Why Europe Must Learn the Language of Power
I'm just back from another stimulating Digital Life Design (DLD) conference in Munich where all the talk was about the growing technological and political gap with the United States and China. From Machiavelli and Hobbes to Napoleon and Bismarck, Europe invented the modern concept of state power. But decades of outsourcing security to NATO and the US have left the continent dangerously rusty both in the language and execution of power. According to Marta Mucznik, a senior analyst at the Brussels-based left-leaning International Crisis Group, "projecting power is the language of today's world." And unless European politicians relearn it, Mucznik warns, that growing gap between Europe and the bipolar reality of a US-China centric world will only continue to dramatically widen.
Keen On America is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
Episode 2524: Martin Wolf on whether Trump's tariffs are as dumb as they seem
Episode 2522: Edmund Fawcett on Trump as a Third Way between Liberalism and Conservatism
Episode 2521: Michael Stein on the Real Lives of the American Working Class
Episode 2520: Larry Aldrich on what's Right with America
Episode 2519: Is Criticism of Israel, by definition, Anti-Semitic?
Episode 2518: 100 Days or 100 Years?
Episode 2517: Soli Ozel on the Light at the End of the Authoritarian Tunnel
Episode 2516: Jason Pack on the Trumpian Post-Apocalypse
Episode 2515: David A. Graham on how Project 2025 is Reshaping America
Episode 2514: How to turn America into a Waymo Democracy
Episode 2513: Adam Hochschild on how American History is Repeating itself, first as Tragedy, then as Trump
Episode 2512: Adam Becker on AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley's Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity
Episode 2511: Jemima Kelly on why she hasn't quite given up on America