{"id":94095,"date":"2020-06-15T19:46:41","date_gmt":"2020-06-15T17:46:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/geab.eu\/transatlantique-21-le-centre-de-gravite-bascule-vers-leurope\/"},"modified":"2023-10-12T18:47:57","modified_gmt":"2023-10-12T16:47:57","slug":"transatlantic-21-the-centre-of-gravity-of-the-transatlantic-relationship-is-shifting-towards-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/geab.eu\/en\/transatlantic-21-the-centre-of-gravity-of-the-transatlantic-relationship-is-shifting-towards-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"Transatlantic 21: The centre of gravity of the transatlantic relationship is shifting towards Europe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Since 2006, the global systemic crisis described by the GEAB has referred to the \u2018system\u2019 founded in 1945 in the aftermath of the WW2.[1]<\/a> Nevertheless, at the heart of this world order is the transatlantic relationship, a link between the USA and Europe based on a double predicate: Europe needs the American guardian so that, firstly, its nations are prevented from killing each other and, secondly, it prospers economically. The first part of the equation justified the creation of NATO in 1949,[2]<\/a> while the second is linked to the famous Marshall Plan launched in 1947, which gave birth to OECD.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

Although these institutions were placed on the old continent, Europe’s self-destruction in 1939-45 gave a territorially unscathed America[4]<\/a> a major strategic advantage in this relationship. Thus, the Western-centric world that emerged from WW2 was predominantly American-centric for more than 70 years. That said, while the visible political power of the transatlantic axis resided in Washington during that time, it was largely underpinned by Europe’s economic and moral success. But in the 1990s, the US, intoxicated by the collapse of the Soviet empire (self-interpreted as a personal victory), was a little quick to overlook the role played by Europeans (Western European diplomacy,[5]<\/a> the Helsinki Agreements,[6]<\/a> Polish Solidarity[7]<\/a> and other similar revolutions and movements in satellite countries,[8]<\/a> the Czech Velvet Revolution,[9]<\/a> the failure of the economic model,[10]<\/a> the Russians themselves of course[11]<\/a>) and tended to believe that they were the masters of the world.<\/p>\n

This is how Bush Sr. inaugurated the post-Cold War era with the concept of a \u2018new world order\u2019. The expression was borrowed from President Woodrow Wilson, who used it to launch the idea of the League of Nations[12]<\/a> (a world order shared among nations). Far from Wilson’s genius, G.H.W. Bush used it to claim that \u2018there was no alternative to American leadership\u2019, a leadership that immediately resulted in the first Gulf War in 1991.[13]<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"Figure 1 – Federal debt: total public debt as percent of gross domestic product 01\/1966 – 10\/2019<\/p>\n

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Over the last 30 years, as a result of world leadership through war, America has lost its former moral credibility and has been financially ruined (in 1989, the US debt\/GDP ratio was 50%, today it is 136%),[14]<\/a> but it has held on thanks to its monetary empire and to its European pillar, the moral and economic security of which underpinned the American power.<\/p>\n

In this process, the transatlantic alliance has inevitably turned into a yoke that Europe has constantly attempted to shake off over the last twenty years: launching the euro,[15]<\/a> refusing to follow the US into the second Gulf War,[16]<\/a> claiming its own sovereignty,[17]<\/a> marginalising the United Kingdom,[18]<\/a> launching INSTEX[19]<\/a>\u00a0 and so on. But the more the Europeans raged, the tighter the halter became.[20]<\/a> That\u2019s the moment D. Trump arrived, seeking to impose his will even more visibly than the others and thereby confirming the decoupling of the EU from the US (calling into question NATO[21]<\/a> and various trade relations[22]<\/a>).<\/p>\n

As we had anticipated, the two collateral victims of this policy have been the EU, as it has developed since the Maastricht Treaty[23]<\/a> in 1992, and America, leader of a great world disorder inaugurated by Bush Sr. in 1991. We will not mourn either of them. For beneath the EU and America, we will begin to envisage what Europe and the USA have really become; better than that, we will envisage what Europeans and Americans have become. And, based on that, both sides of the North Atlantic will finally be able to reinvent themselves and rebuild their alliance.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the transatlantic link is not about to disappear. The US and Europe have a common history, culture and values (which need to be rethought as far as values are concerned), and many instruments strongly connect the two shores – institutions, trade, media, civil society, businesses, various networks,…<\/p>\n

We do not therefore anticipate the disappearance of the transatlantic relationship, but its re-founding, based on new transatlantic socio-political and global geopolitical realities on the one hand, and on Europe’s initiative on the other. Indeed, the new realities are giving Europe new impetus, for the following reasons:<\/p>\n