James Carden, currently a contributing writer for The Nation and former advisor to the State Department, published a call for American policymakers to stop listening to neoconservative claptrap about a supposed rise in “authoritarianism” in Europe coming from pundits such as Anne Applebaum. Carden argues in his Oct. 5 article, published in the American Conservative under the above title, that instead, what is happening is that “the nation-state is making a comeback” in Europe, and that is good for the United States.
“The renewal of national sovereignty on the continent” was well under way before the European Union failed to respond equitably to the coronavirus, he writes. That failure, however, ensures that “the EU may become one of the pandemic’s most prominent victims.” He argues, in gist:
“What we are currently witnessing in Europe is really more of a revival of Gaullism than a revival of authoritarianism, as pundits like Applebaum would have us believe. Mistaking Gaullism for authoritarianism will only midwife bad policy….
“No doubt part of the reason for the alarm expressed by neoconservative critics such as Applebaum is that the more Gaullist Europe becomes, the more conducive it will be for better relations with Russia. This is what the bipartisan American foreign policy establishment fears most…. But U.S. interests would certainly benefit from a Europe at peace with itself, and a Europe unable to coexist with Russia is likely to suffer from a surfeit of economic and political instability….
