A continent goes soul-searching

Half a century after its creation, the European Union is a project not yet half completed. It will never truly live until its citizens invest it with a ‘soul.’

 

Exactly a century ago, Europe was about to witness the breakout of the First World War and its unprecedented devastation. Fast-forward a hundred tumultuous years, and a politically united Europe now watches anxiously as tensions in the Ukraine and Russia threaten to spill over into armed conflict.

“If 2014 is going to end in Europe in a more peaceful manner than 1914, it is above all going to be because we have the EU,” Wolfgang Ischinger, global head of Public Policy and Economic Research at Allianz SE said during the opening of this year’s Berlin Conference “A Soul for Europe” at the Allianz Forum in Berlin.

“Seen from the outside – maybe not equally seen from the inside by many disgruntled European citizens – the European Union is surely the most innovative political creation of the last hundred years,” said Ischinger.

Hosted by the initiative “A Soul for Europe”, the European Parliament and the Allianz Kulturstiftung in the Allianz Forum in Berlin, the event brought European political leaders together onstage with artists and intellectuals from across the continent. Debates focused on how Europe could better utilize its cultural assets.

More than Brussels

 

In his opening remarks, Ischinger argued that culture is more than just a “nice-to-have” accessory to Europe’s political institutions. “It is essential for our security, for our stability, and for our well-being and prosperity,” said Ischinger.

 

"One of the problems we have in Europe is that very often Europe is considered Brussels, or Luxembourg, or Strasberg,” said European Commission President José Manuel Barroso in his keynote speech. “Of course, these are very important parts of our Europe, namely the institutional part. But Europe is not them; Europe is us.”

 

“We cannot build a Europe that is only considered the responsibility of the European institutions,” added Barroso. “We have to make Europe a reality from the citizens’ point of view."

 

But this hasn’t happened yet, according to “A Soul for Europe,” a civil society initiative that links citizens and politicians from across the Continent. They lament that culture too often takes a backseat to bureaucracy, finance, and regulation. Rather than lobbying for more financial support for culture and the arts, the group wants culture used more as a tool to reinforce European integration.

 

German filmmaker Wim Wenders believes European integration has really never grown out of being a purely “technical and economical enterprise.”

 

"People need more,” said Wenders at the conference. “They need soul, emotion, ideas. They need nourishment for identification and for belonging. That missing link is simply called culture in the wider sense.”

 

“Whenever Europe is in dire-straights, when its image is down the drain, it sometimes calls its artists and intellectuals and sometimes filmmakers to help that image,” said Wenders. "We're not regulars in Brussels … We remain the bystanders, onlookers – we're the ornament, if anything.”

 

Hungarian writer Gyorgy Konrad said a sense of irony was needed when participating in the event. Europe has many souls, many stories, he said. "Giving or finding just one soul is a chimera."

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso in his keynote speech: “We cannot build a Europe that is only considered the responsibility of the European institutions. We have to make Europe a reality from the citizens’ point of view."
European Commission President José Manuel Barroso in his keynote speech: “We cannot build a Europe that is only considered the responsibility of the European institutions. We have to make Europe a reality from the citizens’ point of view."

A Continental soul?

 

But can an entire continent really have a soul? And, if so, what would the soul of Europe look like? Here, the opinions among conference participants vary.

 

“The cooperation of countries and nations across borders and common institutions needs a soul,” European Parliament President Martin Schulz told Open Knowledge.

 

“This idea that we respect each other and create frames in which we act on equal footing,” said Schulz, “but not the big (countries) giving lessons to the smaller ones, or the rich saying, ‘we have the money, you follow’ – this is a soul.”

 

For Rebecca Harms, president of the European Green Party, the continent’s soul can be seen in the willingness to tackle common problems together, getting beyond the “very risky idea and limitations of the nation state.”

 

“I think sometimes you see it better from the outside,” said Harms. “For example, right now in Ukraine, you can feel it everywhere that they know better about our values than we know.”

 

Former prime minister of Luxembourg Jean-Claude Juncker told Open Knowledge that European consensus about values such as democracy, human rights, respect, and tolerance is – for him – a reflection of a soul.

 

“The continent’s painful history has taught us that we should talk to each other rather than shoot at each other,” says Juncker. “In that respect, Europe has a soul.”

 

Joining an artist-politician debate panel with Wim Wenders and Sziget Festival Director Fruzsina Szép, Juncker, said he sees ignorance among Europeans about other Europeans as perhaps the biggest challenge to European integration.

 

“This is a real cultural problem,” said Juncker. “We just don't know enough about each other.”

 

“We could help with that,” replied Wenders. “And we would like to help.”

Exchange of views. Jean-Claude Juncker (European People's Party) and German filmmaker Wim Wenders spoke at the conference.
Exchange of views. Jean-Claude Juncker (European People's Party - left) and German filmmaker Wim Wenders (right) spoke at the conference.

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Ursula Schürmann
Allianz SE
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