Imprescindibles para sobrevivir

Obra muy mayor:

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Henry Kissinger, World Order. Reflections on the Character of Nations and the Course of History (2014).

En el relato de Kissinger, la historia de la diplomacia y filosofía de la historia se traban con una precisión implacable.

De su análisis se desprende un melancólico balance: ante las nuevas amenazas emergentes, Europa, la UE y los Estados europeos son víctimas de procesos históricos de este tipo:

-Una construcción política que oscila entre dos perspectivas, regional y nacional: sin conseguir los beneficios de ninguna.

-Los Estados han transferido a la UE muchos de sus atributos; pero las políticas estatales siguen siendo esencialmente nacionales.

-Esa situación -esquizofrénica, por momentos- condena a los Estados a un funcionamiento muy complejo y bizantino, que impide tomar decisiones rápidas y eficaces, cogidos en la trampa de dos “lealtades” que pueden llegar a ser antagónicas.

-En el terreno de la seguridad y la defensa, la UE defiende valores “cosmopolitas”, sin tener los medios y recursos indispensables para hacer valer sus principios.

-Las lealtades nacionales, por otra parte, están fragmentadas, amenazando, incluso la integridad de varios Estados.

-Los Estados intentan imponer a los ciudadanos unas solidaridades europeas que no siempre existen, en la práctica.

-Consecuencia fatal, la construcción política de Europa ha entrado en una fase de incertidumbre, escepticismo y dudas sobre su legitimidad política y democrática…

Cuestiones capitales, que Kissinger desmenuza con mucha precisión, iluminando la debilidad histórica de Europa ante las amenazas que se ciernes sobre sus Estados:

The outcome has combined aspects of both the national and the regional approaches without, as yet, securing the full benefits of either. The European Union diminishes its member states’ sovereignty and traditional government functions, such as control of their currency and borders. On the other hand, European politics remains primarily national, and in many countries, objections to EU policy have become the central domestic issue. The result is a hybrid, constitutionally something between a state and a confederation, operating through ministerial meetings and a common bureaucracy—more like the Holy Roman Empire than the Europe of the nineteenth century. But unlike the Holy Roman Empire (for most of its history, at least), the EU struggles to resolve its internal tensions in the quest for the principles and goals by which it is guided. In the process, it pursues monetary union side by side with fiscal dispersion and bureaucracy at odds with democracy. In foreign policy it embraces universal ideals without the means to enforce them, and cosmopolitan identity in contention with national loyalties—with European unity accompanied by east-west and north-south divides and an ecumenical attitude toward autonomy movements (Catalan, Bavarian, Scot) challenging the integrity of states. The European “social model” is dependent upon yet discomforted by market dynamism. EU policies enshrine tolerant inclusiveness, approaching unwillingness to assert distinctive Western values, even as member states practice politics driven by fears of non-European influxes.
The result is a cycle testing the popular legitimacy of the EU itself. European states have surrendered significant portions of what was once deemed their sovereign authority. Because Europe’s leaders are still validated, or rejected, by national democratic processes, they are tempted to conduct policies of national advantage and, in consequence, disputes persist between the various regions of Europe—usually over economic issues. Especially in crises such as that which began in 2009, the European structure is then driven toward increasingly intrusive emergency measures simply to survive. Yet when publics are asked to make sacrifices on behalf of “the European project,” a clear understanding of its obligations may not exist. Leaders then face the choice of disregarding the will of their people or following it in opposition to Brussels.
Europe has returned to the question with which it started, except now it has a global sweep. What international order can be distilled from contending aspirations and contradictory trends? … Henry Kissinger, World Order. Reflections on the Character of Nations and the Course of History (2014).

Las negritas son mías.

From Islamism to Putin, Europe faces new threats – but can it unite to fight?
La balkanisation de l’Europe est en cours.
Le réalisme libéral de Henry Kissinger.
How to Defend Global Order.

Aron y Gramsci nos ayudan a comprender la guerra y el terror Francia / Estado Islámico.
Muchas dudas sobre los bombardeos de Hollande contra el Estado Islámico, en Siria y en Líbano-sur-Seine.

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