As nationalist sentiments and U.S. dependability appear to fade, Germany and France have gaps to bridge in their common push to strengthen the EU
The European Union is back in vogue, as a recovering economic region and as a rallying cry for voters and politicians.
The question is whether the bloc can turn its new standing into action, or whether old differences will hobble plans to make the EU more effective at home and abroad.
Only a few months ago, Europe’s political establishment feared the nationalist wave that helped to power Donald Trump into the White House and the U.K. toward Brexit might spread to the continent.
Instead, strongly pro-EU candidates did unexpectedly well in French and Dutch elections. Emmanuel Macron’s triumph in the French presidential race has also changed the tone in Germany’s election campaign, where establishment parties have gone from barely mentioning Europe to competing to praise it.
The French and German governments are talking of seizing the moment to strengthen the EU and its currency, the euro. Excited EU officials in Brussels are dusting off proposals for deeper union. Some Eurocrats even think the challenges from Mr. Trump and Brexit have created an opportunity to make Europe great again.
This week, the new mood peaked in a Munich beer tent, where German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for European self-help and voiced her voters’ disillusion with the direction of the U.S. under Mr. Trump. “We must fight for our future ourselves as Europeans, for our destiny,” she said, while counting somewhat less on the U.S. to manage international order.
Ms. Merkel’s terse, much-parsed comments drew three circles around Germany: a core EU family that must stick together; American and British friends who are less reliable than in the past; and other neighbors such as Russia, with which Europe should work where possible.
The chancellor has said before that Europe must do more to help itself. But her words on Sunday sounded like a break from the traditional view of Atlanticist Germans such as herself, who have long seen the alliance with Washington and the partnership with Paris as equally important. On Monday she reverted to a more familiar stance, calling the trans-Atlantic alliance “of paramount importance.”
Her mixed messages reflect a dilemma for Germany and Europe as a whole. EU capitals may believe the U.S. is retreating from consistent global engagement—a long-term trend reflecting a more multipolar world and changing U.S. domestic politics. But that doesn’t mean the EU is ready to fill the gaps, even in its own neighborhood.
Some problems, such as climate change, are inherently global and impossible to manage without the U.S., a point Ms. Merkel stressed last weekend at the Group of Seven summit in Sicily.
‘There is a clear sense that Germany and France must demonstrate to everybody that they are leading in Europe and investing in the EU.’
On other issues, such as trade, the EU is strong enough to negotiate pacts with countries in Asia or Latin America that expand its ties with world markets even if the U.S. turns against multilateralism. But the painstaking negotiation of trade agreements isn’t the major political project that the EU is looking for to prove it is regaining its mojo.
“There is a clear sense that Germany and France must demonstrate to everybody that they are leading in Europe and investing in the EU,” said Ulrich Speck, senior research fellow at the Elcano Royal Institute, a Spanish think tank. “But there are not many joint projects.”
Many of the latest proposals focus on the euro. Europeans widely agree the currency union is incomplete, but they don’t agree about what is missing. France and southern countries continue to believe the eurozone needs more common financial resources to boost growth and protect weaker countries against slumps. Germany and its northern allies think pacts on fiscal discipline and market-friendly overhauls need stricter enforcement.
Germans’ deep-seated belief in a eurozone based on common rules and national self-reliance makes the country’s elites nervous about Mr. Macron’s demands for a eurozone budget funded by its own taxes and bonds. Berlin is eager to encourage Mr. Macron’s domestic reforms, but German unease about his eurozone proposals was captured by news magazine Der Spiegel’s recent cover declaring Mr. Macron to be Germany’s “Costly Friend.”
Given the differences, ambitions for a common eurozone treasury or collective bond issuance are probably “pie in the sky,” says Mujtaba Rahman, head Europe analyst at Eurasia Group, a political-risk consulting firm. More likely than any grand bargain are modest overhauls, such as an incremental strengthening of the eurozone’s banking union and bailout mechanism, Mr. Rahman says.
Some European politicians want to focus on defense instead. “The big problem here is Germany and France are not on the same page. Germany doesn’t consider using military power as a political tool, whereas France does real fighting,” said Mr. Speck. Germany might sometimes support French military operations overseas with logistics or reconnaissance—“the soft side of hard power,” Mr. Speck said. “That’s something, but it’s far from common European defense.”
The U.S. remains the only power that can credibly deter Russia from attacking members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Europe’s security establishment agrees. For that reason, Europeans were upset that Mr. Trump refrained from explicitly affirming U.S. commitment to collective defense at last week’s NATO summit in Brussels. For Europe, the Americans, however unpredictable, remain indispensable.