Europe the Grand Theatre of finding a Common Ground

European Germany or German Europe

 

This past Wednesday the ruling of the German Bundesverfassungsgerichtmade it very clear, the German public is about to spend about 22 billion Euro on the permanent ESM fund, a 500 billion euro bail out facility, with an additional guarantee of 170 billion liability. The eight judges of the FederalConstitutional Court in Karlsruhe dismissed the motion that, according to Chancellor Angela Merkel, would have meant the definite end to a single European currency the Euro and ultimately an end for a unified Europe. This was their biggest day. Merkel and Co. had put just enough pressure on the five men and three women. Nobody really expected them to stand against the bureaucratic monster that Europe has become and everything European politicians have worked for over the past two, almost three, decades. Never before in the history of the German court, was the international media whipped in such a frenzy. Founded in 1951 as a supreme court with interventionist powers, the German Federal Constitutional Court may be focused on constitutional issues but its authority goes beyond a mere judicial review it is tasked with overseeing the compliance of all political institutions and decisions with the Basic Law of Germany.

The production “Gauweiler vs. ESM” had all the great features of a thriller. The highly talented cast, playing politicians from all over Europe, effectively delivered their beautifully scripted lines in the evening news, prophesizing the end of the world as we know it should the judges decide in favor of the motion. The media machinery staged these unfailingly pro-European rise-or-fall aphorisms against the backdrop of thousands and thousands of extras from Greece and Spain, protesting against yet another austerity policy and budget cuts. It was the grand opening of the matinee, when the red robed men and women solemnly stepped into the limelight with just the right amount of dignified gravity, ready to face the eagerly waiting public at ten a.m., just in time for the markets to save or condemn us all.

Now four days later the media landscape in Germany is still trying to decide how to present this decision as the saving grace for all of us or the failure of the German judicial system, as it bows down to investment bankers in Frankfurt and on Wall Street with their superior powers wielding the market forces. After the doom-and-gloom atmosphere of the past week, Brussels’ bureaucratic mess is save, at least for now. As of today, people can go back to fiercely loathing the might of European institutions and its media-made image of Europe the un-democratic voracious juggernaut, gnawing on the sovereignty of the nation states, devouring mercilessly every shred of cultural individuality and national particularity.

The disgruntled Bavarian politician, a member of the Christian Social Union (CSU), Peter Gauweiler who petitioned the Constitutional Court, dared to voice what a lot of Germans fear. We are politely and forcefully asked to pay for the mistakes of others, shoving money into the endless ever-hungry poor mouths down and south. The world post-landmark decision is still unimpressed by the unpopular EU and the myriad of questions concerning leadership in Europe, the role of national parliaments and the widespread fear of European imperialism, which politicians and media alike fail to translate into transparent institutions and understandable rhetoric. Europe is far away and I am hungry, sick and need a roof over my head here and now. I don’t care if Italian cucumbers are larger than German ones or the fancy new light bulbs with mercury. The focused attention to meticulous detail may very well break the camels back. Some even begin to doubt the concept of Europe as a federation of states with a shared economic interest, suggesting we should start thinking beyond EU and begin thinking as one state. Am I now a European, with a shared European culture and language, a heritage and history and beyond that a constitution and its legal system, taxes and fiscal policy. How far back do we want to go to rewrite history books to fit the new Europe with Charles the Great as the first true European politician? Five years ago my economics professor at the Sorbonne called me a “bâtard boche” to my face, which is the French equivalent of “Kraut”, and during my visit to London the year prior I was verbally abused, when a passer-by told me “all Germans stink, they are Nazis” which admittedly reflects the current Greek attitude towards all things German, with Angela Merkel cast as the evil witch from the west.

If a Europe of Nations is about to be extinct, blown into the a new ice age by the debt meteor that hit the globalized financial markets in 2008, shouldn’t we be adjusting our perspective and begin to actively look for some viable alternative concept for Europeans, the people, not the nations, before we face the same fate as the dinosaurs? A lot of the skepticism we face today was born in the pit of globalized gobbledygook and those who are tasked with educating the people, the representatives in politics and media, fail to explain, either underestimating the reasoning skills of their people or overestimating their ability to suffer.