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What's the best course for Europe to take to emerge from its ongoing crisis?
The editors of The Economist magazine and Harvard financial history professor and Newsweek columnist Niall Ferguson tell us that a federal superstate is the only viable way out of a horrendous financial disaster in Europe.
An Economist lead editorial asked, "What will become of the European Union?" ("The Choice," May 26, 2012). It answered: "One road leads to the full break-up of the euro [the single currency of 17 of the 27 members of the European Union], with all of its economic and political repercussions. The other involves an unprecedented transfer of wealth across Europe's borders and, in return, a corresponding surrender of sovereignty. Separate or superstate: those seem to be the alternatives now."
Niall Ferguson put this dilemma much more emphatically in an interview with Ben Laurance in Britain's Sunday Times: "'It's too late to unravel the single currency,' he says. 'People talk about that as if that option existed, and it simply doesn't. It's an illusion to think you can just kick Greece out without unleashing a real nightmare of contagion through the banking systems of the peripheral [European] countries" ("One Nation (Under Germany)," May 20, 2012). Only the Germans have the financial wherewithal to save the euro and the "European Dream."
Ferguson continued: "The complete descent into disrepute of national political elites makes the case for federalism." Witness, as he pointed out a little earlier in a Newsweek article he wrote, France electing a champagne socialist as president on promises of taxing the rich up to 75 percent of their income and a lower national retirement age, as well as Greece electing a ragtag coalition of disparate splinter groups. Also Spanish fiscal policies have resulted in 50 percent of youth being unemployed ("Niall Ferguson: The European Farce," May 14, 2012).
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Keywords: European unity superstate European national politics
European Union - economy: