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The European Union the superpower of the 21st century, the European Century?

What do you think? An extract from an article by Mark Leonard, from the Irish Times Newspaper from 2005. For all the talk of the American Empire, the past two years have been more about the limits of American power. Its economic lead over Europe is disappearing (in 1950 its GDP per capita was twice that of Western Europe, while today it is almost the same size), while the political price for saying no to the superpower has never been lower (as Germany, France, Mexico, Turkey and Chile found over Iraq). In fact, the US leads the world in only two ways: it has the biggest army in the world, and the most popular "popular culture". But the combined might of the US military could do nothing to stop 9/11 or halt terrorism in Iraq, and the more America's presence around the world becomes militarised, the less attractive the American way of life becomes. Meanwhile, across the pond, Europeans - often by accident - have been developing a new kind of power that cannot be measured in terms of military budgets or smart-missile technology. It works in the long term, and is about reshaping the world rather than winning short-term tussles. And when we stop looking at the world through American eyes, we can see that each element of European "weakness" is in fact a facet of its extraordinary transformative power. In just 50 years, Europeans have made war between European powers unthinkable; European economies have closed the gap with the US; and Europe has brought successive waves of countries out of dictatorship and into democracy. If you look at a map of the world, you can see a zone of peace spreading like a blue oil slick - from the west coast of Ireland to the eastern Mediterranean; from the Arctic Circle to the Straits of Gibraltar - sucking in new members in its wake. Around the 450 million (as of 2009 it's 500 million) citizens of the EU, there are another 1.5 billion people who depend completely on an EU that is their biggest trade partner and their biggest source of credit, foreign investment, and aid. These two billion people (one-third of the world's population) live in the "Eurosphere": Europe's zone of influence, which is gradually being transformed by the European project and adopting European ways of doing things. Europe's power is easy to miss. Europe doesn't flaunt its strength or talk about a "single sustainable model of progress" as America does. Instead, like an "invisible hand", it operates through the shell of traditional political structures. The Dail, Irish law courts, and Irish civil servants are still here, but they have all become agents of the European Union, implementing European law. This is no accident. By creating standards that are implemented through national institutions, Europe can take over the world without becoming a target for hostility. The same is true of European troops abroad who often serve under UN or NATO flags rather than the European one. While every US company, embassy and military base is a terrorist target, Europe's invisibility allows it to spread its influence without provocation. The fact that Europe does not have one leader, but rather a network of centres of power united by common policies and goals, means it can expand to accommodate ever-greater numbers of countries without compromising their independence, while continuing to provide its members with the benefits of being part of the largest market in the world. Europeans are not interested in classic geo-politics when they talk to other countries: instead, they use the law to change them from within. Instead of talking about the war on terror or the balance of power, they look at what kind of government they have. What values underpin the state? What are its constitutional and regulatory frameworks? Europe's obsession with legal frameworks means it can transform the countries it comes into contact with, instead of just skimming the surface. The US might have changed the regime in Afghanistan, but Europe is changing all of Polish society, from its economic policies and property laws to its treatment of minorities and what gets served on the nation's tables. The lonely superpower can bribe, bully, or impose its will almost anywhere in the world, but when its back is turned, its potency wanes. The strength of the EU, conversely, is broad and deep: once sucked into its sphere of influence, countries are changed forever.

Public Comments

1. How can Europe ever be a superpower when they don't have their own militaries? England is the only European country with anything more than a defense force.
2. You seem to forget that the EU is nowhere near the point of being a single nation, they are not even all allies yet.
3. u have to be a white college student from the US, no one else could be so simplistic
4. Economically, I'd say it's going to happen in the next twenty years. Militarily, who really cares? It's not really relevant to being a superpower in this age.
5. After USA falls, the Russians will march all the way to Madrid in a month.
6. It is amazing how since the 50s America's growth has lagged behind considerably that of other nations. And it's quite simply really. We've too busy policing the world, spending millions on wars that don't effect us, undermining governments and trying to control the middle east. One day our military spending will out weigh our economy.
7. As an economic group only. They expect the US to fight their wars.
8. A lot has changed since 2005. Countries like Italy and France rushed to adopt the Euro and were immediately boosted by it. Since then, however, the first EU recession is already showing some cracks in the system as old rivalries and nationalistic divides creep back into their "unified" system. Let's see how the EU handles it's first burst "bubble" before anointing it the "leader of the pack."
9. The EU has done what Charmane, Napoleon, Hitler and Stalin could not do - Conquer Europe. They have a long way to go before Germany takes complete control of the "Union" and unifies an army. But they will and then we will have a real problem to deal with. Their crisis will be the muslim threat to Christianity.
10. An interesting contradiction. The article take a jingoistic tone about a Europe that is completely devoid of jingoism. And a little out of date about terror attacks, given that the three worst terror attacks in the western world since 2005 have all been in Europe (Madrid train bombing, London train bombing, Scotland airport attack). But it does have a point that Europe's influence is increasing, and that a lot of that can be attributed to the unification. Can you imagine the U.S. unifying with anyone? Conservatives would go ape shit. Maybe this is another strength of the European Union, i.e. that their conservatives are actually sane. And they are also in power in Germany and France, with the UK not far behind. It used to be that Reagan and Thatcher represented the conservative viewpoint in the western world. Today's conservative in the U.S. makes Reagan and Thatcher look like Bolsheviks.
11. The invisible hand of the EU is indeed coming. Welcome to the EU world order.