Shaping Europe’s Future With Confidence

The Capitoline Hill in Rome is a unique historic site. For thousands of years, it was the setting for the rise and fall of empires, for intrigues and the unconditional pursuit for power.

However, 25 March 1957 marked a turning point. On that day, politicians and diplomats from Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands laid the foundations for a new Europe – a Europe of peace, reconciliation, prosperity and mutual respect. With the Treaties of Rome, they founded the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom), forerunners of the EU as we know it today.

One of the founding fathers, the then Belgian Prime Minister Paul-Henri Spaak, had the following to say about this: ‘This is [...] about the material well-being of our peoples, about the growth of our economy, social progress and about completely new possibilities in industry and trade; but, above all, this is about defending and protecting a civilization, moral rules and an attitude to life, the understanding of a more fraternal and more just humankind. […] They [the Europeans] have done a great thing and, remarkably and perhaps uniquely, they have done so while repudiating any use of force, constraint or threats.’

When you read these lines, you can really sense Spaak’s awe at the historic importance of this moment. You also sense his pride: pride in the fact that European women and men, exactly 12 years after the end of the most terrible war and worst atrocities in human history, had had the courage and vision to build Europe anew, peacefully and without violence, and to find common solutions for getting to grips with the political challenges of the times.

Facing the future

We should take inspiration from this courage and vision when we think about solutions to the political questions of our times. It is in the field of foreign policy that we face enormous challenges in the coming years and decades:

The rules-based international order is being questioned in many quarters or even actively undermined today. After the end of the Cold War, observers interpreted this as the beginning of the ‘end of history’; liberal democracies had supposedly won the battle of the systems. Today, we face a new rivalry among the Great Powers that is much more complex than the confrontation between blocks in the Cold War. New actors have gained in strength and are questioning established rules. The law of the strong threatens to replace the strength of the law.

We need global solutions more urgently than ever in environment and climate change policy. The consequences of further global warming could be catastrophic. With the Paris Climate Agreement of 2015 and the Katowice Rulebook of December 2018, the international community has agreed on concrete goals for protecting the climate. But this is just the first step. Achieving these goals is a task that will take generations to complete and requires Europe to take the lead and take others with it.

The world’s natural resources are finite. This is even truer in the face of a global population that is still growing. We must also give our children and grandchildren the prospect of a decent life through sustainable development. With the 2030 Agenda, we defined 17 concrete targets for sustainable development in 2015 that must be put into practice in a systematic way – in collaboration between developed, emerging and developing countries.

Migration will remain a global phenomenon. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that around 67.7 million people around the world were displaced in 2017. There were 49 armed conflicts worldwide in that year. This bestows a great responsibility on the global community to commit even more strongly to achieving peace in the regions of origin and to stand up for the protection and decent living conditions of refugees everywhere. In 2018, a political framework to this end was established with the Global Compact on Refugees and the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration. Crisis prevention, humanitarian aid and stabilization of conflict zones will, however, continue to be of the greatest importance.

Digitalization is already part of our daily reality. Its scope and the opportunities it offers are nothing less than a fourth industrial revolution. The great challenge will be to use the economic opportunities it offers in a socially sustainable manner, to bring these into line with cyberspace security and safeguard human rights in cyberspace. In a word, we must translate the European model into the digital era.

Free trade as an essential pillar of Europe’s prosperity is coming under pressure. In 2017, the member states of the EU exported goods and services to the tune of 2816.9 billion euros into non-EU countries. This success will be in jeopardy if perceptions grow worldwide that trade policy is a zero-sum game with winners on one side and losers on the other. Europe must come up with a positive agenda for global trade to counterbalance unfair competitive practices and new trade barriers.

Europe’s answer

All these questions about the future have one thing in common. They are, in the literal sense of the word, boundless. No wall or fence will be sufficient to keep them at bay. We will only be able to master the task ahead of us with courageous and astute policies – and these policies cannot be confined to the national level, simply because we as individual countries are too small. This is reflected by statistics. According to the UN, today’s current 28 EU member states accounted for 13.5% of the world’s population in 1960; by 2015, this had gone down to 6.9%, and by 2060 it will probably stand at around 5.1%. No single country in Europe will be able to deploy the creative power and clout to develop and apply solutions to global questions by itself. We can only develop solutions today on a multilateral basis and in close coordination with like-minded partners. The EU enables us to speak with one voice on behalf of around half a billion people and to wield this clout in international forums. When other countries insist on putting their own interests first, then our answer must be ‘Europe United’!

A strong and sovereign Europe is therefore in Germany’s fundamental interest. A Europe that can act and is ready to bring its weight to bear on global issues and crises constructively, powerfully and credibly. A Europe that is founded upon common values, beliefs and interests.

Europe’s foundations

Europe can only be a strong and credible international player if it is built on firm foundations. What is today’s Europe based on? Three elements are key in this regard:

1. Our common values

‘The Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values are common to the member states in a society in which pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and men prevail.’ (Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union)

This clear commitment to our common European values comes right at the beginning of the Treaty on European Union. This is no accident, but a decision with great symbolic power. It underlines the importance we attach to these principles – going beyond the borders of member states and our respective histories. This is why we speak of a community of values.

European values are an expression of shared European beliefs. They were shaped by the insights of humanism and the Enlightenment, according to which each human being should be in a position to make use of his or her own reason and therefore develop his or her talents to the full. And these values were profoundly influenced by the democratic movements experienced by the countries of Europe, from the French Revolution to the years of 1848 and 1919 through to the peaceful revolutions of 1989 and 1990.

These values are not just an historical legacy, however. They are basic principles to which we feel committed to this day. And they are at work on a daily basis in our everyday lives – often unnoticed. They ensure the fair participation of all in the democratic process. In legal proceedings, independent judges deliver independent judgments without regard to the person in question. This guarantees legal certainty in a way that enables citizens to be truly able to exercise their rights. Such legal certainly enables entrepreneurs to make sound investments in the world’s biggest domestic market and thereby to create jobs. It is European values that ensure that European women and men can live here as they see fit – free and protected from an arbitrary state.

These values are a deeply unifying element with the potential to foster the cohesion of our continent. Even so, we have seen in recent years that they also have the capacity to be divisive. It is not enough to pay lip service to these fundamental values; they must be put into practice on a daily basis. It is not always possible to find a common understanding of these values. Therefore, it is important that there are independent bodies such as European courts, the European Court of Justice and courts within the member states that examine whether the member states’ actions are in line with our European values.

However, it is also a political duty to join with all partners in the member states and to hold open discussions about how we interpret these values. One way is to stage critical debates within the framework of the procedure set out in Article 7 of the Treaty on European Union. Another is to make use of procedures such as the annual thematic dialogue on the rule of law. But we should also think about new instruments. It is for this reason that we have proposed a so-called peer review mechanism that reviews the application of the rule of law in all member states on a regular basis. This will enable open and critical discussions without pillorying any member state.

However, it is decisive that we also put our values into practice in our day-to-day lives. All European women and men must endeavour to do this each day anew – by exemplifying them and by calling time and again for politicians to abide by these values.

2. A social Europe

Peace and prosperity are the great accomplishments of the European integration project. Europe is the biggest and most successful internal market in the world. The abolition of customs duties, the harmonization of product and production standards and a common currency in 19 member states are tangible, measurable improvements for all businesses operating in this internal market.

For Europe’s citizens, these improvements brought about by a united Europe are not always equally apparent. Achievements such as freedom of movement, a common currency and the opportunity to live and study elsewhere in Europe improve the lives of many European women and men directly, but also almost in passing. However, it is often the moments when Europe failed to meet our high expectations that remain more strongly etched in our minds. From 2007 to 2011, the EU was hit by the worldwide financial crisis, which escalated into a eurozone crisis. Despite the swift and forceful intervention of the EU, the member states and the European Central Bank, this crisis, according to Eurostat, led throughout the euro area to declining per capita incomes for several years. But not all member states were hit to the same extent. Whereas Germany saw a dip in per capita income for just one year, Italy needed a full eight years to regain the same pre-crisis level; Greece, on the other hand, has still not yet reached the per capita income of 2008 – even today. But these are just figures. The real meaning of unemployment and damaged career prospects for a French steelworker or a Greek woman teacher with a family can only be fully grasped by very few of us. But what we can see is that, in addition to the major economic imbalances within the eurozone, social imbalances are being exacerbated.

It is therefore our task to make Europe not only more resistant to crises, but also more socially just. This is close to my heart for me as a social democrat – not least because German and European social democracy have stood for more than 150 years for peace, freedom, justice and solidarity.

So what can we do to make Europe more resilient to crises? We must focus upon the area in which, during the last crisis, we were at our most vulnerable, namely the European banking sector. We have raised the requirements as regards equity and risk evaluation. Now the task is to complete a genuine European banking union. That is the only way in which we can reduce existing risks and enable better oversight, sound regulations for managing banks and safeguarded customer deposits throughout Europe. We will make more funds available through a European Monetary Fund to this end. Coping with risks in the best way possible means getting the strong to shoulder a greater burden – in this case the Europeans. In the long term, all Europeans will benefit from this within a common economic area. Incidentally, this also includes getting the financial sector to assume its appropriate share of the burden through a financial transactions tax.

A just Europe for me, however, is a social Europe in which solidarity among Europeans is a facet of everyday living. A Europe that makes good on its promise of prosperity for all. In November 2017, EU member states proclaimed a common European Pillar of Social Rights. This requires further and more astute investments in social and economic progress, investments in education, health care, mobility and support for the younger generation. We also need a stronger role for our social partners. The European social model cannot be boiled down to a race to the bottom. Social justice therefore requires social standards to be aligned within the EU. The basic principle must be equal pay for equal work in the same place. Such minimum standards can be supported by European policies. This could be accomplished with the tools of European policy. For instance, by introducing a European re-insurance fund for national unemployment insurance schemes, we could make such systems fully resilient to crises.

With an astute package of measures, we can manage to create a social Europe built on solidarity that can meet its citizens’ expectations in terms of prosperity and security in perpetuity – especially in times of crisis. It is not least economic pressure that renders some people receptive to the simple promises and half-truths propagated by populists. A social Europe can therefore help us to stand up to populists.

3. Trust among the member states

A strong EU requires strong member states. Europe was born of a voluntary union of sovereign states that retain their national identities and their political and constitutional structures within a united Europe, but which gain extra sovereignty through closer collaboration. The member states play a key role in setting and designing European policies via the European Council and the Council of Ministers. That is why trust and loyal cooperation among the member states are indispensable for the EU’s future.

The foundation of this trust has been truly put to the test in recent years. In particular, the financial crisis and lack of unity in migration policy have exposed rifts between north and south and east and west within the EU. Slogans and stereotypes that we thought were a thing of the past suddenly became socially acceptable again.

We must therefore work together to build renewed trust among the member states. On 22 January 2019, with the signing of the Treaty of Aachen between Germany and France, we put our relations with our closest partner in Europe on a new footing. This treaty raised our bilateral collaboration to a new level. Whereas the Elysée Treaty of 1963 sought to achieve reconciliation and a meeting of minds between Germany and France after two world wars, the two countries are now working together to face the European, foreign, security, social and economic policy challenges of our times. With this treaty, Germany and France will lend greater emphasis and support to meetings and exchanges within civil society, strengthen their cooperation in border regions to find shared and sustainable solutions, develop new common strategies in the response to a changing external and security policy environment and, above all, continue to stand up for a strong Europe.

We are also building bridges in the eastern part of the EU. In 2018, I attended the summit of what is known as the Three Seas Initiative for the first time. This joint high-ranking forum of 12 countries of eastern and southern Europe between the Baltic, Adriatic and Black Seas seeks to promote connectivity, convergence and cohesion in this part of the EU. Germany is a natural part of this region, and not only in its capacity as a country bordering the Baltic Sea. We want to use this format as part of our efforts to promote the integration of central Europe.

A vision for Europe: a modern European patriotism

Our expectations of the EU are high – and rightly so. The peaceful integration of Europe after the catastrophe of two world wars is a unique historic achievement. I can well understand the pride that Paul-Henri Spaak took in this achievement.

However, Europe cannot always be the story of astute founding fathers that we recite over the generations. Today’s Europe requires new stories of brave European women and men. We can rightly be proud of this Europe that stands for our shared values, that is social and founded on the principle of solidarity and guarantees peace and relations based on a spirit of trust between its member states.

I believe that this pride can be at the heart of a new European patriotism. A patriotism that is quite distinct from the historical forgetfulness of populists and nationalists. A patriotism that gives pride of place to our common values and beliefs and feeds upon the pride that we Europeans, in the words of Paul-Henri Spaak, have repudiated ‘any use of force, constraint or threats’.

We can be proud of our European model. The American Dream has traditionally stood for freedom. The Chinese Dream stands today for prosperity. Our European model, on the other hand, combines these elements. Europe stands today, in equal measure, for freedom, democracy and the rule of law, and also for prosperity, security and social justice.

The future of Europe lies in the hands of each and every one of us. We all have the opportunity to play our part as proud European women and men to make our common Europe strong and sovereign so that it is well equipped for the tasks of the future. Let us seize this opportunity with both hands!