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There is an enormous sadness at the heart of Europe by Michael D. Higgins (1999)

This is expressed as a set of multiple alienations - alienations of those who are excluded, intellectuals and writers: most interesting is also the form of the alienation of consumers. We are consumed in our consumption - an imprisonment in the self and in space.

These times of sadness reflect a Europe which is not a Europe of citizenship, but of consumption.

We have to address this issue recognizing both tasks and dangers. We need

 

Our fundamental question in Europe is how we can be together in the world. We have to reconstitute the social and in doing so we have lost many words which were a part of the humanist tradition such as kindness, joy, belonging.

We have to recover the capacity to live reflectively. That has the great benefit of enabling us to deliver the opportunities of science and technology within a model of society that regards the cultural space as wider as the economic space.

The tendencies which we have to address are:

 

We cannot accept uncritically what is happening in the world and simply term it „globalisation“.

What we are witnessing is the homogenisation of commodities, neurotic consumption based on neurotic competition for ever more standardised products advertised on television systems structured for commercial profits and owned by monopoly interests whose power is now set to increase given the arrival of some of their extreme exemplars in the European Parliament...

I am interested in what N. Keith, the distinguished Swedish editor and author has to say in reference to the Sarajevo writer about Dracula’s story of globalization and murderous use of identity: our World and Jihad: The example of the lovers, a story of two lovers who attended Spielberg movies, went to discos on Saturday evening, participating in a homogenised youth culture and who were assassinated wearing the same dresses as the assassin – jeans, sneakers and sweat shirts with logos. It could be a story from so many parts of our world.

We cannot allow the creation of a Europe of Citizens be destroyed by a creation of Europe as consumers. As to concentration of ownership, to mention but one figure - 17 Multinational companies control 70% of the entertainment products of our planet.

Commissioner Monti – who had promised a control of such multi-national companies, but a directive towards the end of the Commission, had the support of Santer in saying lets have these matters be decided upon by the market.

This is in striking contrast to the Commission’s energetic pursuit of public national broadcasters to give way to the demand of commercial broad casters.

We need a Europe of cultural diversity, not one of loss of diversity. Culture, however, is not high in the European Union’s priorities.

All this is reflected in the weakness of the Council of Cultural Ministers. During the decade 1984 – 1994, the Cultural Ministers passed 22 resolutions, reached 10 conclusions, passed 1 directive, 1 regulation and 2 decisions. This shows how weak culture is within the structure of the European Union.

There are some inescapable features then at the end of the twentieth century that we cannot afford to ignore.

For example, the largest economy of the world produces over 25% of its Gross Domestic Product from arms production.

We have also recently witnessed the triumph of militarism over diplomacy. We are ending the century with the recognition of war rather than discourse as a means of resolution of conflict. The promise of the century had been to say goodbye to war and instead we see it be reasserted and strengthened as a strategy over, above and beyond international law.

Our challenge then is that we have to consider the tasks facing the role of culture in achieving the re-integration of work, culture and space as a model of ethical governance.

In restoring the space of culture we come to see the economic as simple instrumental.

We have no hope of a Europe of citizens at home in the world if we allow a non-accountable, non governable market to control the very forces such as the media that has such a deep influence. A world of entirely privatised experience is a world of misery.

Following such a reflection it is necessary to address the praxis of a re-orientation in Europe.

The practical agenda:

There are a number of things which we should consider in terms of 1) civil society 2) political institutions and 3) market institutions.

1)      Civil society:

 

2)      political institutions:

 

3)      market institutions:

 

There is discernable in the world a hunger for authenticity in life, a new way of being in the world together. This requires putting an end to the anti-intellectualism which is rampant in Europe at the present time. There is even a need to discover a lost vocabulary of human interdependency and joy.

There are words we no longer use such as kindness, sadness, friendship.

We must re-engage our intellectuals and writers.

In our critique of the state and our uncritical move to the acceptance of the market, we have lost many of the values of solidarity and of the social and yet amongst the people of Europe, there is a dismountable instinct to want to be together on the basis of affection, respect and the possibilities of the imagination. Now we must not choose to continue to drift with our acquiescence in a life lived in private, uncritical and in miserable sadness.

If I might change a little a message from Hannah Arendt’s writing, we have not only the instinct, the right, but the duty to will what we ought to be. That is the hope of common humanity together.

 

Note: Michael D. Higgins gave this speech at the EU CIED conference in Leipzig, June 1999 and thus immediately in the aftermath of the Kosovo bombardment which threw back Europe completely in its effort to secure social and economic cohesion peacefully and without use of force.

 

 

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