On Jan. 22, 1963, France and Germany signed a treaty at the Élysée Palace in Paris that ended centuries of rivalry and laid a new foundation for amicable relations between them. Certainly the spirit of the “Élysée Treaty” was on view at the event held on the common ground of the Alliance Française and the Goethe-Zentrum Atlanta the evening of Jan. 26 in Midtown’s Colony Square.
Gallagher Fenwick, an international correspondent with the French government supported France 24 news service, and Christoph von Marschall of the Berlin-based newspaper Der Tagesspiegel, engaged in an informative and engaging discussion of the current state of affairs in Europe and the European Union’s prospects for the future, in addition to describing how they go about doing their jobs.
France 24 is a 24-hour multilingual international news network that was launched in December 2006 in response to the global reporting concerning the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. Der Tagesspiegel is a daily newspaper that has regional correspondent offices in Washington and Potsdam, Germany.
The well-attended session composed of members from both the Alliance and Goethe-Zentrum concluded with Dr. Marschall’s view that Europe would muddle along into the future despite the many nationalistic forces that continue to divide its members.
Dr. Marschall, the chief diplomatic correspondent at the Tagesspiegel, began his remarks with the following statement:
As a start, I would like to point you to the general development of typical German thinking about the European Union over the past decades.
You are probably aware that we have at least a six-fold crisis:
• the euro crisis with the special case of Greece
• the war in Ukraine and the general conflict with Russia
• the migration crisis
• the prospect of a Brexit
• the terrorist threat and the challenge how to protect our societies without giving up basic rights
• the threat to democracy and the state of law by authoritarian tendencies in countries like Hungary and Poland.
It seems to me that Germany had a rather special love story with EU integration but most Germans were not aware of it, and our partners did not share this view.
For post war Germans, Europe was in a certain way the absolution of their sins.
The imperial seduction of Germany that led to two world wars would be restrained. EU integration was therefore a good thing, and persistence of the nation state a dangerous thing.
You can imagine, that this was not the philosophy of our neighbors and partners. Why should the French, the Dutch, the Italians think, that their nation state was bad and dangerous and something history should overcome and leave behind?
Most Germans never realized that they were the exception in Europe.
This changed slowly after German unification. Germany started to understand that it was now the powerhouse of Europe. And that it is rather a normal thing to have national interests. If I would have to pick a date, I would pick the summit in Nice (France) in 2000 as a watershed when Germany was no longer the party willing to finance Europe without pursuing national interests.
[pullquote]Most nations are focused on domestic questions, not the common approach to solve European problems[/pullquote]
But a general challenge in European politics I already mentioned remained: Most countries, most nations are focused on domestic questions, not the common approach to solve European problems.
Germans are mostly not even aware, that European partners don’t aim for the same solutions. They take it as a given, that since we are so bright and clever and have reasons for our national solutions, other countries should do the same – and if not, it should be just a question of time, when they fall in line. Because it can’t be that they have a competing and maybe an even better idea of how to match a challenge.
Germans expect European partners to understand that the Energiewende is the only acceptable approach. Poles should give up coal mining, the French their nuclear power and rely at least 50 percent on renewables in 10 years from now
If the German Bundestag introduces a new legislation for, let’s say, telecom data storage, would we ask first, how our partners are dealing with this challenge?
No. Germany has introduced a new law permitting storage for 10 weeks. During the debates in the Bundestag nobody asked, how the French, the British, the Swedish, the Spaniards are doing it – although we know, that we need a common European solution and not a patchwork of different national regulations.
This seems to me the biggest challenge. In theory we demand European solutions, in reality we think in the category of nation states and are unwilling to sacrifice our national convictions, how a problem should be solved for the common good.
The euro crisis, the migration crisis, the discussion about Grexit and Brexit are just mirrors of this basic battle inside of all of us. Where do we draw the line? What is a common European task and what should be left for the nation states? You might say: Well, that is regulated in the so called European treaties.
But I would say: The citizens don’t know the details of the share of responsibilities in the treaties. And they prefer their gut feelings. In times of crisis they do not trust the European level. If they trust at all – a big if – , they turn their hopes and expectations to their national government. That is the state of our union, the European Union in 2016.
Rachel Richter, communications manager of the Goethe Zentrum, interviewed Dr. Marschall during his visit to Atlanta. To read her blog posting of the interview, click here.
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