By Adrian Wooldridge
Europe has gone through many eras in its turbulent history: the age of discovery, the age of enlightenment, the age of expansion, the age of destruction and the age of unification. Now he is entering a new era: that of humility.
Europe's dispute with Donald Trump over whether the U.S. can forcibly buy Greenland from Denmark may be surreal, but it fits into a broader pattern. The US (or China) is acting. Europe responds. The US (or China) is moving decisively. The EU is debating and hesitating. This week, Europe's elite reached a frenzy over Trump's threats to use force or tariffs to gain control of Greenland, until Trump finally made a 180-degree U-turn and claimed to have struck a deal with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, a deal that, in effect, has been on the table for quite some time. The storm has now passed, until Trump turns his attention to something else – or decides that the Greenland deal is a sham – and Europe must once again respond to external challenges.
From the 15th century onwards, Europe was the main power in the history of mankind – sometimes for good (the Renaissance and the liberal ideal), sometimes for evil (Nazism and communism), but always with consequences that changed the world. Europeans invented the defining technologies of the modern era, from the printing press to the locomotive, as well as the defining political ideas.
Europeans imposed their will on the rest of the world through imperialism and colonialism, exporting more than 60 million people from 1600 to 1950 and filling the planet with areas such as New Spain, New England, New France, New Caledonia, New Amsterdam. Two-thirds of the current members of the United Nations belonged to European empires at some stage in their history.
However, despite gunboat diplomacy, Europe triumphed with both attraction and coercion. The colonies adopted European (mostly British) sports such as golf, tennis, cricket and football. Atatürk ordered the Turks to abandon the fez and adopt the European-style hat. Jawaharlal Nehru shaped the parliament of the newly formed independent India on the model of the British one, even in the detail of having a Speaker of the Parliament.
Europe was almost destroyed by the two most devastating wars in modern history – wars that began in the heart of Europe but spread around the world. However, when things calmed down, Europe remained at the center of the great conflict between capitalism and communism. Europe also embarked on a form of "self-cleansing" that marked history, creating a new kind of politics and a new kind of society: a post-national state and a mixed economy that provided all its citizens with generous benefits and holidays. In 2005, Mark Leonard summed up the euphoria that prevailed after the creation of the euro in his book "Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century".
That is now over: Europeans are now clearly recipients of history, not creators of it. The protagonist of international affairs for five centuries has been reduced to a mere spectator, a key driving force of historical change that has now turned into a pot.
European leaders belatedly realized the magnitude of their weakness. The Eurocrats argue that they need to earn a seat at the table to avoid being put on the menu. Emmanuel Macron worries that Europe must be reformed, or it will die. In a scathing report in 2024, Mario Draghi, former head of the European Central Bank, said that, without radical changes, we will inevitably have less prosperity, less equality, less security "and, as a result, [we will] be less free to choose our destiny." But the truth is that the opportunities for bold reforms may already have been lost.
Europe's political leadership is either indifferent (Friedrich Merz) or exhausted (Macron) or both (Keir Starmer). The last leader who had any chance of pushing through major reforms, Angela Merkel, squandered her 16 years in power following one of the most misguided policies of decades – importing cheap energy from Russia in order to sell industrial products, especially machine tools, to China. Today politics is paralyzed: the European Commission relies on a zombie bureaucracy, the center is fragmented and the populist right is gaining ground, with France's National Rally garnering about 33 percent in the polls and the even more hardline Alternative for Germany garnering 25 percent.
Europe's share of world GDP has shrunk from more than 30% in 1995 to less than 20% today. Only four of the world's top 50 tech companies are European – and the chances of that changing are slim: From 2008 to 2021, nearly 30% of European "unicorns" (startups worth more than $1 billion) moved their headquarters overseas, the vast majority of them to the US. Even the traditional industries that dominate the European economy and research and development (R&D) funding are suffering: European electricity prices are two to three times higher than those in the US and China, and a new generation of cheap Chinese electric vehicles is poised to destroy Europe's largest manufacturing industry, the automotive industry.
Economic stagnation undermines Europe's two remaining assets that made it history: its standard of living and its intellectual power. On a per capita basis, real disposable income has almost doubled in the US since 2000 compared to the EU. The QS World University Rankings for 2026 places only five European universities in the top 30, of which four are in England.
Europe has made big bets that have failed miserably. He bet on the benevolent nature of both Russia and China. Both turned out to be malicious. He bet on free movement – and then doubled the bet in 2016, when Angela Merkel welcomed in nearly 300,000 Syrian refugees. However, the combination of high immigration and free movement led Britons to leave the European Union – marking the first shrinkage of the Union since its inception – and fuelled the rise of populism.
Europe's bet that the U.S. will be willing to cover about two-thirds of NATO's costs by the end of the world is beginning to crumble. European politicians were unusually bold in criticizing Trump in Davos this week. Macron warned of a "new colonial approach". The Prime Minister of Belgium, Bart De Wever, urged Europeans to defend their "self-esteem". But what could Europe have done if Trump hadn't made the 180-degree turn? Could harsh words really be turned into cruel deeds? Europeans have more to lose from the collapse of NATO than America does, just as they have more to lose from a tariff war.
Europe's other big bet, regarding the viability of the free market, is also going downhill. The European economy is the most open in the world – trade's contribution to GDP exceeds 50%, compared to 37% in China and 27% in the US. It is also the most exposed to international adversity: Europe obtains about 40% of its imports from a handful of suppliers; about half of these imports come from potentially hostile countries (and that doesn't include the US). With protectionism on the rise, mercantilism all the rage, Trump brandishing the axe of tariffs, and conflicts erupting everywhere, Europe is terribly exposed.
All of these bets were driven by a desire for the easiest choice. Europeans usually either argue that there are no difficult compromises (between ecology and development, for example) or postpone difficult decisions (such as defense funding) to an indefinite future. No one is more hated in the EU than Boris Johnson. But Johnson's motto "have both the cake and the eat it" defines Europe's weakness.
The marginalization of Europe is a tragedy. Europe is adopting a set of principles – global cooperation, liberal universalism and calm decision-making – that the world desperately needs. However, Europe has caused its own tragedy by underinvesting in "hard power" and allowing generous sentiment to crush dynamism in the economy. The chances of a continent of small politicians miraculously producing a new generation of De Gaulle or Churchill are slim.
Historian A.J.P. Taylor once said that Europe had created more history than it could consume and, therefore, was forced to export it abroad. Today, Europe seems doomed to create less history than it can consume and watch, inactive, as more dynamic countries shape the future.
Adaptation – Editing: Lydia Roubopoulou
