11 October 2024
Politics, the political process at the national level, is in a disastrous state across Europe. Our politicians are mediocre and unimaginative, and in any case, they have little room to make their own decisions in the national interests, with an overbearing hegemon breathing down their necks all the time.
This has lowered the quality of candidates for high office and created a vacuum into which populist parties enter, lowering the overall tone of national debate and governance.
Just look at the UK, where apparently Boris Johnson is threatening or hinting at making a comeback, and the competition in the current leadership race is so intense.... yet no one has anything new to put forward. Johnson was the one who did America's bidding and triggered the start of that disastrous war in Ukraine.
To me, and maybe I've said this before in other posts, this problem of a vassalised Europe is a symptom not of burgeoning American power but of its and the West's, decline.
After the cold war (1945 - 1991), there was the unipolar moment (1991 - 2014) when America was the unchallenged world leader, and Washington felt relaxed enough in its hegemony to allow its allies in Europe some freedom in deciding their own external national policies.
Then around 2014 the challenges started. There was the Chinese 2025 belt and road initiative. There was the start of the Ukraine war over its entry into NATO. And not long after there was Trump with his withdrawal from the world stage, cancelling the Paris accord and questioning NATO.
America could have agreed to these changes, gone with the flow and become part of a multipolar world; or it could resist. Well, it chose to violently resist.
It it seems from the record that during the unipolar moment, America was focused on imposing its values ( at least that is what it said) on the Middle East by restructuring that region with wars in Syria, Libya, Afghanistan and Iraq and early outliers Kosovo and Yugoslavia.
Then post 2014, post unipolar, renewed great power rivalries in Ukraine, the war on ISIS, the second Libyan war, Nagorno-Karabakh.
Europe did have choices. Remember the UK had earlier refused to join in Vietnam and Paris refused Iraq. It could have pursued Gorbachov's Common European Home and included Russia. It could have gone with the UN idea of international law and order. Of course, America's greatest fear at the time was Europe, and particularly a Europe where Germany was allied with Russia.
But instead, Europe, fearful of Russia, scurried under the skirts of America, adopted NATO and the Pax Americana, aka the rules based international order, in place of the U.N.
The words we will remember from this post unipolar period are I think "double down" and "escalation". That's what America did to halt the decline and keep its place as no. 1. America was in reality fighting the challenge from Mackinder's heartland, from central asia.
On defense spending, on trade policies and on sanctions against Russia and Iran, Europe felt itself. forced to comply. Against national interests.
The line, the political position, the insistence dictated by America on all these issues and conflicts, grew stronger and stronger. The sovereignty of European nations was increasingly crimped, "if you are not for us, you are against us" was the ruthless American policy, leaving less wiggle room in European parliaments for policy choices. There was less room for creative initiatives, the quality of candidates for political positions dropped because there is less opportunity for able and ambitious people to make their mark on national life. I also believe there is more corruption in politics today because this is the way Americans get things done. (I always remember for example the planeloads of $100 bills shipped into Iraq.)
With the attention of european elites turned more to america than their own people and national interest, the electorates started turning against leadership. Then couple that with the policy of open borders and a massive rise in immigration, which may arguably suit the needs of the economy and benefit the owners of capital, but ordinary people saw migration as an invasion, stressing the countries' welfare, housing, infrastructure and transport systems, and menacing, a countries long established culture with takeover, a completely alien culture, and you have the foundation for a rise in populism.
Populism with all its known weaknesses. Populist political parties often rely on charismatic leaders, offer simplistic solutions to complex problems, and focus on short-term popularity rather than sustainable governance. Historians will recast this as mediocrity. It can lead to inconsistent policies, further societal division and loss of the middle ground, and being outsiders, inexperience in governing and impatience, creating conflicts with democratic institutions, further weakening their long-term effectiveness.
European politics is in a state of decline, with mediocre politicians lacking the ability to make independent decisions due to American pressure. Only Hungary under Viktor Orbán maintains a distinct voice.
The situation worsened after 2014, with rising global challenges like China’s Belt and Road initiative and the Ukraine war. America responded with resistance, enforcing a stronger unipolar order through NATO and economic sanctions. European sovereignty diminished as the U.S. dictated policies, leaving little room for national interests or political creativity.
In response to the leadership turning to america rather than its electorate, came a rise in the "populist" vote, and potentially divisive figureheads with oversimplified solutions and little respect for democratic institutions.
The loss of soverignty and rise in immigration create a political vacuum into which steps populism. The consequence is that we lose the outstanding talent of yesteryear and "the national interest" suffers. Thus, the overall result of becoming vassals of a foreign power is to lower the quality of our own home leadership.
References
Glen Diesen, "The Ukraine war and the Eurasian world order"
https://www.youtube.com/live/ZNUNMxoYNkY?si=KHuIHPL-mlgDFJGD
