A Vision for Europe 2020: Nothing But an Alternative
About this ebook
This 2020 Edition features contributions by Kate Aronoff, Bill McKibben, Evgeny Morozov, Jerome Roos, and more.
The European Union was an exceptional achievement. It brought together and in peace peoples speaking different languages and submersed in different cultures, proving that it was possible to create a shared framework of human rights across a continent that was not long ago tormented by murderous chauvinism, racism, and barbarity. It could have been the proverbial Beacon on the Hill, showing the world how peace and solidarity may be snatched from the jaws of age-old conflict and bigotry.
But things turned out differently. Today, a common bureaucracy and a common currency divide Europeans who were beginning to unite despite their different languages and cultures. A confederacy of myopic politicians, economically naïve officials, and financially incompetent ‘experts’ submit slavishly to the edicts of financial and industrial conglomerates, alienating people and stirring up a dangerous anti-European backlash. Proud peoples are being turned against each other. Nationalism, extremism and racism are being re-awakened.
With contributions from some of the world’s foremost thinkers, artists and politicians covering the full spectrum of concerns for the future of the Union, this volume presents realistic and viable alternatives to the mainstream barrage of dreadful prospects - a true vision for Europe.
About the author
Yanis Varoufakis is co-founder of the Democracy in Europe Movement (DiEM25). In January 2015, he was elected to Greece’s Parliament with the largest majority in the country, and served as Greece’s Finance Minister until July 2015. He is a Professor of Economics at the University of Athens, and the author of a number of best-selling books, including Adults in the Room, And the Weak Suffer What They Must?, and Talking to My Daughter About the Economy.
Rosemary Bechler is an editor of openDemocracy, including its European section Can Europe Make It? She is on the coordinating collective of DiEM25.
David Adler is the DiEM25 policy coordinator. Previously, he was a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford and a Fulbright Scholar at the Colegio de México. His research and writing have been featured in the New York Times, the Guardian, and the Washington Post, among others.
