Comment by microtonal
1 day ago
They all talk about the importance of European digital sovereignty and then continue to do the exact opposite behind the scenes.
To be honest and I say this as a Dutch person, this is typical Dutch (government). Basically two rules in Dutch politics: (1) always choose the option that pleases the US the most; (2) always postpone solving issues to the latest possible moment (US dependence, nitrogen deposition, childcare benefits scandal, gas-induced earthquakes).
France, Germany, etc. are much better examples when it comes to sovereignty.
As an aside the parliament wants to stop the Solvinity acquisition or stop renewing the contract with Solvinity. But the VVD (one of the parties in government) is always going to choose what is best for big business (the party is one big revolving door) or the US.
It's not only Dutch. Instead of building sovereignity, the EU thought they could regulate their way and force everyone to bend the knee because of their share as a trading partner. This started 20 years ago. However what has happened is that the EU's soft power is crumbling, but the politicians have hard to grasp with the reality they could somehow dictate things globally. AI will only further accelerate this.
Only way to have control is to have domestic actors you can push around.
Europeans (and not just the EU) think they still have the influence on the world they had in the 1980s when their economies were a much larger proportion of the global economy. Europeans have no idea what the world looks like from Asia which contains most of the world's population and generates a third of global GDP.
Americans (and not just the US) think they still have the influence on the world they had in the 1980s when their economies were a much larger proportion of the global economy. Americans have no idea what the world looks like from Asia which contains most of the world's population and generates a third of global GDP.
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They also came to realize building, operating and maintaining a military force is extremely expensive. Free healthcare, 7 weeks of vacation, 36 hr work weeks, unemployment benefits, subsidized housing, etc etc is all great when you don’t have the financial burden of protecting your home.
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> However what has happened is that the EU's soft power is crumbling
Uh, no. The US soft power is turning to dust whilst the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin.
What has happened the past ±30 years is that most EU countries cut spending on their militaries to the bone, because big brother USA would take care of it anyway. Now that we are returning to a multi-polar world, suddenly the EU is left scrambling for hard power that it doesn't have. That's why they can't play hardball when the US does a new ridiculous thing, because they simply lack the hard power to back up Ukraine.
The US is sorely going to regret their antics though. Long term, the EU is going to switch to their own stacks, both for military but also things like cloud and other tech. It's trillions of $ the US economy will be missing out on. And voting in a Democratic president, senate and house is not gonna change a thing about it, because the US has proven itself to be a fundamentally unreliable, if not outright hostile partner.
The US alone spends 1.5x as much on consumer goods (yes, adjusted for PPP) and nearly 2x as much on R&D as the entire EU. It’s very sweet that the EU is trying to decouple itself from the US economy, but I highly doubt its ability to become “leader of the free trade world” when it has so little money to throw around.
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"the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin"
At its usual pace ... do you know when the negotiations with Mercosur started? Year 2000. Only now we have an agreement. Still, better than not doing anything at all. But I wonder how many of the original negotiators are still alive.
It also yet remains to be seen what happens if China puts a real pressure on us. Our list of allies is now somewhat thin and we have to cozy up to India, which indirectly funds the Russian war against Ukraine by importing Russian weapons and Russian oil/gas, the latter in huge quantities. Still, better than cozying up to China, because the possibility that Beijing teaches Brussels some cool tricks to keep the population under perfect surveillance scares me.
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>Uh, no. The US soft power is turning to dust whilst the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin.
To quote when harry met sally - I'll have what she's having.
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It is difficult to think of an economic region that is more opposed to free trade than Europe (that isn't a comedy country). Possibly some countries in South America?
Trade within Europe has massive restrictions. I have no idea why, given the stated aims of Europe...we are posting this on a post about the Netherlands trying to protect office software ffs, people think this isn't the case. One of the reasons why the EU created a trade bloc, and the same reasons why you see the same attempts in areas of the world like South America, was to limit the impact of free trade. This should be completely obvious given that the EU is not competitive in areas where they lack the ability to limit competition.
Also, I will point out: US policy is for the EU to do exactly the thing that you are suggesting. This has been the consistent position of Trump since 2016. The main blockers for this have been politicians in the EU. I am not sure how you equate being unreliable with subsidising EU defence spending to the tune of multiple trillions so that EU countries can spend on welfare either.
The EU self-image is totally bizarre, it is so out of touch with reality. Hostile to all forms of change and innovation: actually one of the greatest free traders there has ever been. Xenophobic and hostile to certain countries: possibly one of the greatest allies to these countries ever. Never gets any support on Ukraine, would be a leader if the US weren't such bastards: spent multiple decades fuelling Putin's state.
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> whilst the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin
In the same way America is stuck in its military heyday past, the EU is stuck pretending its brand of multilateralism is still a thing outside its own borders.
What? In this case the problem isn't that EU wants to dictate things globally, but US laws that do just that. EU laws just apply to Europe. As time goes on and European agencies get their shit together and actually start to follow their own rules, it will mean a shitton of business will leave US companies.
The problem for the EU is being so consumer centric but having a weak currency and diminished manufacturing (thanks to Russian invasion).
> always postpone solving issues to the latest possible moment
Germany has the exact same issue. Always looking to keep the status quo for as long as possible. It’s really a structural problem, it’s the result of the political system, elected leadership, demographics (mostly the voting population aging rapidly). I expect the same issue is shared by most Western European countries
Isn't this simply a "human thing", keeping the status quo for as long as possible? I see the same European country I'm from, where I'm living currently, the South American country my wife is from and every single country I visit.
Maybe another framing, is there any countries where this isn't true? Where truly the default is to go against the status quo and continuously improve no matter what? I know there are a few countries people think are like that, but when you start reading about it, turns out to be kind of "hyped" and not matching reality.
It's a manager thing, something you learn in business school and from airport-lounge management lit. "Decide at the last responsible moment" has its place but managerial types often undeservedly elevate it to a general principle.
Technical people are usually not like that. If anything they fall into the opposite trap: Always chasing the latest and greatest and wasting all their energy on novelty churn.
People talk like "status quo" was inherently a bad thing, and that any change to it is good by default. On the contrary, "status quo" is usually a hard-won place, a foothold against strong tides, a position that you try to preserve while carefully considering your next step, because a careless step will just send you falling back down to whatever hellhole reality your predecessors dragged themselves up from.
Status quo is not a stable state, it's a state you defend.
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Some countries with different politics like China do not seem to suffer the same issues, or at least not yet. Or maybe the country is defending a different status quo (the mono-party)? But they seem to be eager to develop the infrastructure and country as a whole.
Not that I would want to live under their political system, to be clear. I wish we could have a democratic system AND also be eager to develop our regions instead of being so protective of everything
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Not to mention being overrun by Dodge Rams that do not meet EU safety roles but come in under a loophole. I like living here mostly but a lot of what makes it nice is threatened by the US.
This is part of the point of Carney’s Davos speech. Us middle powers need to de-Americanize together or we don’t stand a chance at succeeding.
Which might be impossible given that sacrifices will have to be made in the interim, and people already riot if you even hint at moving retirement age up a year.
The problem is the government treating people like the enemy drowning them in paperwork. Western governments believe they can create the perfect citizen if they just surveill them and regulate them enough.
Don’t forget that they’re in the process of letting our digital government identity being managed by a US company. It’s absolutely ridiculous.
Another way to look at it is that things just move slowly in government land. The tax office moving towards Microsoft has probably been in preparation for half a decade... And do you really believe the government is technically capable of switching DigiD to a different provider on a (relative) moments notice without causing large scale outages?
We'll start seeing government bodies moving away from US IT suppliers in a couple of years.
The actual question is if (capable) SWEs will choose working for (or be a founder of) Dutch/Euro tech companies over US ones, or even leave the US to live there.
Europe is an excellent value prop if you want to be a bartender or baker. Its decidedly less so if you want to be a white collar/gold collar worker.
> Its decidedly less so if you want to be a white collar/gold collar worker.
If you want to earn big money, you're better of in the US, for sure. Quality of life though, as a white collar worker?
That does probably have its effect on economic growth..
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I left the US in my 20's to live in Europe and I like raising kids here (I'm now in my 40's) but honestly... it was a stupid thing to do. Meanwhile, my in-laws, who stayed in the US, are now retiring to France in their 40's with a few million dollars.
The opportunity cost of living in Europe is absolutely enormous. You're basically lighting $1-2 million (or more, perhaps) on fire for every decade you're here instead of the US.
Though I don't find myself wanting to move back to California any time soon...
> France, Germany, etc. are much better examples when it comes to sovereignty.
France maybe, Germany most definitely not.
No, not France either. It used to be, and some inertia from the Gaullist past remains, but the current leadership is as useless as everyone else.