Europe is in an unprecedented state of flux. After decades of virtual inanition, the continent is being convulsed by a ferment of change and conflict; the overused cliché “seismic” is, for once, appropriate. This turbulence might not be instantly discernible to a visitor travelling across Europe: the public institutions of government appear to be functioning normally; there is little overt sign of upheaval; at the Berlaymont building in Brussels it looks like business as usual. Yet a traveller in Europe might have registered the same deceptive perceptions in June, 1914.
Western politicians are promoting fictions in the face of an economic reckoning
Is the voters’ choice to be either left wing chaos or right wing chaos?