"Any euro zone failure would send
shock waves around the globe, shifting the balance of geopolitical power and
perhaps prompting a fundamental reassessment of what the world's future might
look like.
EU sources told Reuters that officials of France and Germany, since the 1950s the driving forces of European integration, had held discussions on a two-speed Europe with a smaller, more tightly integrated euro zone and a looser outer circle.
Estimates of how likely the currency bloc is to break up, how damaging it might be and what might remain afterwards vary wildly. But with European leaders still struggling to find a credible response to the crisis, the prospect of one or more countries leaving -- and effectively defaulting on their sovereign debt as they do so - is seen rising by the day.
Suddenly, pundits, policymakers and other observers find themselves questioning one of their most fundamental assumptions -- that an increasingly united Europe would be a key player in a newly multipolar world.
"You already have one of the great pillars of globalisation, the United States, entering a period of difficulty and looking inward," said Thomas Barnett, US-based chief strategist of political risk consultancy Wikistrat -- which is being asked by several private clients to urgently model scenarios. "Now one of the other pillars, Europe, looks about to implode."
That, he said, could leave the continent's powers -- who only a handful of years ago made up much of the G7 group of largest economies -- increasingly sidelined as China, India, Brazil and others rose.
At the very least, analysts say, the world may have to get used to a Europe that has lost much of its confidence and has much less appetite for international engagement.
Coming after so many meetings not just of European leaders but also the G20, it would also leave the reputation of existing global governance systems and a generation of political and economic elites in tatters. Some of the damage may already be largely irreversible.
"Even if by some magic the crisis were to be over tomorrow, the other strategic actors in the world are already beginning to revise their views of Europe," said Thomas Kleine-Brokhoff, a strategy expert at Europe-facing Washington DC think tank the George Marshall Foundation of the United States. "Any consensus that Europe was simply and certainly on the path to integrate further and become a unitary actor is gone."
That raises interesting questions for other areas of the world, where many had often expected regional blocs would gradually in time form EU-like entities and move to closer integration.
"Europe was supposed to be the model for others to follow," said Nikolas Gvosdev, professor of national security studies at the US Naval War College. "That's going to be questioned."
DECLINE OF THE WEST?
For some, any unravelling of the euro zone -- whether or not it brings with it a collapse of the wider EU -- would be seen as yet another sign of much faster than expected western decline.
"For India, China and many of the other new powers, they don't see simply a crisis of the euro zone," said Kleine-Brokhoff at the George Marshall Foundation of the United States. "They see a crisis of the rich world and it makes them even more confident that their time has come."..."
at http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/11/10/uk-eurozone-breakup-geopolitics-idUKTRE7A932M20111110
EU sources told Reuters that officials of France and Germany, since the 1950s the driving forces of European integration, had held discussions on a two-speed Europe with a smaller, more tightly integrated euro zone and a looser outer circle.
Estimates of how likely the currency bloc is to break up, how damaging it might be and what might remain afterwards vary wildly. But with European leaders still struggling to find a credible response to the crisis, the prospect of one or more countries leaving -- and effectively defaulting on their sovereign debt as they do so - is seen rising by the day.
Suddenly, pundits, policymakers and other observers find themselves questioning one of their most fundamental assumptions -- that an increasingly united Europe would be a key player in a newly multipolar world.
"You already have one of the great pillars of globalisation, the United States, entering a period of difficulty and looking inward," said Thomas Barnett, US-based chief strategist of political risk consultancy Wikistrat -- which is being asked by several private clients to urgently model scenarios. "Now one of the other pillars, Europe, looks about to implode."
That, he said, could leave the continent's powers -- who only a handful of years ago made up much of the G7 group of largest economies -- increasingly sidelined as China, India, Brazil and others rose.
At the very least, analysts say, the world may have to get used to a Europe that has lost much of its confidence and has much less appetite for international engagement.
Coming after so many meetings not just of European leaders but also the G20, it would also leave the reputation of existing global governance systems and a generation of political and economic elites in tatters. Some of the damage may already be largely irreversible.
"Even if by some magic the crisis were to be over tomorrow, the other strategic actors in the world are already beginning to revise their views of Europe," said Thomas Kleine-Brokhoff, a strategy expert at Europe-facing Washington DC think tank the George Marshall Foundation of the United States. "Any consensus that Europe was simply and certainly on the path to integrate further and become a unitary actor is gone."
That raises interesting questions for other areas of the world, where many had often expected regional blocs would gradually in time form EU-like entities and move to closer integration.
"Europe was supposed to be the model for others to follow," said Nikolas Gvosdev, professor of national security studies at the US Naval War College. "That's going to be questioned."
DECLINE OF THE WEST?
For some, any unravelling of the euro zone -- whether or not it brings with it a collapse of the wider EU -- would be seen as yet another sign of much faster than expected western decline.
"For India, China and many of the other new powers, they don't see simply a crisis of the euro zone," said Kleine-Brokhoff at the George Marshall Foundation of the United States. "They see a crisis of the rich world and it makes them even more confident that their time has come."..."
at http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/11/10/uk-eurozone-breakup-geopolitics-idUKTRE7A932M20111110
