had a bunch of roughly equally powerful top countries, they fought wars with each other all the time (other than that century of peace between the Napoleonic wars and WWI). That's because states ultimately can't trust one another. When a hegemon dominates, you don't see that (hence why we talk about the Pax Americana and Pax Romana and why the golden ages in China are all when one dynasty lasts for a long time and acts as a regional hegemon). The US putting nearly all the countries west of Russia in NATO has made war between NATO countries inconceivable. And I'm dubious of your assertion that elites in a bigger political entity are farther away from it's people. Do you have anything to back that up? Were the rulers of the trillion or so tiny statelets in the Holy Roman Empire closer to their subjects than the rulers of a unified Germany now? What about the Papal States vs. a unified Italy now?
The key word in your reply is trust. All levels of social cohesion can only reach their full potential when he level of trust is high enough
And the only way to make that happen is to be in the same state or some other higher organization that has a monopoly on violence.
It's nice to think that humans should trust one another but as Putin has shown, a system of trust that ultimately isn't based on coercion will fail.
Wow, that's a pretty negative view of the world. I hope for your sake that you are referring to trust at the international level rather than trust at a personal level.
Do you think the Ukrainians fighting against Putin trust each other? I don't think anyone is forcing them to risk their lives.
I would come to the opposite conclusion. A system of trust that is based on coercion will ALWAYS fail eventually. In fact I would say that the statement is an oxymoron. Trust and coercion are mutually exclusive, the whole point of real trust is that it doesn't require the threat of force.
No one but a fool would trust Putin, so what we do agree on is that coercion or threats are required in some circumstances and that is why pacifism doesn't work. There have always been and probably always will be people who have no empathy for others and have psychopathic personality traits, but these people aren't that common. As Catalin mentioned in her post, the problem is that human leaderships contests often actively select for these traits!
I like your observations about the Pax Romana and Pax Americana, but the reality is that they eventually failed. To get better at peace, we surely need to understand why they failed.
See my reply to the naked emperor. Elites in a bigger political entity will by definition be geographically farther away from the people, but that does not necessarily mean that they are intellectually or emotionally further away though it does increase the risk. That risk requires active mitigation (e.g. political focus groups in democracies) but should be manageable with modern communication tools.
Exactly NATO and the EU meant fewer devastating wars. That is enough. Turning the EU into a superpower is unnecessary as the close cooperation over the last 40 years has shown.
The EU wanting to become a superpower is what drove the UK away and is what will ultimately be its demines.
You cannot compare the EU with the US, each country has a rich culture and history that people do not want to give up. They are happy to co-operate, trade and be peaceful however.
NATO's not enough because the European countries are ultimately still dependent on big daddy USA to protect them and because there isn't much coordination of military purchases between countries, it's extreme inefficient. And because foreign policy isn't coordinated, it would still be pretty easy to divide up Europe.
Absolutely. Disconnection is the theme you are highlighting here (8th Day of Xmas TP) and it is a massive problem in all sorts of ways. Humans evolved successfully in the context of social connection and co-operation. The greater the distance between people the less connection there is with the result that there is little feedback.
Humans are generally emotional creatures so to get donations for a charity in Africa you need to show people starving and get others to feel connected to them. Do people around the world feel connected to Ukranians at the moment? You bet they do. But the ruling class and wealthy people (in fact people in general) have developed all sorts of techniques to avoid feeling any connection to the everyday citizen. The side effect of this disconnection is that communication breaks down. Good leaders find ways to keep listening to their followers and use that to maintain some balance (because there are advantages to being able see things from a distant and disconnected perspective).
So I would say that an EU with its own military isn't necessarily a problem. Disconnection between the Brussels bubble and the citizens IS a problem.
A large part of the reason that Putin invaded Ukraine appears to be his self-directed isolation from the rest of the world over the last few years. If you disconnect from the world it is hardly surprising that you become disconnected from reality and make bad decisions.
Ce n'est pas très intelligent de dire de faire l'anglais une langue co officielle pour tous les pays en Europe.
Je trouve inadmissible qu'à Londres personne ne peut parler français. Qu'en pensez vous ?
Je pense que le français ferait une bien meilleure langue pour l'union européenne. On ne peut avoir comme langue officielle celle d'un pays qui a refusé l'union européenne.
Ce sont des gens comme vous qui sont responsables du Brexit.
Votre opinion est claire. J'adorerais comprendre votre raisonnement.
Le fait de ne parler qu'une seule langue a fait croire aux britanniques qu'ils étaient beaucoup plus proche des américains que des européens. Ils se sont enfermés dans une bulle idéologique et pensaient limite revenir au XIXeme siècle en reconstruisant l'empire.
L'unité linguistique que vous désirez est une vision appauvrie des échanges. On ne peut avoir une langue co officielle en Europe pour chaque pays, ça risquerait de blesser l'orgueil de beaucoup de pays européen.
1. Vous vous centrez beaucoup sur le RU. L’anglais deviendrait la langue véhiculaire non pour les plaire, mais simplement pour accepter la réalité: l’anglais est de très loin la langue la plus véhiculaire du monde, et c’est plutôt grâce aux US qu’au royaume uni
2. Vous dites que la barrière principale c’est l’orgueil. Je suis d’accord. On collabore et produit moins parce qu’on est orgueilleux. N’est-ce pas stupide?
3. L’anglais est déjà la langue officielle de plusieurs pays de l’UE: l’Irlande et Malté.
4. C’est aussi la langue la plus parlée de l’UE
J’ai écrit 2 articles sur le thème si ça vous intéresse:
https://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/should-everybody-learn-english
https://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/the-ineluctable-progress-of-english
Oui j'ai lu les articles c'est très intéressant et très fourni. Bravo pour votre travail. La force de l'américain est sa capacité à faire briller sa culture. Aujourd'hui peu importe où vous êtes vous entendrez parler anglais grâce à Internet.
Mais je pense sincèrement que faire de l'anglais une langue co officielle dans chaque état membre de l'UE ne serait pas une bonne chose. C'est une vision américaine du monde de vouloir n'avoir qu'une seule langue. Ça ne conduirait qu'à un rejet de l'union Européenne.
Personnellement en tant que français je trouve ça honteux d'accepter que l'anglais soit une langue de travail de l'union européenne et je n'accepterai pas ça!
Je ne vois toujours qu'une opinion. Je ne vois pas d'arguments rationnels qui démontrent que le monde (et la France) soient de meilleurs endroits sans l'anglais comme langue véhiculaire.