2. What stories are being told about the European Union?

Everyone knows Orwell's 'Animal Farm'. It is about all animals being equal, except the pigs. By contrast, one story not narrated about the European Union, but most telling is that all citizens are equal with regards to EU institutions, except the member states. That can explain already why the law of proportionality has been distorted beyond the point of self recognition when citizens look upon EU institutions to see how they are governed. They do not find themselves being treated equal to all the non elected officials appointed by the states to oversee the functioning of the EU.

Given the rise in anti Europe sentiments, the outgoing president of the EU Commission, Mr. Barrosso called for a new narrative. Since so far all narratives told about Europe suggest what a huge success this project has been, one can wonder why some doubts have been raised as of late and especially this in conjunction with the European elections?

Naturally a narrative serves the prime purpose of justification. It supposed to give moral and political legitimacy as to how decisions are arrived at within EU institutions. The narrative should put this process beyond any doubt by ordinary citizens. Naturally best for this process to continue, so the story goes, is that citizens do not ask too many questions nor doubt it. In short, the assurance is given that things will work out in the final end to the benefit of all!

Of course, citizens are not really told a true narrative. If so, they would make visible the real problems faced by the EU institutions. Rather their real aim is to silence the critics. Moreover the European narrative is told in a new language called 'Euro'-speak. Its aim is to develop such a neutral language that all 28 member states can find something to agree with in every formulation and work out any disagreement within such a consensus building process, that general and particular meanings can blend into one another. The outcome is a neutralization of all important nuances of understanding as to what makes up Europe. The disadvantage thereof can be seen, for instance, on hand of the Water directive of 2000 which contains no such wording which is sensitive to the diverse Mediterranean landscape. Rather its highly technocratic language retains models of thinking which aim to create a certain dynamic at EU level by allowing a redistribution of funds for actions which can be linked to a certain direction of development. Indicative for this are the latest slogans used to promote the new funding programme called Horizon 2020 since now everything ought to be 'smart' development.

That only certain stories are preferred, that can be observed on hand of the fact the European Union spends a huge amount of money to ensure journalists report only in a friendly manner. However, it leads dangerously ever closer to media manipulation and sheer propaganda. It confuses as well reporting about the real state of affairs and tends to reproduce misleading information as to what the European Union is really about. The latter was originally called 'European Community' till Kohl came along and thought of a European Union train to connect the continent as had been the case in America when going West. But the biggest misunderstanding of what a European Union entails became most explicit when the draft of a new EU Constitutional Treaty – it had been prepared by the European Convention - was not ratified in 2005. One reason was that the press chose to ignore that it was a 'Constitutional Treaty'. Instead journalists focused only on it being an unreadable constitution due to having too many pages. In reality, the proposal by the Convention was basically making two texts compatible: the Maastricht Treaty and the Charter of Basic Rights. The member states added a third book without any consultation and therefore upset the apple cart. Yet this aspect of being as well a new treaty in the making, this the press never made clear. In the aftermath of this failure to ratify the EU Constitutional Treaty mainly first by France and then Holland – England never put it to a vote - in 2005, this misunderstanding was never admitted and consequently the mess never cleaned up. Far more serious is the consequence, for the failure to ratify the EU Constitutional Treaty means definitely all EU institutions have lost their moral legitimacy. Given all the money they shall continue to exist, but without morality, real life has gone out of them. Merkel tried to paper over this problem by initiating the Lisbon Treaty but the problem of legitimacy is still the single largest unresolved issue of the European Union.

Already 1999 was a turning point in the history of the European Union and specifically of the European Commission. President Santer and his cabinet had to step down due to a financial scandal. It transformed some MEPs in the European Parliament into 'blood hounds' eager to see if the Commission would commit another serious mistake. At the same time, the bombing of Kosovo ended the peaceful EU integration. Till then the aim was to bring about social and economic cohesion best done, so the assumption, by achieving equality between all the different regions in Europe. After 1999, the EU shifted its focus to such external matters as a rapid intervention force. The Lisbon treaty reinforced only this trend by appointing a special envoy for the EU's external affairs while the Council of Europe gained in addition to its powers an own president.

Already during deliberations of the European Convention, it is was predicted that the new form of governance shall become the 'open method of cooperation' between member states. Its aim is to find consensus about priorities within major policy fields. It is not binding but can translate, so the hope, eventually into concrete policy measures. All along all EU institutions tend to follow more informal than formal procedures to reach an agreement. Consequently they operate to different degrees in near anonymity. That is especially the case with the Council of Europe and thereby allows non elected representatives of member states to dictate which policy options have a chance to be accepted by the European Union as a whole. Their influence outdistances by far the voices of citizens in need to be heard but which reach hardly ever the European level. The European Commission tries to initiate such methods as public consultations and a structured dialogue with civil society by creating platforms to give the Commission specific policy advice. In matters of culture, these have been three: intercultural dialogue, access to culture, and creative / cultural industries. However, their shortcomings are many since only so-called EU experts shape their agendas while those working in the field do not understand really the terms used to enhance more a pseudo than a real policy debate.

About the needed European debate, the philosopher Bart Verschaffel states that a long cultural development has to take place before 'public truth can be heard in public spaces.' More importantly this truth should not be taken to be as an absolute but it should be possible to be questioned since an expression of opinion. ^¹

Certainly the short comings of Europe can be reflected in what is being said about Europe. Still more often they are reduced to mere rumours while their impact is a dwindling support given by the wider public to this project. Lately Euro-Sceptics seem to been able to rally ever more people around mere 'negative truths' about the European Union. Sadly enough the current European debate can not affect this trend since the debate takes place at an increasingly superficial levels. For sure, the fate of people living together on this continent cannot be decided by expressing merely yes-no opinions on single issues e.g. either for more or less Europe, or 'in or out of the Euro-Zone'. As Habermas would put it, either/or options are always false alternatives but demagogues love to use black-white contrasts to score points and to gain more support for their mainly single issue parties.

The question has to be asked seriously, if a new narrative is what Europe really needs? Any answer to that question has to include a critical reflection as to what constitutes a good story, and therefore distinguishes it clearly from being a mere propaganda tool. This has become all the more urgent, as someone like the film maker Wim Wenders recommended to European policy makers that Europe needs a new propaganda tool, in order to sell itself better to its citizens and to the world. That was said at a conference organized by 'Soul of Europe' in Berlin 2010. Only one Polish delegate stood up and contradicted Wenders by saying Europe had enough of propaganda. Coming from Eastern Europe, he should know.

The risks to be deceived by new forms of propaganda tricks can be attributed to a loss of theoretical reflections since everything is based on 'shaky evidence on the ground'. It creates mainly ambivalence. ^² It became, for example, most explicit when people tried to follow the news and counter news coming out of Eastern Ukraine with regards to the fate of the Malaysian airliner which came down on July 17^th 2014 with 295 passengers and crew members on board. Alone eighty of them were children. While all victims were innocent civilians having nothing to do with that war in Eastern Ukraine, rather than someone taking the responsibility, blame and counter blame instigated doubt as to who was really behind such a criminal act. Till to date relatives of the victims have no definite answer as to what an who brought down the plane. Since evidence at the crash site has been 'contaminated' i.e. presumably because incriminating traces have been removed, it has become a “ground of ambivalence.”

Always stories seem when heard for the first time without doubt an account of what took place in reality. Yet after posing some further questions while being startled by some unusual associations, a closer look at the story can lead to many more questions until suddenly problems which had remained hidden till then, begin to appear. That indicates quite a different story has to be told before one can make up one's mind as to what is the case. Likewise there is a need for true stories to be told to citizens on how they are governed by EU institutions. Such stories would seek to identify elements which can be translated into a sound conviction that the EU institutions ensure that governance is in accordance with democratic principles.

There are some serious doubts that this is the case and therefore a narrative is needed to give a sense of unity to the whole European project. But what if Europe shall only be united by hate, as propagated by especially Extreme Right Wing political groups? If so, it would mean social cohesion and economic equality shall be replaced by growing hostility and violent behaviour. Likewise coercive forces will add to a growing uncertainty about the future. This is especially the case for the younger generations. As a result youth protests like the one which erupted in Greece in 2008 have to be taken more serious. For it is a revolt against a society which has become completely corrupt in their eyes. As these protests are a mere indication of far worse things still to come if the European Union does not alter its way of handling money and connected with that the way power distributes privileges, a sense of proportionality has to go hand in hand with observing the need for equality.

Especially the Southern EU member states have since 2009 entered a crisis mode. In member states like Greece the Troika has become the negotiating partner for any memorandum of understanding on how to get out of the crisis. In clear text, it means the imposition of strict austerity measures. As a result there is in Greece an overall unemployment of 27% while amongst the youth it is over 65%. Subsequently many of the youth go abroad, while others seek an alternative life e.g. highly qualified academics entering biological farming. In the worst case, they decide to end their lives. The suicide rate in Greece has been going up steadily to such a high level never experienced in the past.

A lot more would need to be said about the mechanisms at work to subdue the subsequent protest. Here it suffices to heed the warning of Johannes Agnoli who pointed out in his book 'Fascism beyond Revisionism' that an inherent danger is for society to take recourse to fascist methods once all other solutions have failed to keep the crisis under control. It would mean the return of the 'language of hate' which Jean Pierre Faye has described and analysed so well in 'Totalitarian Languages'. Indeed, people can end up hating themselves so much for allowing themselves to be manipulated and pushed around, so that they load themselves up with hate as if a gun ready to be unloaded and directed at the next suitable object, and which has become the migrant as the outsider of the 21^st century.

Given the extent of false or untrue narratives covering up a lot, a culture is needed which promotes critical judgement so as to be able to tell the difference between a true story and a lie. What this entails may be revealed by the following story. When I asked a friend who worked for amnesty international at that time in India, what was most difficult for him, I expected him to say that it is hard to talk with people who have been tortured. To my surprise he answered instead that due to travelling so much around, he would meet people maybe once or twice, at the most three times, and consequently these people never came around to tell him their true stories, stories which reveal their pains. He meant as a result of this his own pain was never touched although needed if he was to judge what was going on in the Indian society. For instance, when he takes one of those crowded trains with many people lying, standing, crawling in the corridor since all compartments were full, he can never distinguish a true from a false beggar. His perception was not penetrating enough.

It goes without saying, without deepening perception and sharpening critical judgement by hearing stories which touch human pain, no culture can be understood in its nuances. Instead mere superficial stories shall generate false generalizations. Unfortunately such fake stories are being propagated by a tourist industry geared to cater self interest. For instance, the Greek Ministry of Tourism initiated once an advertisement campaign which said come to Greece and enjoy your own myth. Such a concept of travel excludes any interest to get to know the people who live in the land being visited. It follows that outsiders have nothing to do, for instance, with all the repercussions of the austerity measures in Greece. Even a local politician like the mayor of Athens expressed dismay when he saw crowds of people gathering on Syntagma Square to discuss the impact of the crisis. He claimed such political gatherings mean noise, dirt and even drugs, in short are a health threat and a pollution to the eye of the tourist. He went on to argue that tourists come to see the cultural heritage of the country and prefer clean public spaces. At the same time, it was disturbing to see stereotypical images resurface in the European media once the crisis erupted, as if the Greeks were lazy people. It underlines a cultural failure of European integration since it could be expected such stereotype like images of the other were a thing of the past. If Europe is to be connected through culture, people have to find a way to meet and not by-pass each other as wanted by the tourist industry. Here the ECoC's do have a role to play but their contributions to reducing stereotypical images have been so far very modest. Rather they tend to subscribe to the EU 2020 vision which advocates an 'economy of experience'. One may wonder if such a Europe will ever come together if it costs money to make experiences being mainly virtual since produced by a media designed to further some kind of infotainment but lacks in substance.

The EU Commission does not cease to tire to point out in its narrative about Europe that this promises to be a 'success stories', meaning economies making money while tourists make their experiences. The Commission would want European citizens to be happy, and to prove that a nebulous Eurobarometer is used to measure the level of satisfaction. Yet this top-down flow of information to propagate EU measures would need citizens who can set the European agenda.

Propaganda as mode can go even so far that some countries praise their people for upholding a friendly smile for the tourist even when they feel miserable inside. If wearing a mask of permanent happiness is not a sign of people at risk to succumb to a slave language just to hide their inner most feelings, a further look should be taken to see what happens at work. There most people have learned to survive by not saying what they really think. Especially in times of high employment, the fear to lose the job silences people. It is a coercive force as business practices have become ever tougher in terms of lower wages and bad working conditions. No wonder that little or no protest is heard. In reality, the coercive power of fear upholds artificially the purchasing power of the wealthy since more people are prepared to work more for less money. That is the crude equation. It goes without saying such an economy tends to reproduce 'a poverty of experience'. So while everything possible is done to keep the economy going, the real question is but how can people relate to one another, if they cannot even narrate to themselves a true story about their lives in Europe?

So what other stories need to be told about the European Union aside from the ones which begin with 'those in Brussels'? Since more often than not rumours rather than real stories circulate, it is best to admit the intricacies of EU institutions make it very difficult to understand how they function. Since they are quite complex due to being over flooded with all kinds of information coming from all directions, there is a constant need to respond to a great variety of issues. Here an overview is simply lacking but also such an information system which would allow for validation of the information passed top-down is missing. Citizens find no easy access to knowledge about what is really going on. For this reason I want to tell just briefly two stories which I experienced while working for the Cultural Committee of the European Parliament 1999-2000. They may high light something peculiar about the European Union and its institutions.

The first story happened to me while I was walking through the old town of Brussels. At the fish market I was approached by a fine looking African who asked me straight right away, where I work. I said at the European Parliament. He then introduced himself as ambassador of an African nation, and told me that he had just been yesterday at the Parliament. He then asked what I do. I replied, 'advisor to the cultural committee'. Oh, he replied quite surprised, but that is a coincidence since he had just talked with a Green MEP on that committee. Who? He searched for the name and solicited my help. I mentioned Lukas Van der Talen, the Belgium MEP. Yes, that is him. And so it went on till we discovered that we both lived not only in Uccle, but he just up the road where I had my house. Suddenly his face became very sad. What is it, I asked? He replied his wife is sick and he is just on the way to the pharmacy but due to being in a hurry he has forgotten his wallet at home. After some further back and forth, I asked him how expensive is the medicine. He mentioned 20 Belgium Francs (at that time the Euro did not exist as of yet). When I gave him that amount he thanked me and promised to give it back that same day. After all we were living on the same street. Naturally I never saw that man again, but the story reveals how he managed to crack my code of trust so that I was completely taken in by him. Only afterwards I realized that his art was to build up my confidence and trust in him by asking such questions for which I had given him all the answers. As to my code of trust and confidence, it reflected as well a common self-understanding shared generally by all those who are on the 'inside' i.e. work for some EU Institution.

The second story relates to the visit by Dr. Baader, Under Secretary of State of the US government. He had come to Brussels to sign the new Educational Treaty between Europe and the USA. When I heard about it, I contacted him to arrange a special meeting between him and Green MEPs. Upon his arrival we met and while walking through the Parliament building to the meeting room, we were suddenly pushed aside by bouncers who shouted at us to make way. We were pressed to the side to let some dignity pass by. It turned out to be Tony Blair and his entourage. He passed us as if he was the king of Europe and not merely the prime minister of the UK. It made me wonder about this odd discrepancy between real and fake power. While Blair demonstrated the pretence of power camouflaged by pomposity, there was a modest Dr. Baader standing on the sidelines. Even though he was second in power after the Secretary of State in the US State department, he waited like all the others patiently. It says something about the usual misconceptions about those who wield US power. Admittedly authentic figures when it comes to exercising real power are rare in politics. Once Blair had passed by, we continued to the meeting. In that half a hour of discussion with him the Green MEPs learned more than what they could in one year in Parliament. One key concern for Dr. Baader was in terms of education how many students would take up business studies and after graduation depart to work for private businesses. His concern was that not enough students were taking up policy research, yet what European governments need is feed back to their policy measures as to which really work. He found this lack of policy knowledge alarming. Alone this story says a lot about what matters most in politics, namely the ability to identify the problems and to set the right priorities. It was equally revealing when one of the Green MEPs admitted during the discussion that he would vote too often on budget lines without really knowing what lies behind them.

Indeed, this lack of policy knowledge has also a deep impact upon the prevailing political culture. The usual debates focus only superficially on what supposedly is 'politics', but they never get so far as to distinguish between different policy options. At the same time, politicians require not really policy research but how reports make them look good in the eyes of the general public. Given that sad state of affairs, no wonder when many conclude that only impossible demands is what makes politicians really move. One such demand would be to take the ECoC title serious as it should benefit primarily culture to connect people of Europe, and not merely the city.

1Bart Verschaffel, „Public Space and Public Truth“. http://www.poieinkaiprattein.org/europe/european-debate-2/political-and-philosophical-appraisal/public-truth-and-public-space-by-bart-verschaffel/

2See Martin Jay, (2006) „The ambivalent virtues of mendacity“ http://poieinkaiprattein.org/philosophy/martin-jay/the-ambivalent-virtures-of-mendacity-by-martin-jay/

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2. What stories are being told about the European Union?