When Gandhi was asked once to comment on European civilization,
his quip was, "It would be a very good idea."
When asked today about our views on the European Union,
I think we can be excused to reply in a similar fashion.
What a splendid idea it would be if we could only pull it off.
United only in name,
the European Union is, I'm afraid,
in a process of disintegration as we speak.
With the commitment and determination of a termite colony,
which is eating into the foundations,
very soon there will be nothing left but an empty shell,
to remind us of the lofty ideal, that used to be the European Union.
In Agatha Christie novels
when the reader comes across in the prologue a group of characters,
upper class characters usually that are congregating some chateau,
the reader knows what to expect, a series of murders.
Similarly, today when we hear that our European politicians are gathering today
or together we know what to expect, a comedy of errors
which will be wrapped up in triumphant rhetoric,
but which very soon will prove to be nothing more
than dangerous harmful waffle.
To err is human.
But to mess up spectacularly
we need an elite made up of prime ministers,
presidents, ministers, apparatchiks, opinion makers
who are determined not to face up
to a systemic crisis systematically.
Alas, at least now we have enough evidence
that renders all such denial inexcusable.
Humanity has not surprised itself very often
but it has done so twice in the past.
Οnce in 1929 and yet again more recently in 2008.
1929 ought to have taught us a very simple binary twin lesson.
First that the first victim of such a crisis is the common currency.
It was the gold standard in 1929, it is the Euro today.
The second victim is of course truth and civility.
One such terrible crisis hits the world.
A Hobbesian war of all against all is unleashed on an unsuspecting humanity
and the first victim is our capacity to recognize the systemic crisis
we are in, as a systemic crisis.
And therefore it renders us incapable of accepting our responsibility
for at least a portion of that crisis.
Thrillers begin with some cunning detective who is unmasking
one shady character after the other.
But good thrillers, I submit to you,
do not end with the unveiling of the perpetrator.
Τhey go one step further.
Τhey reach the momentus moment
when the cunning detective inadvertently unmasks himself.
Bewildered he is staring at his own image in the mirror.
This crisis is having a similar effect on all of us.
Our masks are falling.
Unscrupulous bankers, inane politicians,
conniving entrepreneurs, cynical academics,
uncritical citizens, who are all being unmasked
but as their masks keep falling the dejection is becoming generalized.
Meanwhile the human costs are mounting up
and the only way of making sense of them
and measuring them sensibly is by means of counting lost generations.
It is time to transform Europe and to be transformed in the process.
Now, the medical profession only very recently
managed to save more people than it killed.
Up until the 1920s or so the disease was preferable to the cure.
Similarly with the Εuro crisis now
our European leaders are enacting,
what I call a poisonous medicine.
Toxic bailouts, inane austerity.
We created, in order to salvage a Εuro system, a currency union
which was never meant, never designed to sustain
the catastrophe of 2008,
the shockwaves of that great earthquake.
What we have done is we created a scaffold
which is, instead of helping the edifice from collapsing
it is putting more pressure on it.
We've created this European Financial Stability
or Instability Facility
and we modeled it.
We created it in the image of Lehman Brothers' infamous derivatives.
It was as if we took two stones
and we tied them together by means of a string,
hoping they will float more readily.
The result of course is the uncontrolled disintegration
that we are experiencing.
Now, by now most people are realizing this.
So what we have here is a new Jerusalem that is being canvased.
It comes in the form of the so called "Federal Option."
Well-meaning Europeans and some friends from federal field
recite this litany of federal concepts, ideas, suggestions.
I'll just give you some.
We hear of the importance of forging a Fiscal or a Transfer Union in Europe,
of having a Federal Treasury,
of giving a new Leviathan, a new Economic Czar
the power to rule over all of us with an armed fist and keep us in awe.
What we hear about is Centralized Disposal of National Assets,
particularly of the Greek kind.
The laws of National Sovereignty
as a price we have to pay for this Fiscal Union
and of course the dreaded treaty changes
that have to go through 27 parliaments and/or electorates.
I submit to you that this is both unworkable and undesirable.
Why is it unworkable?
Because - and this is a message to federalists -
the worst enemy of federalism at the moment is itself.
And the reason why I'm saying this is because
if we move in the federals' direction
the crisis is certain to outpace us.
It would run faster than we do.
And when the treaty changes take longer than the collapse of the Euro,
all we will be left with is the smouldering mess
in which there will be nothing left to federate.
But there is a second reason why this Federal Option needs to be shunt
and it is that if the United States of Europe is a good idea,
it is not an idea that should be wasted and subsumed
in the context of trying to solve the current crisis.
Let me put it very simply. The Federal Option will only be possible
once the crisis is over, not as an antidote to the crisis.
We will only be capable and worthy of federation,
when as European we can imagine the future
in which Greeks and Germans
will be voting in Greek and German politicians to represent us.
We will only be able to affect a decent Federal Europe
when we can imagine a situation where our national armies
are dissolved and are merged into a common European Defense force.
We are only going to be able to put together a decent Federation
if we can imagine a situation where our views are assessed
within Europe on the basis of their merits and the merits alone,
what the ancient Athenians used to refer as "Isigoria."
As opposed to judging what somebody says
on the basis of the who they are, what accent they speak in
which country they come from,
and finally at a symbolic, but a very important level,
let me say this, we are only going to be capable of a proper federation
when we can decide as Europeans what to print on our euro notes.
Instead of these abstract bridges and gates that symbolize one thing,
our incapacity to agree on common symbols.
So if I'm right that the new Jerusalem is not really a new Jerusalem,
and that it is putting forward an unworkable and undesirable idea,
which will also lead to uncontrolled disintegration,
then what is the alternative?
Well, let me suggest to you that before we agree in an alternative,
perhaps we should agree on some shared principles
that should govern our future.
Τhese future principles may seem contradictory
but they can be rendered harmoniously
and if they can't then we have no future.
Let me give you examples.
One principle is that I think we should end the perfectly partitioned Europe
that we created in Maastricht in order to create the Euro,
while at the same time however, strengthening National Sovereignty
and empowering National Responsibility within that model.
Another set.
End the soothest solidarity
which is being imposed upon the Dutch and the Germans
in order to give bailouts, pretend bailouts to the Greeks and to the Irish.
Stop inane austerity which is only making the debt crisis worse.
Ignore all the calls for debt buybacks which will not work,
but at the same time integrate investment and management of our problems
like existing debt and banking losses.
This is what I refer to as decentralized europeanization
so allow me an acronym.
Decent Europe.
Europeanize what?
Free realms.
We need a management of existing debt at a European level.
We need management of the banking sector
which is collapsing all over us,
and we need a europeanized investment policy in aggregate.
How do we do this without treaty changes and federation?
We already have existing institutions in Europe
and each one of them can be assigned one of these tasks.
I'm not going to go into this.
This is not the place or the time.
You can see more of this proposal elsewhere.
All I want to do now is to give you a flavor
of what the whole purpose of this is.
Decentralized europeanization creates circumstances
for national sovereignty and national responsibility
to be strengthened.
Because if we integrate these three spheres in Europe
of existing debt, of banks and investment flows,
then at the national level
each member state can run a balanced budget,
and can learn to live within its means,
and also to be empowered within these limits
to exercise a full national sovereignty.
So I present this Decent Europe proposal to you
as if you want a forger of a future Federation's prerequisite,
which I already mentioned and I won't mention again.
Let me finish by reminding you of a myth,
according which Sibyl of Cumae
offered Tarquinius Superbus, the king of Rome at the time,
the nine books of wisdom at a price that Tarquinius considered to be exorbitant
and therefore he said no to the offer.
Sibyl as you all know started burning one of these volumes after the other
until Tarquinius relented agreeing to pay the original high price
for the remaining three volumes.
Let me suggest that the European crisis is following Sibyl's strategy.
The problem is that our European leaders keep saying no
and therefore threatening
to allow our common heritage to burn in its entirety.
Decentralized europeanization offers Europe a chance
to save its last three books of wisdom or the equivalent.
It offers us a chance to usher in a new era
in which Europeans, Northern and Southern,
Western and Eastern, can stare into each others eyes
and see and recognize a partner.
If we miss this chance,
then Europe is going to be dragging the whole planet
into a despicable mire for a third time in a century.
It is our duty and over overarching obligation to prevent this.
Thank you.
(Applause)