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Europe’s goal should not be a United States of Europe, but a better united Europe of states

Glendinning, S. (2014) “Europe’s goal should not be a United States of Europe, but a better united Europe of states“, LSE EUROPP, 20 Νοεμβρίου.

 

Is a European ‘superstate’ desirable and, if so, could it ever be created? Simon Glendinning writes on philosophical approaches to this question, drawing on the work of philosophers such as Hegel, Kant, Marx and Derrida. Taking inspiration from Kant, he argues that rather than aiming for the ideal of a European state, we should instead direct our efforts toward a ‘negative substitute’: the formation in Europe of a relatively stable federation of free states.

In a recent article, Darian Meacham and Francesco Tava write on what they term the “post-Europe project”. In making a short and somewhat critical reply, I do not want to give the impression that I find the aims of their discussion unwelcome. The effort to explore ways of thinking beyond Eurocentrism and anti-Eurocentrism is something I wholeheartedly applaud, and the attempt to do so here with reference to the thought of the Czech phenomenologist Jan Patočka is extremely interesting. It is far from a straightforward ambition, but I too think that “hope for a European project” is inseparable from the development of “a philosophical and historical engagement with the concrete structures and institutions of European life.”

Integrating these two elements – finding a way to move from and between philosophy and concrete life – is of course something of a holy grail for all philosophical reflection. Karl Marx perhaps thought it was beyond philosophy’s reach to do so, but we do not have to follow him on that in following his desire to contribute in some way (putting it in his grandiose terms) to changing the world.

The opportunity provided by a philosophically informed approach to the future of European union is, as the authors suggest, to help liberate discussion from domination by narrowly “economic thinking which sees growth, expansion and accumulation” as the be all and end all of Europe’s ambitions. However, I found the authors’ assessment of “what is needed” or “required” in its place to remain too stubbornly close to a classical form of rational cosmopolitical thinking that is no less all or nothing – and which, I will argue here, in wanting everything can get nothing.

 

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