Philip Bobbitt: Britain should be leading Europe, not leaving it to flounder

In 1963 President de Gaulle explained why he had decided to reject the British application to join the European Community: “England, in effect, is insular. She is maritime. She is linked through her trade, her markets, her supply lines to the most distant countries … She has, in all her doings, very marked and very original habits and traditions. In short, England’s nature, England’s structure, England’s very situation differs profoundly from those of the Continentals.”

These were profound half-truths. At least since Queen Elizabeth I, Britain’s strategic policy had been directed towards Europe and the objective of preventing any one great power from dominating the continent. Indeed it was Britain’s global links that enabled her to do so. But while Britain’s judgment of the threats it faced from the continent has often been forward-looking and imaginative, its appreciation of its own successes has lagged behind the reality it is been so influential in bringing about.

Thus there persists a mistaken belief that there is a “real EU” with monetary integration and borderless labour markets at its core, impelled by an irresistible inertia towards greater political integration. In fact, that vision of the European Union is dead, very largely buried by the passive aggression of Britain and the counterexample it represents. The European Union that has survived is a much more promising constitutional arrangement than anything envisioned by founders Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman and Paul-Henri Spaak and has greater scope for pluralism and innovation.

Not only has the UK euthanised the super-nation state sought by the traumatised generation of the Second World War, it is well positioned to lead the new EU. It has the confidence and the backing of the greater number of European states now that the union has increased its membership to include states wary of a Franco-German condominium. It is also a world leader in credit and finance, the paramount global “industry”.

Modesty and self-deprecation are attractive traits but for some time now Britain has resolutely refused to recognise the stunning success of its diplomacy. It is the closest military ally of the world’s greatest military power and can seamlessly augment its relatively small armed forces with the ability to project power anywhere in the world. At the same time it has emerged as an economic leader in the world’s largest economic single market. Sometimes power is defined as getting one’s way. Perhaps a better definition might be: getting others to act on your behalf.

The European Union does have a very serious structural problem and no one has diagnosed it better than the former governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King. Some EU economies are running large and persistent current account surpluses while others seem stuck in significant deficits. This shifts capital away from those states with abundant labour and has brought about the crisis, of which Greece’s recent troubles are one example.

But this problem has not infected the UK, and its continued membership in the EU does not entail adding to the contagion. Nor will the problem of these striking imbalances, lashed to a disjunction between monetary and fiscal policy, be made better if the UK leaves the EU. Europe’s best hope is for a devolution of monetary policy, of which the UK is the most successful example. A change in the membership of the eurozone, which has been so ardently resisted, is probably the best of a set of unpalatable options; Britain’s example — within the EU — makes this option less frightening.