Cold War
From the desk of The Brussels Journal on Sat, 2005-08-13 00:32
A quote from Tom Kremer in The Financial Times, 9
August 2005
Europe’s faultline does not lie in the middle of the English Channel. Across the continent it separates those countries with an eccentric heritage, where power emanates from the grass roots and authority is vested in the individual, from those with a concentric tradition, where power is centralised and the corporate state predominates. [...] In critical respects the Nordic countries, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Britain are eccentric while Germany, Spain and France form the concentric core of the continent. [...]
For the next decade the struggle between a concentric and an eccentric future will dominate the politics of Europe. France and Britain, as chief protagonists of this polarity, will be engaged in a cold war. Globalisation, the emergence of competitive Asian economies and the preponderance of US power make an eccentric resolution inevitable. A French-inspired, protected geographic entity cannot withstand the forces of the 21st century.
Europe’s faultline does not lie in the middle of the English Channel. Across the continent it separates those countries with an eccentric heritage, where power emanates from the grass roots and authority is vested in the individual, from those with a concentric tradition, where power is centralised and the corporate state predominates. [...] In critical respects the Nordic countries, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Britain are eccentric while Germany, Spain and France form the concentric core of the continent. [...]
For the next decade the struggle between a concentric and an eccentric future will dominate the politics of Europe. France and Britain, as chief protagonists of this polarity, will be engaged in a cold war. Globalisation, the emergence of competitive Asian economies and the preponderance of US power make an eccentric resolution inevitable. A French-inspired, protected geographic entity cannot withstand the forces of the 21st century.