My disappointment with the type of reporting (or are these opinion pieces?) produced by Steven Erlanger caused me to write a comprehensive critique of one of his recent pieces -- see below.
If Mr. Erlanger is supposed to do "reporting", then I'm disappointed in the NYT for providing such obviously one sided, biased reporting, and in the NYT fact-checkers for not catching some of the more obvious inaccuracies.
If he is considered on opinion-writer, then a regular contributor with a more balance view on Europe would be good for the NYT.
Here is my critique, embedded in the original article:
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Euro, Meant to Unite Europe, Seems to Rend It
PARIS — The euro was a political project meant to unite Europe after the Soviet collapse in a sphere of collective prosperity that would lead to greater federalism. Instead, the euro seems to be pulling Europe apart.
The Euro was not primarily a political project, but a monetary and economic project built on top of (portions of) an already existing political union. Although initially conceived as early as 1969 (even earlier, 1929, if you include the early proposals by Gustav Streseman) as part of the discussions of the formation of the European Union, the current Euro was defined by the Maastricht Treaty in 1992. Its goals were primarily monetary (avoid fluctuations among European currencies) and economic (foster trade, free flow of capital among EU members).
As European leaders scramble to present a united front for this weekend’s critical meeting in Brussels, anxiety in Europe is growing, and not just about the euro. The assumptions of 60 years suddenly seem hollow, and the road ahead is unclear, as if the GPS system has gone out of whack.
Lumping the current difficulties with the Euro, which many economists predicted early on, with a dismissal of the goals and assumptions of the European Union ("The assumptions of 60 years suddenly seem hollow") is intellectually unbelievably shallow. As Mr. Erlanger himself goes on to say in the next paragraph, "[o]n the surface, the European Union is an enormous success" - what does "on the surface" mean? The "success" is not real and tangible?
On the surface, the
European Union is an enormous success. It has nearly 500 million citizens and a
gross domestic product of more than $17 trillion, larger than that of the United States and more than three times China’s or Japan’s. It is America’s largest trading partner by far, and together the two economies account for roughly half the world’s gross domestic product and nearly a third of its trade.
But Europe is in economic and demographic decline as Asia is rising. The European Union’s share of global trade is steadily dropping, especially in exports. Its aging population is placing huge strains on generous social welfare and pension programs and pumping up sovereign debt in an extended period of flat growth.
The economic decline of Europe relative to Asia is relative, as opposed to absolute (whereas the economic decline of the US is absolute, given the decline in income, wealth, education, health care and many other measures among the ever shrinking middle class). The demographic decline is absolute and is shared by most advanced industrial nations. However, just as the declining and aging populations of advanced economies represent a liability for the near- and mid-term, the exploding populations of developing countries, like China and India, represent a time-bomb of potential and real youth unemployment and runaway expectations, which may very well prove to much for these countries to manage.
Technologically, it is behind the United States, but its pay scales are too high to be an easily competitive exporter.
This is a fascinatingly incorrect statement: According to 2010 WTO data, Germany alone within the EU exported almost as much as the US, so if you include all 27 EU countries, the EU exports a lot more than the US. Thus, the EU's technology and its cost structures (including pay scales) must certainly be competitive.
It is such an accepted conventional wisdom that the US is technologically so far advanced, that journalists like Mr. Erlanger seem to repeat it almost like a mantra, without really thinking about it. There is of course some technological innovation which the US excels at - just look at Apple and Google and any number of high-tech companies. But in other technologies, which may matter more for an economy's long term health and survival, the picture is often starkly different. In renewable energy the US is falling behind; in the technology and state of repair of its infrastructure the US is woefully out of step with most EU countries.
The current crisis over the euro has deep roots in the imbalances between north and south, rich and poor, export-led and service-driven economies, tied together by a currency but few rules, and those are rarely enforced.
This is the area where all seem to agree on what the failings of the Euro are, and the fact that the rules, such as they were/are, were routinely broken by even the largest of the EU economies (Germany and France) and that some countries, like Greece, were admitted in spite of common knowledge that they did not meet the criteria, has come back to haunt the Euro.
A fix will require fundamental changes in the functioning of the bloc, with more interference in the workings of sovereign states. There would need to be a fiscal union, with a treasury and a finance minister capable of intervening in national budgets, and more unified tax and pension policies. But it is far from clear that the European Union can gather itself to take these fateful steps away from nationalist identities to a truly European model.
This too is accepted within most countries of the Euro region, and work is actively progressing, if parallel to the admittedly somewhat disjointed efforts to avoid an immediate meltdown, in the direction of a long term solution which will require individual countries to give up additional sovereignty in fiscal and social service matters.
“We are today confronted by the greatest challenge our union has known in its entire history,” said José Manuel Barroso, the head of the European Commission. “It is a financial, economic and social crisis. But also a crisis of confidence — in our leadership, in Europe itself, in our capacity to find solutions.”
There are many who believe that the European Union and its leaders have already been found wanting, and that the European project that brought democracy and peace to the Continent may begin to unravel.
True enough, but this kind of statement is a well-worn journalistic ploy to give "weight" to ones own prejudices. Of course I can find people who predict the demise of the Euro and even the EU (see for example Paul Krugman's column of Oct. 23), but I could make the same statement about the US being in terminal economic and democratic decline -- "There are many who believe …", etc, etc.
What struck me, though, in a recent discussion among members of most political parties on German TV, is how strong and coherent the support for the Euro and the EU is among all these players - with a few notable exceptions, of course. On the super-national front - if you take out Slovakia, where the opposition was more a reflection of internal politicking - support for the Euro and EU is similarly strong. It is of course true, as Mr. Erlanger points out below, that the necessary changes, involving giving up additional sovereignty, will require popular votes in the member nations, and the politicians' mettle will be tested in generating that popular support.
“This crisis is threatening the benefits of 60 years of European integration,” said Nicolas Baverez, a French economist and historian. “All the principles on which the euro zone was built — no state default, no monetary transfers, no bailouts and strict limits on debt — all these principles are dead, and we have no rules to make this work.”
Worse, he said, political leaders underestimate the dangers. “This is not just another
recession, but a real and fundamental crisis,” he said. “There is a tension in the political system and doubt about democratic institutions that we have not experienced since the fall of the Soviet Union.”
Built from the ruins of war and expanded generously in the euphoria after the Soviet collapse, the European Union heralded itself as a model, radiating “soft power.” But now the model looks tarnished and flawed.
To paraphrase Mark Twain, the news of the demise of the European Union is premature. Mr. Erlanger seems to equate problems with the Euro with the demise of the EU. Yes, the political process to save the Euro is messy, and yes, the steps needed to stabilize the Euro against future fluctuations in the fortunes of individual member states are complex and will require skill and leadership from Europe's political leaders. However, if one compares the quality of leadership in Europe with the Keystone Cops performance in the American Congress, I would give the EU a better chance of survival than the US.
Leaders seem diminished; local politics trump solidarity. There is a new nationalism degrading the collective responsibility and shared sovereignty that defines the European Union. Euro-skepticism runs from far-right parties that simultaneously detest immigrants, globalism and Brussels to the governing parties of Europe’s most successful countries.
I assume Mr. Erlanger means that "Leaders seem diminished" in the eyes of their electorates, which is probably true. But journalists, in the eyes of the public, are even more "diminished" than politicians, and this kind of "reporting" by Mr. Erlanger does not help.
A European Union of 15 nations seemed coherent and manageable; the Europe of 27, soon to be 28, is almost ungovernable, even by a professional bureaucracy with little connection to voters and whose decisions cause increasing resentment, summarized in the “democratic deficit” that the European Union suffers.
The historical ironies are considerable.
Germany, for example, divided and in ruins after the war it fought to dominate Europe, is reunited and dominating Europe now, but without arms and with deep reluctance.
Nothing gets done in the European Union without German agreement, commitment and money. But in Chancellor Angela Merkel, Germany has a leader who is reactive and uninspiring, while her coalition partners, the Free Democrats, are slumping into irrelevance. Her eye is on Germany’s internal politics, its loose federalism and coalition government, a major contrast to France’s centralized, nearly monarchical state.
France once dominated the European Union, but Paris has now fallen behind booming Germany, one reason that François Mitterrand feared German reunification. Anxious about its own debt, banks and credit rating in the midst of a nasty presidential campaign, France is having a hard time dragging Berlin along.
At the same time, the countries of Eastern Europe are more vibrant economically than many of their western partners. They share much of the German, Dutch and Finnish view about strict fiscal discipline, and are reluctant to join a shaky euro and become responsible for the failures of others.
Britain, always an outlier in the European Union, looks wise to reject the euro, and the mood now is probably more anti-European than even in the days of Margaret Thatcher.
The fundamental changes needed to cope with the euro crisis — particularly the historic step of creating a common treasury — would require a redrawing of the basic treaties, which would require the approval of the voters.
But Europe is unpopular, a local metaphor for globalization, faceless and interfering. It is by no means certain that the voters are ready to leap into a new world of economic integration. Even if they prove to be, the new treaty will be complex and take years to draft even before being put to the electorate for ratification, if there is ratification.
This is a nice summary of the leadership roles of France and Germany, the fact that they have very different traditions and approaches to government, and the energy of the new members in Eastern Europe. But in terms of the current crisis, that is nothing new. The criticism of Germany's "reluctance to lead" has been self-evident from the start and was and is a requirement to assuage the understandable mistrust of Germany's strength, especially after reunification. As a matter of fact, there are regular tirades in the British press, even today, of how Germany has now conquered Europe, not with guns, but with its economic power.
The press's criticism of Merkel as "reactive and uninspiring" and their call for charismatic leaders is completely serf-serving - they tend to sell more papers. But just look at our own charismatic leader, President Obama, who was swept into power by a wave of adulation, especially from the press. He has turned out to be a very ineffectual leader.
It is easy to say that the answer is “more Europe,” not less. That can seem self-evident to Eurocrats and the political elite. But “more Europe” may not be what voters want.
“The only thing that can save the euro in its current form can’t and shouldn’t be done without democratic debate and support,” said Simon Tilford, chief economist for the Center for European Reform, a research institution.
“You need to bring the electorate with you,” he said. Of course, he acknowledged, a real democratic debate “could exacerbate the crisis.” That may be the largest historical irony of all.
Here Mr. Erlanger hits the nail on the head (for a change), even if this is nothing new: the needs to improve and adapt the EU and the Euro are evident to most leaders and politicians, but it is very difficult to sell these ideas to the individual national electorates. Thus the principals of popular democratic governance for changing the various treaties underlying the EU and the Euro will prove to be the biggest obstacles. But that has bee the story of the EU and the Euro from the start - it has been a development lead by some very dedicated visionaries and leaders, who managed to drag the general population along, sometimes willing, more often kicking and screaming.
Mr. Erlanger obviously belongs to the host of EU/Euro doom-sayers (interestingly, most of these come from Anglo-American media and economists -- such as Paul Krugman). Having lived and worked in Europe both before and after the formation of the EU and the introduction of the Euro, I am still impressed by the benefits both have brought to this continent. My hope rests with the young people of Europe, who - based on my subjective, non-scientific impression - are overwhelmingly and completely committed to both the EU and the Euro, not necessarily because they intellectually agree with it (although that too), but because it is the only Europe they have known, and their lives would be dramatically constrained without the freedoms of movement it has allowed them.
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Addition: Oct. 27, 2011:
Here a comment from a German reader of Mr. Erlanger's article today on the latest deal to "solve" the Euro crisis - I could not say it better myself...
So I give only some remarks from a european view.
The EU is a project far from perfect, holding together totally different nations and languages. But at the end we like it.
Today the german Bundestag vote for a support of the EU on a bill auf all partys, exept the comunists. The US senat and house of represantives can not come together on a bill to support your own nation, even you have only two partys in charge.
Even the Slowenen voted for a support, dispite they have a smaller GdP then Greece.
The keyword here is solidarity.
The other keyword abandonment. Most europeans can live with a little bit less, when they can have peace therefore.