Europe Needs a New Identity

Theory and practice diverge sharply. Europeans claim to have given up their old national identities, but have they really? by Fareed Zakaria

1. France has a work problem. The country has the shortest number of hours worked per capita in the entire industrialized world.

2. This cocktail of unemployment, underemployment and stagnation is not an Arab problem, it's a French problem.

3. France's current crisis is (...) a problem of national identity

4. European countries speak of postreligious, postnational identities, but at heart they remain countries where identity is defined by family, community and territory.

5. These "foreigners" are citizens; they have to be integrated. In fact, for Europe to prosper it needs more immigrants. Europe's economies are not quite as sclerotic as people imagine. The biggest cause of its lower growth rate is a lack of immigration.

6. But if immigration ineluctably causes social chaos, Europe is doomed.

What is the solution? Is it is a Frenchman's nightmare—Americanization? In some ways, yes. France and other European countries need to move closer to a national identity based on ideas and values. And they need to take active measures—like affirmative action—to integrate their new minorities. Without affirmative action (in schools, colleges, business, the armed forces), America would not have the sizable black middle class that it does today, which is the most effective balm to the problem of race relations.

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