The other European crisis

The principal casualty of the ongoing European sovereign-debt crisis is the European Project itself.
In recent months, press, public and official attention has largely focused on the national blowback from the eurozone crisis: the political turmoil in Greece, the fall of multiple European governments and, most recently, the broader implications of the electoral defeat of French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his replacement by François Hollande. But it is now clear that the principal casualty of the ongoing European sovereign-debt crisis is the European Project itself. Europe is experiencing a full-blown crisis of public confidence: in the benefits of European economic integration, in membership in the European Union and in the euro. 

Creating a common European market that would be good for Europe’s citizens was the founding raison d’être of what today is the European Union. That 1957 proposition, which became the rationale for subsequent enlargement, creation of the single market and a common currency, is no longer an article of faith for a large portion of the European public. 

A new survey of eight EU countries released this week by the Pew Global Attitudes project found that majorities or near-majorities in most countries now believe that the economic integration of Europe has actually weakened their economies. This is the opinion in Greece (70%), France (63%), Britain (61%), Italy (61%), the Czech Republic (59%) and Spain (50%). Only in Germany (59%) do most people say that their country has been well served by European integration. 

Moreover, since 2009, belief that economic integration has weakened their national economy has grown by 22 percentage points in the Czech Republic, 20 points in Italy and 18 points in Spain. 

Who are these disaffected Europeans? The survey of more than 8,000 conducted between mid-March and mid-April 2012 found that women in Germany, Spain and the Czech Republic are more likely than men to say integration has been bad for the local economy. Moreover, by a large margin, less-educated people in France, Germany, Spain and the Czech Republic say integration has weakened their economy. In Spain, where roughly half the younger population is jobless, it is people 18 to 29 years old who are more likely than people 30 years of age and older to say integration has worsened the economy. In the Czech Republic, it is older people who hold such critical views. 

The downsides of membership

Doubts about European integration have led many Europeans to second-guess their own country’s EU membership. Germans (65%) are by far the most likely to say membership is a good thing for their country. Only about half of those surveyed hold that view in Spain (54%), France (48%), and Poland 48%. And in Greece just 43% still say membership is positive. The British are almost equally divided. A plurality of the Czechs say that the EU has been neither a good nor a bad thing for their country. Most ominously, since 2009, positive sentiment about EU membership is down 17 points in the Czech Republic, 15 points in Poland and 13 points in Spain. 

Among the five eurozone nations surveyed, a median of only 37% believes having the euro as their currency has been a good thing. This includes just 30% of the Italians and 31% of the French. At the same time, the three non-eurozone countries surveyed are quite happy that they have kept their own currencies, including nearly three-quarters of the British (73%). 

A glimmer of good news

Possibly the only good news in this survey is that those who now use the euro want to keep it, including 71% of the Greeks, 69% of the French and 66% of the Germans. 

But the findings from multiple questions that have now been asked of the European public over several years are unequivocal. The deepening European economic crisis is undermining the foundation of European unity. The stakes in resolving the euro crisis are far larger than many may have been first appreciated.