Clémentine Autain on the EU-US trade agreement: "The so-called defenders of Europe are in reality its gravediggers"
The observation is tragic, and it is echoed across the political spectrum: the European Union (EU) has capitulated to Trump's United States. Unable to protect us, [European Commission President] Ursula von der Leyen lay down without even giving a fight. Yes, a fight had to be fought, and it still must be fought. But which one? The one of protectionism mirroring Trump's? Or the one of a profound change in our conception of the economy and trade? Getting the path right is the key to pushing back the devastating logic of the market and the neo-fascist international.
By signing the agreement on July 27, the EU offered a golden bridge to the United States, to the detriment and contempt of the European people. It failed to capitalize on its strengths in the face of the return of imperialist predation. It failed to imagine a path other than that of unbridled capitalism. The result is sinister: customs duties have tripled while investment commitments across the Atlantic are worth hundreds of billions of dollars. With a climate bomb: the purchase of shale gas for $750 billion. And an expected consequence in Europe: even more budgetary austerity. Even mainstream thinking is choking.
The Prime Minister lamented "a dark day." As if he were merely a commentator. As if he could not make another voice heard for France. In the meantime, we are paying the steep, very steep price for a European construction based on market logic and circumventing popular sovereignty. This European construction so dear to François Bayrou, Emmanuel Macron, and their friends. They who also so promoted NATO, and with it our dependence on the United States in matters of defense, making us so nervous in negotiations today.
These so-called defenders of Europe are in reality its gravediggers, and they are struggling to come up with the slightest strategy for the future. They are nothing more than the lackeys of a globalized oligarchy that crushes public power, commodifies everything, and despises the working classes and democracy. And when the neo-fascist international advances with its so-called freedom slung over its shoulders, which is only that of the markets and the dominant, our leaders turn into stupid and dangerous teddy bears. They do not see the scale of the transformation that must be produced to resist it.
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Today, there is no shortage of voices, even among those committed to neoliberal norms, deploring the carnage of this completely asymmetrical agreement and advocating for retaliation. Faced with a lawless plunderer like Trump, there is no doubt: we must stand our ground and gain independence. Europe has no reason to be submissive. It has solid advantages over the United States, which is highly dependent on the European market. It would have been enough to act by increasing regulations and customs duties, particularly by taxing the GAFAM (Big Four) companies, to produce results as quickly as possible. But this basic defensive attitude does not constitute a political project, either for ourselves or for the world. Defending ourselves from external commercial aggression does not say what other form of commercial, and therefore social and environmental, organization we want.
Yes, we need to chart a completely different path. European and/or French preference over "Make America Great Again"? Or the way out of the economic jungle and the great global relocation? It's one thing to protect ourselves; it's another to plunge into the game of powers that defend their interests against those of others. Responding to the law of the strongest, yes, obviously. Diving into trade war and promoting the opposition of the interests of peoples and workers based on their national affiliation, no. Because the latter have a common enemy: the capitalist oligarchy, which wants to lower employment conditions everywhere and prefers its consumerism to our ecosystem and our desires. And from trade war to war, pure and simple, there can be very few steps.
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