*** NICOLAS STENGER: Denis de Rougemont. Les intellectuels et l’Europe au XXe siècle. Presses universitaires de Rennes (UHB Rennes 2, Campus de la Harpe, 2 rue du doyen Denis-Leroy, F-35044 Rennes cedex. Tel: (33-2) 99141401 – Fax: 99141407 – Internet: http://www.pur-editions.f r). "Histoire" series. 2015, 410 pp, €22. ISBN 978-2-7535-3616-6.
This book is a reworking of a doctoral thesis by a historian who is now a teaching fellow at Geneva University. It’s a gold mine of information for people who in this compass-free Europe that we live in remember that we have to know where we’ve come from in order to now where we want to go – or at least where we would be able to go and where we could perhaps still go if … Based on unpublished archives lodged in Switzerland, Italy, France, Belgium and the United States, this impressive and meticulous work by Nicolas Stenger sheds light on the intellectual, personalist and activist path of Swiss writer Denis de Rougemont. It provides information about the commitment of one non-conformist intellectual among other intellectuals in the years that preceded and followed the Second World War, which enables him to return to the genesis of the European project and episodes that explain less why the European Union became what it is than the reasons why the federalist ideal that grew strong in the Resistance to the Nazis and other fascists was unable to shake national sovereignties, despite their having been weakened at the end of the years that led to the world war.
Through the chapters of his book, the author first shows how and to what extent the ‘commitment’ in the City was different for Rougemont and for Sartre, before discerning the ‘European spirit’ that the Swiss gentleman made the topic of his conference at the Rencontres internationales in Geneva on 8 September 1946, the day of his fortieth birthday, Nicolas Stenger shows that this text defines a number of cultural foundations of his vision of Europe and that these Rencontres were a founding moment of intellectual Europeanism, although discordant voices made themselves heard, auguring quarrels among chapels and, more broadly, divergent ideological visions that were to break out with the start of the ‘Cold War.’ In the second part of the book, he sets out and analyses the ‘activist hopes and disillusions’ of federalists during the period from the ‘campaign of the Congresses’ to what they saw as the disappointing creation of the Council of Europe. Through the writer’s participation in the Congrès of Montreux and The Hague, through analyses of his relations with leaders of the European Union of Federalists and the European Movement, he reveals the divergent visions of the future of Europe that clashed at the time, and he provides elements that enable one o understand why, in fine, the revolutionary aspirations of Rougemont, Alexandre Marc, Brugmans, Frenay or Spinelli crashed against the realism of British unionists, who had very quickly taken control of the European Movement. Twenty years later, Rougemont returned to this dialogue of the deaf in these terms: ‘- Nothing can be done in governments, some used to say… - But governments don’t want to do anything, others would reply.’ The fully intergovernmental Council of Europe resulted from this; hence the ‘bypass’ soon discovered by the ‘strategist, Jean Monnet’ but these days we now that States had not given up on their aim to remain masters of the game.
After examining the way progressive literary and intellectual milieus gradually took a certain distance – particularly when it came to Communist fellow-travellers – from Europe the way it was beginning to be built, Nicolas Stenger naturally devotes the remainder of his book to the action that Denis de Rougemont undertook in the cultural field, firstly by spreading his ideas thanks to the Congrès pour la liberté de la culture bringing together liberal intellectuals, and then at the Centre européen de la culture that he helped set up after the Congrès of The Hague, and that he then managed without discontinuation in Geneva. Using unpublished archives, he provides a clear vision of this institution’s contributions, which took up so much of this Swiss writer’s time that André Malraux felt he was ‘lost to literature.’ In reality, the man never stooped explaining his vision of Europe over the years, in his books and a multitude of articles, writing about the human individual and federalism, themes to which he would add in the evening of his life a regionalist and ecological commitment. Here we have sketched out a portrait of a complex man, a ‘moralist’ wanting to be above all a ‘committed author,’ a figurehead who happily positioned himself as a ‘director of conscience or even as a prophet,’ a constant ‘awakener’ who ‘never ceased to conjugate thought and action.’ His thinking clearly deserves to be revisited in these times of doubt, although his message would have changed if he’d still been with us. Michel Theys
*** DICK LEONARD, ROBERT TAYLOR: The Routledge Guide to the European Union. Routledge (2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN, UK. Tel: (44-1235) 400400 – Fax: 400401 – Email: book.orders@tandf.co.uk – Internet: http://www.routledge.com ). 2016, 346 pp, £22.99. ISBN 978-1-138-67039-6.
Having paced up and down the corridors and briefing rooms of the European institutions for more than thirty years, Dick Leonard (who was at one point a Labour MEP) and Bob Taylor (who has now become a consultant on European issues) are among the British journalists who best understand the inner workings of the European project and its policies. Hence the utility of this book, which clearly and reliable describes the European Union. As they state in the introduction, it is both an ancient and a modern book. Ancient because Dick Leonard published it in the past under the title The Economist Guide to the European Union, this being the tenth edition that has bee translated into eleven different languages. Modern because, with the help of Bob Taylor, it is now decked out with a new title, but also and more importantly, it has been completely overhauled and updated, with the authors remaining faithful to the original desire to write not for experts but for the general public wishing to discover the facts about Europe, far removed from the fibs and tall stories told by too many British tabloids. In the first part of the book, the authors go back to the origins of the European Community and describe the various stages that led it to become what it is today. In the next section, they describe the European institutions and the role they play in the light of the processes and procedures in place. The third part is devoted to powers and policies, ranging from the financing of the European Union to Foreign Security and Security/Defence Policy via economic and monetary union, workers’ rights and climate change. The fourth and final part sees Leonard and Taylor looking at a number of specific issues, such as relating to the enlargement policy or the role of the United Kingdom in Europe. In this connection, the authors stress the extent to which the British will be shooting themselves in the foot if they decided to leave the European Union, because the island will remain geographically, and therefore economically, connected to the Continent. At the end of an uncompromising analysis of the behaviour of British politicians, the authors are relatively pessimistic about the future of the Union. (MT)
*** NIKOS BELOYANNIS: Voici donc les nouvelles d’Alexandre (Tsipras). Faits saillants de l’époque des mémorandums pour la droite et de la gauche. Editions Agra (99 rue Zoodochou Pigis, GR-11473 Athens. Tel:(30-210) 7011461 – Fax: 7018649). 2016, 224 pp, €15.50. ISBN 978-960-505-199-0.
Since the continent refuses to learn from its history, our contemporaries have been landed Europe of the neoliberal invasion, France of Le Pen and Hollande, Italy of Berlusconi and Beppe Grillo in the presentable attire of Renzi, Spain and Catalonia at a time of neo-Francoism…. There is also the Greece of Amphipolis, where Alexander the Great’s tomb is said to be, and then there’s always Greece of the black economy and under the table deals. Hence the freak show exposed in around sixty articles trying to work out where this new European monster comes from with respect to the past. The subject matter is not neutral because the author, a chemical engineer and writer, is the son of Nikos Beloyannis, a Greek Communist executed in 1952 for treason after Pablo Picasso did his portrait, known around the world as the picture of ‘the man with the carnation.’ In short bursts of text, the author presents to us the former conservative prime minister Samaras and other ‘glories’ of modern Greece, taunts Alexis Tsipras, has a dig at Germany from the time of the Goths and Visigoths to the present day, and also has a go at Beppe Grillo, the Vatican for its relationship with the mafia and Nazi Germany, Juan Carlos and his mistresses and financial scandals, China after Mao, Ceausescu and the Greeks in Romania and the ‘heroism’ of Putin. Naturally, Stalin also has a place, as do plenty more besides. This reveals the gap between political speeches and statements and the action that tends to be taken… … (AKa)
*** CHRISTOS LASKOS, DIMOSTHENIS PAPADATOS-ANAGNOSTOPOULOS (Eds.): Le non qui est devenu oui. Editions Kapsimi (55-57 rue Zoodochou Pigis, GR-10681 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3813838 – Fax: 3839713 – Email: info@kapsimi.gr – Internet: http://www.kapsimi.gr ). 2016, 296 pp, €14. ISBN 978-618-5156-15-2.
Slammed by some quarters of international public opinion as a "coup d'Etat," the signing of the third Memorandum by the Syriza-Anel coalition government following the No vote in the 5 July 2015 referendum, turned the no vote into a symbolic victory of the ‘yes’ vote. This break with the sovereignty of the people is commented upon in this book by some twenty authors, all academics, editorialists, journalists or politicians. Edited by economist Christos Laskos, editorialist in a number of Greek newspapers and member of the Political Secretariat of the Left Coalition for which he is responsible for political theory, and Dimosthenis Papadatos-Anagnostopoulos, also an economist, the authors raise many questions and provide answers to them. What lead to this break? Did it emerge from the coalition’s own weaknesses? Are these developments prescribed? Why were they felt internationally to be so negative? Are people who talk about simple ‘betrayal’ plain wrong? The answers to these questions and to plenty more besides are provided in the light of the struggle carried out by Syriza before it came to power and during its seven months of governance before the referendum. The responses cover the future more than the past, with the authors judging that the intensification of the capitalist crisis that brought Alexis Tsipras’ party to power is still ongoing. The way they see it, the aggressiveness displayed by the ‘European institutions’ proves that a ‘historic compromise’ with brutality is impossible. In other words, a new cycle has begun and the struggle continues, as no defeat is definitive. (AKa)
*** SAVVAS KELENDERIDIS: Crise et patriotisme. Editions Infognomon (14 rue Filellinon, GR-10557 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3316036 – Fax: 3250421 – Email: info@infognomon.gr – Internet: http://www.infognomon.gr ). 2016, 498 pp, €25. ISBN 978-618-5219-00-0.
Patriotism, a sacred and supreme ideal that has characterised Greeks for centuries and has been one of the major forces protecting the Greek nation over the long haul, has become faded and degenerated in recent decades which, says the author of this book, has led to a deep moral, social, political and economic crisis. It reached its culmination during the past six years and unfortunately remains in place. A retired professional military man who is now a book publisher, Savvas Kelenderidis says that only recovery and regeneration of patriotism will allow Greece to pull through. He says patriotism is in fact the only force left that can re-unite Greeks divided by the crisis of the economy that is now going so far as to threaten the nation and the motherland itself. The author says he is publishing this book in the hope of generating intense and profound reflection on the question of Greek patriotism, which he urges readers to rediscover by returning to the glorious pages in the past of the Greek people. He says lessons need to be learned from this past, adapting them to the twenty-first century, which will continue Ariadne’s thread so that the Greeks can escape from the crisis. (AKa)
*** Il Federalista. Rivista di politica. Edif (8 Villa Glori, I-27100 Pavia. Internet: http://www.ilfederalista.eu ). 2016, No. 1, 80 pp. Annual subscription: €25 (Europe), €30 (outside Europe).
The editorial that opens this issue of a publication connected to the Movimento Federalista Europeo is devoted to the role that the European Union should play to accompany the digital revolution that is under way and the economic, social and societal upheavals it will and is already bringing about. While the European Commission recently sent the member states guidelines revealing the potential of the new collaborative economy and the need to regulate rather than banish, the editorialist points out that national capitals continue to act in a dispersed or even contradictory manner. On the contrary, he argues, they should open up to this new technology while ensuring rules are set at European level, which will require ‘setting up a system of European federal government,’ that citizens feel is legitimate. Other topics addressed in this issue cover the role of political realism and federalism in the current ‘crisis of global order,’ the growing complexity of democracy at a time of referendums, the Altiero Spinelli Prize granted to the emeritus Italian president, Giorgio Napolitano, the problem of Brexit, working on European defence and, finally, the need to draw up ‘a federal balance sheet of the eurozone.’ (MT)