 This year, the European Union presents new faces and a retooled leadership structure. Its new president is Hermann von Rompuy, a Belgian, while Catherine Ashton has been assigned the post of foreign minister. Both positions were created to give the EU greater visibility and depth in terms of its global presence. The Lisbon Treaty also saw creation of a European External Action Service, a foreign affairs department.
But what exactly does all this internal movement mean for Europe?
Does it transform the EU into a world power? Where will the EU rank in terms of other regional actors in an increasingly multi-polar, globalized world?
Will its new positions and their occupants be respected, or will von Rompuy and Ashton become little more than symbolic figures, with the real foreign policy centers remaining in national capitals?
It’s been 40 years since American Secretary of State Henry Kissinger allegedly quipped, “Who do I call if I want to speak to Europe?” The European Union has worked persistently to put away that tedious line. Now, if someone wishes to call Europe, there are two numbers they can use, three in fact, if you consider the European Commission. Whether President Barack Obama will ever feel compelled to use any of them is an open question.
Supporters of the late Jean Monnet would hail these new institutions. Institutions create their own gravity. They work within policy to carve out their own space.
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In Iran people continue to die on behalf of their belief in democracy. Though those willing to put their lives on the line can’t yet be called amajority movement, they do increasingly represent a large segment of the population. In China, Google is pulling out to avoid government censorship.
An interconnected world now faces the reality that the postwar “G” model, long a bastion for Western states, no longer reflects global realities. Strategic positioning has fundamentally changed and so-called ‘variable geometry’ is here to stay. The pressing challenge is to find forms of governance that respect the new
Now more than ever, the world is now debating a fundamental dilemma: How to improve the institutional mechanisms of global governance.
The Copenhagen summit was a troubling failure. Rifts between nations at different stages of development created insuperable difficulties. Lobby pressure prevailed over logic. Looking ahead to the next climate summit in Mexico City, United Nations is now trying to bring fractious nations back together. But first, they must agree to legally acknowledge the modest Copenhagen deal.
Since 2000, Russian TV has gradually transformed itself into a kind of public theater.Most networks reflect the priorities of government leadership while most citizens appear not to care. Russian viewers continue to swear by a “first citizen,” a role Vladimir Putin has occupied for nearly a decade. With newspapers nearly out of the picture, the online world becoming the only available ‘opposition’ choice.
