As often happens, who is on the other shore of the Atlantic understands European reality more clearly than us, plunged in the current of a crisis of which we do not see the end. “The failing of the euro would cause not only a collapse of the economy. It would be a fatal blow to the great European project, which brought peace and democracy to a Continent that has experienced a history of tragedies”, Paul Krugman observes. The great American economist catches on to the core of the problem. And he explains it with an example: when Florida found itself in very troubled waters, there was no default because the federal State intervened to cover the costs of social and health insurances, to guarantee bank solvency, to support employment, until the situation was redressed. 

That is what is happening in Europe; “the coming about of the United States of Europe is not near”, Krugman says. But without a strategy change, that brings about a federal power for managing the economy and for complementing the ECB competences, the euro is doomed; and with the euro the entire construction of the Union. That is what many people in by now know well and say. And yet, nothing moves so far to make possible a step forward towards the political union of the continent. Obviously, a transformation of such a magnitude requires a long time, because it implies a new Treaty. However, what can immediately change expectations is the certainty that that transformation will indeed happen, on the basis of a precise political commitment taken by the States, starting from those of the Eurozone and whoever is willing to join. A commitment by the governments is necessary, and shall include the fixing of a date and some intermediate stages, as happened with the euro in 1990.

The situation today is quite far from that. Paradoxically, the very absence of a federal power is driving to an excessive limitation of the sovereignty of individual States, contrary to a correct application of the federalist principles. Moreover, the European integration is going to become a bitter and quarrelsome sequel of unyielding confrontations between giving and taking by part of the individual member States. No one is considering the enormous advantages in terms of peace and welfare that the single market has produced. Above all, people forget that economic integration is the outcome of a choice of a different nature made originally by the States, inspired by the founding fathers of the European project: the choice to share our destiny of nations without cancelling them; on the contrary, exactly for the purpose of keeping them in peace, security, democracy and solidarity, after the terrible afflictions of two world wars. Without that initial choice, the economic union would have never been born.

The final step can only be made towards a federal order, because there must be a supra-national decision-making power that overcomes the inefficiency of the intergovernmental method, which the countless summits of the last two years did nothing else but confirm. This step has not been done yet. France has slowed down the journey to the final goal many times: in 1954, in 1984, in 1992, in 2003. And it is now in Germany that strong contrary winds have started to blow, opposing the sharing not really of debts but of our common destiny. The alliance between the Bundesbank (that culpably forgets to be now a branch of the ECB; imagine if to behave like this were another central Bank...), the German Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe (which is emphasizing beyond a lawful limit the role of the German Parliament in the sectors of EU competence) and the growing anti-European populism exalted by the media and caressed by many politicians, is a spurious alliance, because it is founded on different cultural premises. But it is potentially deadly for the future of the Union. The fundamental core of values which lies at the root of European integration is in serious danger. Germany, that about the rigor on State accounts has rightly obtained the full agreement of the other governments and national Parliaments, risks now to make the entire train it is part of derail. Also on the protection of the single market and competition the Union risks to fall to pieces, and this is already happening to a certain degree. The bitter reality is that in Germany and in Europe nationalism is on the rise. An attitude quite different from the love for one’s history and nation, if not the opposite: because nationalists, more than loving their own country, despise the other nations, considering them alien and potentially hostile. The terrible pathology of the Europe of the 1900s is today regaining force.

And yet, the remedies are clear by now, both on the plane of economic integration and on the institutional plane. A supra-national European government for the economy and security, endowed with its own resources, limited but sufficient, and effective instruments; a decisionmaking system in the Councils that abolishes the right of veto; an indispensable democratic anchorage ensured by the European Parliament with the legislative co-decision. Nothing more and nothing less. Among the population of our States, Germany included, the sentiment in favour of a united Europe is not at all extinguished. It still is in the majority, all the polls confirm that. But such a positive judgment is now frail like a light sigh, almost suffocated by the deafening clamor of populism and anti European demagogy, amplified by the media. Above all, what is lacking today in many observers, albeit so diligent in monitoring the crisis of the euro, and in all the men in government, albeit so expert in earthly matters, is the awareness that history is also (and perhaps most of all) the result of irrational forces. The tragedies that Europe has experienced – so many in the course of the centuries, together with many highlights – have originated in a similar manner, as shown by the  sudden and unwanted outbreak of the First World War: the bullet of one handgun was sufficient to provoke a disaster. The examples could be countless.

The future of Europe and its citizens is tied to the project of political union of the continent. It is impossible not to realize it, if one looks at the planet’s reality. But the opportunities to make steps forward, true discontinuity jumps on the road of civilization, as a positive answer to the challenges of the present, are not infinite. They are rare, very often made possible precisely by a crisis: if neglected, they vanish. And then a civilization declines and not rarely it disappears over time. The deposit of history’s wreckages is as large as the bottom of the seas. Europe is now at a crossroads. For this reason too, Angela Merkel and Wolfgang Schäuble’s statements in favor of a future evolution of Europe towards a federal structure must be taken literally, put to the test and carried out with determination. They shall be shared with France and with whoever will be willing to join. With no more delays. The European governments are playing with fire. For everybody the moment of awareness and wisdom will come. But the risk is that it will come when it is too late.