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The writer is co-chief executive of the Itinera Institute, a Brussels-based think-tank, and the author of ‘Superpower Europe: The European Union’s Silent Revolution’
The EU faces the challenge of a new world order. May 9 marked its official “Europe day” — a celebration of peace and unity that is a stark contrast to the world beyond. Europe sits strategically alone: Russia is an enemy, China an adversary as well as partner, and Donald Trump’s US a threat or liability.
The bloc essentially has three major options. One: do an America in Europe geopolitically. That means developing what is needed to project European power, tying third countries to a Pax Europeana built upon a big market with integrated technological and security capacities, eventually flanked by a refashioned Nato.
To get there, Europe would have to do a China economically: rebuilding a strong industrial and technology base. It would then not only dominate its Eurasian theatre but an adversarial Russia, while achieving a degree of geopolitical independence in the wider world.
The second option is to buckle down on positioning the EU as the last bastion of globalisation. It would follow in the footsteps of the US under Joe Biden’s administration, engaging with like-minded countries while shielding strategic industries with a high fence of protectionism.
This strategy would eventually involve either China or the US as a security backstop. However, as long as Trumpism means US indifference or worse, the EU may have to consider doing its own “reverse Kissinger”: offering Beijing an off-ramp in its trade war with Washington on the condition of neutering its partnership with Moscow. Europe’s position vis-à-vis Russia would then be one of limited trade and diplomatic normalisation rather than of adversarial dominance.
The third option is for the EU to continue playing second fiddle to the US. In the short run this would mean re-establishing the bloc as a strategic asset for an America First agenda: striking a US-friendly trade deal with Trump, paying the bills for stability in Ukraine while enabling US business interests in reconstruction and mining, and toeing the US line on China.
In return, Europe would benefit from minimal US security guarantees while remaining integrated in American-led technology and financial markets. In the medium term, provided the US becomes less isolationist while maintaining its rivalry with China, a deeper partnership might yet re-emerge, reflecting both geoeconomic realities and a mutual need for burden-sharing in the new world order.
Which of these options is the EU currently taking? The short answer: all of the above at the same time. It is developing common capacity for defence and security while pursuing industrial policies. It continues to promote international trade, including EU-China trade with more Chinese production in Europe. It courts US protection, not least in relation to Ukraine, while exploring the art of a trade deal with Trump.
This shows remarkable political creativity. But Europe is not cleverly hedging its bets in a world of growing disorder. Instead, it is clinging to a status quo ante while only being capable of piecemeal reactions to external shocks.
If Europe cannot become proactive and strategic, the geopolitical cross-currents will eventually divide it politically and marginalise it geopolitically. European nations face the challenge of a new world order as a matter of necessity, not of choice. Either they succeed in channelling a response through the EU, or countries’ individual responses will gradually sideline the bloc. The emergence of ad hoc “coalition[s] of the willing” is a benign harbinger of what could become an existential threat.
If Europe is again to become the master of its own fate, setting its geopolitical compass should be straightforward. Keeping Russia in check on our own requires significant hard-power capacity and autonomy vis-à-vis the US, as well as sufficient economic independence from China. The latter guarantees that Europe will be able to explore a transatlantic reset with a post-Trump US, a scenario that would be undermined by deepening trade relations with China in the short run.
European nations have to become conscious that the “European project” is now a hard-power project that needs a geostrategic footprint beyond its current boundaries. We have been here before. In the early 1950s, postwar Europe tried and failed to institutionalise political and defence co-operation. Back then, it was America’s protection and a European economic community that enabled peace and prosperity. Today, we are fending for ourselves. With economic development subservient to geopolitics, failure is simply not an option.
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