EU: Vision Limited

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The Problems of Success
Europe's a hard sell, Brussels insiders say, precisely because it's been so successful. With the specter of a European war receding into history, with the tasks of the single market and the euro tackled and enlargement having stretched the E.U. east to the Black Sea, what is there for Europeans to rally round? The world is now dominated by issues of global significance — climate change, migration and terrorism. What Europe sorely needs, say many in Brussels, is a strong narrative for the 21st century that explains what the E.U. has done to improve peoples' lives. Wallstrom invokes the life story of a Romanian friend who, along with others eager to escape from Ceausescu's dictatorship, would train in swimming pools by night so they'd be in shape to swim the Danube to freedom. "We forget to tell these stories," says Wallstrom. "This is what we need to do more often."

Say what you will about a Europe divided by an Iron Curtain, it did give the place a sense of drama. Some Brussels veterans suffer from nostalgia. They long for a return to the momentum of the days of Jacques Delors, president of the Commission from 1985 to 1995, who, as the cold war was coming to an end, could rally folk to face the future, persuade 12 member states to commit to the single market and keep the dream of an ever closer union alive.

But Delors was followed by Jacques Santer, a colorless Luxemburger whose presidency was brought to an abrupt end in 1999 after a damning report on commission activities led to a mass resignation of his commissioners. "It was simpler back then," notes a burly, balding E.U. employee in a blue suit, puffing away on a cigarette outside the Commission, and thinking of the Delors years. "A bit of a golden age. Since the Santer Commission, it's all gone downhill."

Or, perhaps, all gone better. There's a generation gap, say many in Brussels, between those who can recall the days when the notion of Germans working with fellow Europeans seemed incredible, and younger Europeans, for whom it's simply a fact of life. An E.U. poll found that 64% of 18- to 24-year-olds in Ireland simply didn't vote in the Lisbon referendum. Of the postwar generation, by contrast, only 31% abstained. "The old generation sees Europe as this utopian dream," says Connellan. "But for us, it's just reality. We take it for granted. That means it's hard to get people excited about it."

Looking for a way to convey a sense of its excitement to its citizens, Brussels is trying to define the Union's core identity. But that isn't easy, so diffuse has the E.U. become as it has extended its membership far to the east. François Mitterand predicted as much, recalls Nuno Venade, a veteran E.U. official from Portugal. Speaking to Venade's graduating class at the College of Europe in Bruges 20 years ago, the French President mused on the downside of the dream of integration between East and West: "I'm afraid that when Europe's body is reunited," Venade recalls him saying, "it may lose its soul." What's astonishing, Venade insists, is that Brussels manages to work as well as it does. Back in 1999, when there were 15 member states, any meeting's tour de table — when each nation had its say — took hours, says Venade, recalling long, long mornings at the Commission. "With 27 countries, it's almost a miracle."

That simple sense of getting things done sustains some in their careers. Just after the Irish vote, Venade attended his class reunion at the College of Europe. His old classmates, he says, were not jaded about the European project. Nearly all were still connected to Europe, whether as lawyers, Eurocrats or think-tankers.

But a Europe staffed by comfortable middle-aged men with degrees in European Studies cannot be the answer to anyone's dream. After the vote in Ireland, Wallstrom commissioned a poll there: well-educated professionals tended to have voted in favor of the treaty, while women, young people and the unemployed staunchly opposed it. "The European Union," says Wallstrom, has been a project for a small political élite. This has to change."

How? Wallstrom wants to retool Europe's image so that it is not seen as just a currency union. For those who came of age in the era of lifestyle politics, she argues that only cooperation on a continent-wide level can tackle massive problems like global warming. So she's trying to get the message out. She blogs, as do other commissioners. Her staff post cheerily on YouTube. She's promoting pilot European Houses in Madrid, Riga and two other cities, conceived as Euro hangouts where the public can watch movies or flick through popular magazines.

That's a long way from the glory days of Delors, when stagiaires and Eurocrats in Brussels could dream that their city would soon be the capital of a third superpower. Sure, you can still hear the old refrains. "European values are good ones," says French MEP's assistant Quentin, sprawled on the steps next to the European Parliament after lunch. "When I was studying two years ago, I really wanted more integration — a United States of Europe." But reality bites, with the gritty work of decision-making in Brussels tempering such idealism. "Europe's like this," Quentin says, tracing an invisible graph of peaks and troughs in the air. Right now, it's in one of the troughs.