394 Europe’s future – Nationalism vs European identity? emerged out of the experience of two world wars? Glucksmann: In the Middle Ages, the faithful prayed and sang in their litanies: “Lord, protect us from pestilence, hunger and war.” This means that community exists not for good but against evil. SPIEGEL: These days, many people cite the phrase “never another war” as Europe’s raison d’être. Does this foundation still hold up now that the specter of war in Europe has dissipated? Glucksmann: The Balkan wars in the former Yugoslavia and the murderous incendiary actions of the Russians in the Caucasus didn’t happen that long ago. The European Union came together to oppose three evils: the memory of Hitler, the Holocaust, racism and extreme nationalism; Soviet communism in the Cold War; and, finally, colonialism, which some countries in the European community had to painfully abandon. These three evils gave rise to a common understanding of democracy, a civilizing central theme of Europe. SPIEGEL: Is a new, unifying challenge what’s missing today? Glucksmann: It wouldn’t be hard to find if Europe didn’t act so heedlessly. In the early 1950s, the core of the union was the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), the first supranational economic alliance in the area of heavy industry; (it was) Lorraine and the Ruhr area, the ECSC as a means of preventing war. The counterpart today would be a European energy union. Instead, Germany decided to embark on its transition to renewable energy on its own, ignoring the European dimension. Everyone is negotiating individually with Russia for oil and gas, Germany signed an agreement to build the Baltic Sea pipeline despite the resistance of Poland and Ukraine, and Italy is involved in the South Stream pipeline through the Black Sea. SPIEGEL: So each country is pursuing its own interests amid changing alliances and bilateral agreements that ignore the spirit of the European Union? Glucksmann: (This is a) grim example of cacophony because it shows that the member states are no longer willing and able to form a united front against external threats and Europe’s challenges in the globalized world. This touches on the nerve of the European civilization project, in which each person is supposed to be able to live for himself, and with which, however, everyone wants to survive together. And it makes things easy for Russia under (President Vladimir) Putin. Despite all the weakness of that giant of natural resources, its capacity to cause damage remains considerable and is something its president likes to use. Recklessness and forgetfulness create the conditions for new catastrophes in both the economy and politics. […] SPIEGEL: The EU hasn’t lost its appeal. No one is voluntarily leaving the Eurozone. Glucksmann: Socrates said that no one willingly does wrong. I interpret this as follows: Bad things happen when the will grows weak. It doesn’t seem to me that finding solutions and paths in the current financial crisis is a superhuman task. After all, the EU’s leaders keep finding them here and there. SPIEGEL: And they’re finding their way from one Brussels summit to the next, and at increasingly shorter intervals. But what are supposed to be solutions just don’t pan out. Glucksmann: What’s missing is a global perspective. The why of the European Union, its raison d’être, has been lost. There will always be ways to improve the EU institutions and adjust them to the needs of the situation. We can rely on the resourcefulness of politicians and lawyers to do this. The challenge appears at a different level, and it’s clearly a matter of survival: If the old European nations don’t unite and present a unified front, they will perish. SPIEGEL: But haven’t European leaders recognized this? Glucksmann: If they have, why are they acting with so little unity? The question of size has become an absolute necessity in 95 100 105 110 115 120 125 130 135 140 145 150 155 160 165 170 175 180 185 190 71051_1_1_2015_Inhalt_4.indd 39 21.01.15 10:40 Nu r z u Pr üf zw ec ke n Ei ge nt um d es C .C .B uc hn er V er la gs