The EU is a colossus. So why is it cowering before Trump like a mouse?
With its woeful trade deal, Europe prostrated itself before the president. We need a leader who will tell him where to shove it, says Guardian Europe columnist Alexander Hurst
Because neoliberals get weak in the knees when fascists look at them.
In this new era, Russia, China and the US all want a return to spheres of influence and the rule of power in place of the rule of law, just with varying appetites for chaos (Russia) versus stability (China)
It's been really annoying seeing Europeans lament the death of so-called international rule of law when, like, seriously? Tell me again how America doesn't consider Latin America and the Middle East its sphere of influence that it gets to do whatever it wants with? Can y'all stop using "rule of law" to mean "good things for white people"?
Europe-based economic activity is among the least carbon-intensive in the world;
Isn't part/most of this that Europe simply exported the carbon-intensive stuff abroad? Not exactly a success story IMO.
Isn't part/most of this that Europe simply exported the carbon-intensive stuff abroad?
Partially true however it is also worth pointing out that industry in the EU produces significantly fewer emissions than the same industries outside the EU. The costs that come with that are largely why industry is outsourcing elsewhere, there is no coordinated effort by some shadow council to export the carbon-intensive industries abroad, just not fully thought out economic policy (producing in the EU causes costs for emissions, importing doesn't/is easier to fudge, the incentive created by this imbalance is easy to see).
Even when you account for offshore emissions the EU's carbon footprint has been going down since around 2010.
That doesn't negate the existence of neocolonialism and it's nowhere near enough to fix climate change, but the EU's population is roughly constant, both it and China are reducing their manufacturing emissions, and economic growth in the EU has been slow and services-based. Like where would a supposed increase in emissions even come from? There's nowhere to go but down.
I know good news feel unbelievable these days but this is one of them. Unfortunately this factually incorrect belief that emitting any less carbon is impossible without serious impact to QoL is why the european ecologist movements have lost a lot of steam in the past few years which is absolutely maddening because it's empirically incorrect.
Because neoliberals get weak in the knees when fascists look at them.
nah, they say "What's up, Dad?"
There is a strong body of research regarding the U.S. tariffs conundrum in the meantime (including here in this comm as I just read) revealing that Trump hurts the U.S. more than any other country or region. (And the EU is indeed the least carbon-intensive economy globally due its environmental laws that - as much as we need to improve also here- are stronger than anywhere else in the world.)
Op-eds like this one are being written these days on a daily basis, but they are exaggerated. The EU could maybe retaliate more (would this hurt the European economy as U.S. tariffs do in the U.S.?), but I wouldn't say it is 'cowering'. The Florida man says something every day, and it wouldn't make sense imo to 'bully back.' Economic forecasts for the U.S. are much worse than Trump and these op-eds make it seem.
[Edit typo.]
Agreed, as long as we are not actually buying almost a trillion worth of stuff from the US🥴
Putting counter tariffs up is maybe nice for the optics of a strong Europe, but I'm fine if we don't do it. Let them tax themselves🤷♂️
Just don't buy billions worth of fossil fuels from the US please!
almost every sphere in which the EU feels inferior to the US boils down to a willingness to spend – or not. The EU is jealous of the US’s big tech firms, but there is no secret sauce here beyond investment. Take space for example, where, again, the US is dominant. How could it be anything other when Nasa’s 2023 budget was $25bn and the European Space Agency’s was €7bn?
This is true.
That said I think the counterintuitive action by the EU governing bodies (contradicting what voters want) might be driven by established European capitalist interests who have sizeable business relationships with the US and whose profits would be hurt if the EU is to retaliate.
I think the greatest concession made was that von der Leyen allowed Trump to frame this as a great victory for him. He has a fragile ego and always needs to look good. She is a much more diplomatic politician and allowed him to appear victorious. But the actual, realistic concessions are pretty limited.
I thought this was a pretty convincing argument why it's not as bad for Europe as it looks https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/sundown-on-the-potemkin-empire-trumps
As far as I know, it was more like Trump "stole" the framing as victory by releasing a statement before the EU and thus being in control of the narrative.
She is corrupt - nothing more!
You may be right, but it’s an assertion and not an argument or convincing in this case.
EU have no hardware that can handle consumer mobile / computing. Whole world is fucked by those monopolies to be honest.
Current consumer/mobile computing is what got the world into this sorry state in the first place.
The world is RIPE for takeover by whoever can develop a better way.
Because they hope to keep Trump in a boat against Russia, I find that very obvious.
I think this is a large component. I think the other is that the calculus on this from a trade perspective is that 15% is better than 50%, and there is a good chance Trump imposes 50% tariffs if no deal is achieved. This would be bad for everyone. In four years, Trump will be gone, and the tariffs will go away again. Of course this sets the precedent that future leaders of the U.S., China, and any other large trading blocks, could unilaterally impose tariffs, and the EU will just roll over. This is why temporary pain is often a better response than acquiescence. I think this is one of the failings of the EU as a governance model. It moves slowly and requires near total agreement. This limits negotiation options because at least one nation would oppose the short term pain scenario.
Because they are playing 4D chess against a checkers player.
... and you have to keep reminding him not to eat the checker pieces
If only he could stop shitting across the game board while we’re at it…
He's more of a tic-tac-toe player.
Who always leaves center empty
What if having Trump as president is 5D chess?
Hopefully he gets stuck in the 2Ds I can't even see.
Or maybe, the hole "deal" is just for show and meaningless anyways: https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/5435369-the-numbers-in-trumps-eu-trade-deal-are-a-joke/
I think the underlying, but mostly unspoken, fear is that you have a mad man with nukes.
I don't think that's much of a factor in geopolitics outside of the implementation of hard power. The problem with nuclear weapons is that there's only so much brinkmanship you can participate in before your threats start to lose leverage.
It's basically the equivalent of someone trying to achieve a goal by threatening to kill themselves. The ends just don't logically justify the means.
European leaders are appeasing the US because it's the most advantageous thing to do for capital holders. The instability that the US is creating is more manageable than the consequences of standing up to the US in a meaningful way would entail.
Capitalism has a great aversion to risk, and will almost always back the option closest to "business as usual". The current US administration is a risk to profitability, an upending of business relations with the US is an existential threat.
Nukes are off the table for the US. It's not like Trump has a big red button. Launch orders go through a chain and if nothing else, the sub/base commander would put a stop to it.
I think the Soviet Union ordered launches on two (?) occasions and the trigger man stood down.
Because the Germans will stop at nothing to sell their fucking cars, and that's the main driving force behind European diplomacy.
Whatever
More like the owners of German car manufacturers. And they don't even care if it's EU-made vehicles that are sold. They care about growing profit by any means. For example they lobby against Chinese EV tariffs because they don't want their own Chinese-made cars or Chinese-made components to get more expensive, reducing their profits; or China restricting their profitability in China. A move obviously hurting EU auto workers. It doesn't matter where and how the profit is made, they will lobby for it, regardless of the German or EU people's interests.
This is overlooking an important point: German national politics and the direct connection the EU commission has to it.
Ursula von der Leyen, while not a strong party ally of Friedrich Merz, is still trying to prop up the incredibly weak current coalition, as the alternative would be significantly worse.
The US tarriffs hit the German export industry especially hard, while the rest of Europe is relatively unaffected by them. With the German car industry already struggling (slept on electric and China isn't buying anymore), a 30% tarriff would effectively force them to downsize significantly and likely merge or kill off one of the big three entirely. This would be a huge political deal in Germany and likely kill the current coalition.
In typical fashion they're trying to put a bandaid on a rotten limb. By trying to delay the inevitable crisis they are ensuring it will hit us worse.
but the Visegrad countries' economic boom since they became part of the EU market is based on the outsourced pre-production (Zulieferer) for the german car industry.
and also others should fear a germany in economic trouble, aks the peoples of Italy, Greece and gentrified Portugal!
Due to the trade deficit and the service sector that America has over Europe.
They simply have more leverage
Due to the trade deficit and the service sector that America has over Europe. They simply have more leverage
The U.S. trade deficit with the EU would shrink considerably if and when we account in the service sector, so that's a leverage the EU has over the U.S. rather than the other way around.
You also have the USA still guaranteeing European security while Russia has been more militarily active.
People like to focus on Germany alone, but the EU is still a federal entity that needs buy-in from several nations.
It's very clear though that a major driving force behind this absolute farce of a deal was the German CDU, our chancellor even congratulated on the deal before he noticed the extremely negative public sentiment against this deal. I worry that our current coalition has their heads stuck up too far in the clouds to fix or address any of the issues we currently have and act in the best long term interest of Germany and Europe, bowing down to Trump might be the "better" solution short term but it makes absolutely no sense for the long term. Especially with the tacked on military package, that's just an incredibly obvious trap they fell for.
Because most of the western EU nations became puppets of the US after WW2 during the Cold War and then eastern EU nations following the end of the Cold War.
