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Turbulent and Mighty Continent

Author: Anthony Giddens

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2013-12-18

Total Pages: 278

ISBN-13: 0745681271

Winner of the 2014 European Book Prize. A "United States of Europe", Winston Churchill proposed in 1946, could "as if by a miracle transform" that "turbulent and mighty continent". "In this way only", he continued, "will hundreds of millions of toilers be able to regain the simple joys and hopes which make life worth living". Today, nearly seventy years later, over 500 million people live in the member states of the European Union – a greater number than in any other political community save for China and India. The currency of the Union, the euro, is used in economic transactions world-wide. Yet the EU is mired in the greatest crisis of its history, one that threatens its very existence as an entity able to have an impact upon world affairs. Europe no longer seems so mighty, instead but faces the threat of becoming an irrelevant backwater or, worse, once again the scene of turbulent conflicts. Divisions are arising all over Europe, while the popularity of the Union sinks. How can this situation be turned around? Now published as a revised and updated paperback that takes account of the May 2014 elections to the European Parliament, Turbulent and Mighty Continent makes a powerful case for a far-reaching and fundamental renewal of the European project as a whole.

Is the EU Doomed?

Author: Jan Zielonka

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2014-06-05

Total Pages: 97

ISBN-13: 0745684009

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The European Union is in crisis. Crippled by economic problems, political brinkmanship, and institutional rigidity, the EU faces an increasingly uncertain future. In this compelling essay, leading scholar of European politics, Jan Zielonka argues that although the EU will only survive in modest form - deprived of many real powers - Europe as an integrated entity will grow stronger. Integration, he contends, will continue apace because of European states’ profound economic interdependence, historic ties and the need for political pragmatism. A revitalized Europe led by major cities, regions and powerful NGOs will emerge in which a new type of continental solidarity can flourish. The EU may well be doomed, but Europe certainly is not.

Journey into Europe

Author: Akbar Ahmed

Publisher: Brookings Institution Press

Published: 2018-02-27

Total Pages: 595

ISBN-13: 0815727593

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An unprecedented, richly, detailed, and clear-eyed exploration of Islam in European history and civilization Tensions over Islam were escalating in Europe even before 9/11. Since then, repeated episodes of terrorism together with the refugee crisis have dramatically increased the divide between the majority population and Muslim communities, pushing the debate well beyond concerns over language and female dress. Meanwhile, the parallel rise of right-wing, nationalist political parties throughout the continent, often espousing anti-Muslim rhetoric, has shaken the foundation of the European Union to its very core. Many Europeans see Islam as an alien, even barbaric force that threatens to overwhelm them and their societies. Muslims, by contrast, struggle to find a place in Europe in the face of increasing intolerance. In tandem, anti-Semitism and other forms of discrimination cause many on the continent to feel unwelcome in their European homes. Akbar Ahmed, an internationally renowned Islamic scholar, traveled across Europe over the course of four years with his team of researchers and interviewed Muslims and non-Muslims from all walks of life to investigate questions of Islam, immigration, and identity. They spoke with some of Europe’s most prominent figures, including presidents and prime ministers, archbishops, chief rabbis, grand muftis, heads of right-wing parties, and everyday Europeans from a variety of backgrounds. Their findings reveal a story of the place of Islam in European history and civilization that is more interwoven and complex than the reader might imagine, while exposing both the misunderstandings and the opportunities for Europe and its Muslim communities to improve their relationship. Along with an analysis of what has gone wrong and why, this urgent study, the fourth in a quartet examining relations between the West and the Muslim world, features recommendations for promoting integration and pluralism in the twenty-first century.

The Far Right Today

Author: Cas Mudde

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2019-10-25

Total Pages: 129

ISBN-13: 150953685X

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The far right is back with a vengeance. After several decades at the political margins, far-right politics has again taken center stage. Three of the world’s largest democracies – Brazil, India, and the United States – now have a radical right leader, while far-right parties continue to increase their profile and support within Europe. In this timely book, leading global expert on political extremism Cas Mudde provides a concise overview of the fourth wave of postwar far-right politics, exploring its history, ideology, organization, causes, and consequences, as well as the responses available to civil society, party, and state actors to challenge its ideas and influence. What defines this current far-right renaissance, Mudde argues, is its mainstreaming and normalization within the contemporary political landscape. Challenging orthodox thinking on the relationship between conventional and far-right politics, Mudde offers a complex and insightful picture of one of the key political challenges of our time.

The Lure of Technocracy

Author: Jürgen Habermas

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2015-06-04

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13: 0745686834

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Over the past 25 years, Jürgen Habermas has presented whatis arguably the most coherent and wide-ranging defence of theproject of European unification and of parallel developmentstowards a politically integrated world society. In developing hiskey concepts of the transnationalisation of democracy and theconstitutionalisation of international law, Habermas offers themain players in the struggles over the fate of the European Union(the politicians, the political parties and the publics of themember states) a way out of the current economic and politicalcrisis, should they choose to follow it. In the title essay Habermas addresses the challenges and threatsposed by the current banking and public debt crisis in the Eurozonefor European unification. He is harshly critical of theincrementalist, technocratic policies advocated by the Germangovernment in particular, which are being imposed at the expense ofthe populations of the economically weaker, crisis-strickencountries and are undermining solidarity between the member states.He argues that only if the technocratic approach is replaced by adeeper democratization of the European institutions can theEuropean Union fulfil its promise as a model for how rampant marketcapitalism can once again be brought under political control at thesupranational level. This volume reflects the impressive scope of Habermas?s recentwritings on European themes, including theoretical treatments ofthe complex legal and political issues at stake, interventions oncurrent affairs, and reflections on the lives and works of majorEuropean philosophers and intellectuals. Together the essaysprovide eloquent testimony to the enduring relevance of the work ofone of the most influential and far-sighted public intellectuals inthe world today, and are essential reading for all philosophers,legal scholars and social scientists interested in European andglobal issues.

Europe Entrapped

Author: Claus Offe

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2015-01-30

Total Pages: 120

ISBN-13: 0745687555

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Today Europe finds itself in a crisis that casts a dark shadow over an entire generation. The seriousness of the crisis stems from one core political contradiction at the heart of the European project: namely, that what urgently needs to be done is also extremely unpopular and therefore virtually impossible to do democratically. What must be done - and almost everyone agrees in principle on the measures that would be needed to deal with the financial crisis - cannot be sold to the voting public of the core member states, which so far have been less affected by the crisis than those on the periphery, nor can the conditions that core members try to impose be easily sold to voters in the deficit countries. The European Union is therefore becoming increasingly disunited, with deepening divides between the German-dominated ‘core’ and the southern ‘periphery’, between the winners and the losers of the common currency, between the advocates of greater integration and the anti-Europeans, between the technocrats and the populists. Europe finds itself trapped by the deepening divisions that are opening up across the Continent, obstructing its ability to deal with a crisis that has already caused massive social suffering in the countries of the European periphery and is threatening to derail the very project of the European Union. In this short book, Claus Offe brings into sharp focus the central political problem that lies at the heart of the EU and shackles its ability to deal with the most serious crisis of its short history.

German Europe

Author: Ulrich Beck

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2013-04-24

Total Pages: 73

ISBN-13: 0745669522

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The euro crisis is tearing Europe apart. But the heart of the matter is that, as the crisis unfolds, the basic rules of European democracy are being subverted or turned into their opposite, bypassing parliaments, governments and EU institutions. Multilateralism is turning into unilateralism, equality into hegemony, sovereignty into the dependency and recognition into disrespect for the dignity of other nations. Even France, which long dominated European integration, must submit to Berlin’s strictures now that it must fear for its international credit rating. How did this happen? The anticipation of the European catastrophe has already fundamentally changed the European landscape of power. It is giving birth to a political monster: a German Europe. Germany did not seek this leadership position - rather, it is a perfect illustration of the law of unintended consequences. The invention and implementation of the euro was the price demanded by France in order to pin Germany down to a European Monetary Union in the context of German unification. It was a quid pro quo for binding a united Germany into a more integrated Europe in which France would continue to play the leading role. But the precise opposite has happened. Economically the euro turned out to be very good for Germany, and with the euro crisis Chancellor Angela Merkel became the informal Queen of Europe. The new grammar of power reflects the difference between creditor and debtor countries; it is not a military but an economic logic. Its ideological foundation is ‘German euro nationalism’ - that is, an extended European version of the Deutschmark nationalism that underpinned German identity after the Second World War. In this way the German model of stability is being surreptitiously elevated into the guiding idea for Europe. The Europe we have now will not be able to survive in the risk-laden storms of the globalized world. The EU has to be more than a grim marriage sustained by the fear of the chaos that would be caused by its breakdown. It has to be built on something more positive: a vision of rebuilding Europe bottom-up, creating a Europe of the citizen. There is no better way to reinvigorate Europe than through the coming together of ordinary Europeans acting on their own behalf.

A Country of Vast Designs

Author: Robert W. Merry

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2010-11-02

Total Pages: 592

ISBN-13: 074329744X

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Explores the one-term presidency of James K. Polk, during which the United States extended its territory across the continent by threatening England and manufacturing a controversial war with Mexico that Abraham Lincoln opposed.

To Hell and Back

Author: Ian Kershaw

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2015-11-17

Total Pages: 608

ISBN-13: 0698411501

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"Chilling... To Hell and Back should be required reading in every chancellery, every editorial cockpit and every place where peevish Euroskeptics do their thinking…. Kershaw documents each and every ‘ism’ of his analysis with extraordinary detail and passionate humanism."—The New York Times Book Review The Penguin History of Europe series reaches the twentieth century with acclaimed scholar Ian Kershaw’s long-anticipated analysis of the pivotal years of World War I and World War II. The European catastrophe, the long continuous period from 1914 to 1949, was unprecedented in human history—an extraordinarily dramatic, often traumatic, and endlessly fascinating period of upheaval and transformation. This new volume in the Penguin History of Europe series offers comprehensive coverage of this tumultuous era. Beginning with the outbreak of World War I through the rise of Hitler and the aftermath of the Second World War, award-winning British historian Ian Kershaw combines his characteristic original scholarship and gripping prose as he profiles the key decision makers and the violent shocks of war as they affected the entire European continent and radically altered the course of European history. Kershaw identifies four major causes for this catastrophe: an explosion of ethnic-racist nationalism, bitter and irreconcilable demands for territorial revisionism, acute class conflict given concrete focus through the Bolshevik Revolution, and a protracted crisis of capitalism. Incisive, brilliantly written, and filled with penetrating insights, To Hell and Back offers an indispensable study of a period in European history whose effects are still being felt today.