Europe- A Macro-Historical Overview

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tUR0Pt: A MACR0-HIST0RICAL 0VERVItr , , l

by Johan Galtung

Center of Internat ional StudiesPrinceton UniversityPr inceton, New Jersey O8544

June 1987


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To explore macro-furopean dynamics today a glimpse ofhistory is indispensaLr le. For this pufpose one might dividethe macro-European region, roLrghly speakinq Europe and thecoastal states of the Mediterranean into four parts, by draw-1ng two 1ines. 0ne of the l ines coincir les wi th the Alpsand thei. r cont inuat ion in the carpathians; i t miqhL also becont inued towards the west, cut t inq through France, perhapsending with the Pyrenees. And it may be arqued that 0ccitanieis to the south of the l ine" The other l ine runs from northto south, fol lowinS the l inguist ic border between the Slavonicand Germanic speaking people, down to the Adriat ic, butplacing in the Eastern part of Europe the Hungar ians and theRumanians, the Albanians. and the Greeks and the Turks. The"pure" East would be orthodox, and even use cyr i l t ic let ters.I t is not , however, so important to def ine t .he l ines in veryprecise terms since the conceptual tools to be used are on,Lvrough ideas about a dist inct . ion between nor thern and southernfurope on the one hand, correspondinq t-o the otd dist inct ionbetween cis-alpjna and tr .ans-alplnar and anybody's intuit ivenot ion of dist inct ion between wesLern and eastern Eurooe,

What is important , however, is that t .his concept ion ofsouthern Europe, could also inc lude west Asian and NorthAfr lcan coastaf states, composing the MecJiterranean reqioqwhen we include the Arab stat .es border ing on the Medit -erraneanand Palest ine/1srae1. Maybe this leads to somet.hing r ike 25countr ies, i t is not so important to know. In extension


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fol lows, however, we shal l st ick tocept ion of Europe.

the Roman empire at i tseastetn outposLs; enclosing

sea i tself . In whata more convent. iona. l- con-

The problem to be discussed can now be phrased using theconcept of power.-gradient : given the two axes, where are thehighs and lows of power in var ious phases of, history? Weshall then dist inguish between three types of power: mil i tarypower ult imately def ined as "who controls, / invades whqm";economic power ult imately def ined as "who exploits whom"(whether i t is through simple robbery or the more intr icaLepract ices of investment in capital goods and transfer ofsurplus character iz ing industr ial capit .al ism, or correspondingpract ices in mercant i le capital ism); ancJ cultural power roughlydef ined as "who forms ( shapes ) whom". Needless to saY r theseforms of power are related and have al l k inds of spi l l -overef fects from one int-o the other" They are, in fact , the threeclassical types of, power: the st ick, the carrot and the idea;coerciver remunerat ive and normat ive power, 0n top o f t .histhere is a lso poli t icaf power, the power to decide which typeto use, or which mix of power types.

i t would not be too dif ferent f romheyday except for i ts northern andthe mare nostrum, the Mediterranean

There ispower in the

no doubt that the Roman empire puL the center ofsouth. They invaded the north, they exploited the


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north and they shaped Lhe north-- the Iat ter so much so thateven in this century the concept of being a person wiLh culture,with Bi ldunq, is related to internal izat- ion of souLhern culture,for instance knowledqe of Lat in and Greek, in other wordssouthern languaqes, today not even spoken in the region. No-body in the south der ives cultural prest i13e from speakingNorwegian; in facL not even f rom Engl ish and German that areseen as more instrumental languages. Moreover, the powercenter was in the west rather l -han in Lhe east by the mere fact-that Rome was located in that part . But that part col lapsedin the f i f th century, and af ter that there was a transfer ofpower from south-west to south-east t i l l the Arabs equalized the South

The Middle Ages can perhaps be seen as a per iod in whichthe power distr ibut ion between the four parts of the regionwe are discussinq became more symmetr ic, with the except ionof the clear cultural power emanat ing f rom Rome, now in theform of the Cathol ic Church. I t was only with the advent ofProtestant ism that a cert .ain symmetry in cultural- power wasobtained, with stronq islands of ProLestant ism establ ished inthe Cathol ic sea, and afmost unchanging borders for the lastthree hundred years or so. The economic counter-parL in-cluded the Hanseat ic League that--of course--star ted muchear l ier ( l l th century ) . Gradual I y the Northwest was to emerqeas the power center i t st i l l is.


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It may perhaps be said that Protestant ism qave a morec lear expression to some basic i l-ems of western socialcosmology inher ited from Greek ant iquity: a strong accent onindiv idual ism and compet it ion, expansion in space and a highlydramat, ic concept" ion of t ime. Life was perhaps safer, moreprot .ect .ed, more col lect ive under cathol ic ism than it becameunder Protestant ism, af ter the Reformat ion, although t-hedif ference should noL be exagqerated" At the same Limemercant i le capital ism was so successful in the North t .hatlarge*sca1e capital accumulat ion started t .aking place.

A11 of this contr ibuted to the industr ial revolut ion in thenorthwestern corner of t -he reqion, probably based on acombinat ion ol capital accumulat ion (that actual ly der ivedfrom Spanish conquista capital used to br. ly goods) used forinvestment- in capital goods, not only for buyinq merchandise,and the clear expression of ind iv idual iz ing western cosmologyfound in var iotrs types of Prot-estant thinkinq, afso expressedin the Magna Cart-a/Glor ious Revolut ion syndrome in Enqlandand the French Revolut" ion in France" Alone none of thesefactors would have made i t . Together they probably accountto a large extent- for the r ise ol modern capital ism in thenort-hwestern corner of furoDe and with that the relat ivesvmmetrv of the Middle Aces come t-o an end. The rest ofEurope had the more hierarchical, and afso more col lect iv ist ,Cathol ic and 0rthodox t radit . ions, less individual iz inq and"entrepreneur ial-", not only economical ly, but also rel igiously.


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I n short : the power-center shi f ted towards the North andi t shif ted towards the west-- later on to proceed to the Farwest, the united states. And thus i t became a h ighly lopsidedregion with pol i t icar/ni l i tary, economic and cultural gradientsrunning from west to east , and from north to south. I t wasthe swedes, the French and the Germans that invaded the s1avs,not the other way round. i t was they who had command overthe trade bet-ween west and east, not the other way round, Andit was they who, part icular ly s ince the t imes of peter theGreat, star ted shaping the east, not the oi-her way round. Andsimilar ly for the no r th/ south gradient : the trade patternquickly became industr ial goods from the north against foodstuf fsetc. f rom the south, af ter the Brit ish, the Low countr ies and theHanseat ic League had created a balance relat ive to the tradi_t ional t rading super ior i ty of the I tal ian city-states thatcorresponded to the Protestant rel igious counterbalance tocathol ic ism, responsible for much of the capital accumulat ion.0f course, the north also invaded the south, an ear ly examplebeing northern Ftance relat ive to southern France. Later camethe establ ishment of the colonies, mainly by Lhe French andthe Brit ish on t.he southern and eastern Mediterranean sea-board.

Actua11y, an image of concentr ic circ les is more adequatethan the four boxes for Lhis per iod" There is a f irst c irc le,a center in t -he north-west, inc ludins us/canacla, a secondeircle consist ing of the souLh-west, the south-east ancJ the


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north-east ; and then a third circ le of the eastern andsouthern Mediterranean seaboard ult imately to be extendedthrough colonia l ism al l over the world.

The 0ttoman empire enters the picture as a barr ier and amenace that lasted al-most. f ive hundred years but. was restr ictedto Lhe southeastern corner. Af ter i ts breakdown i tsfuncLion became more clear: as a bulwark "gainst northwesternpenetrat ion which immediately took place, pol i t icaTTy/ni l i tar i ly,economical ly, cultural ly when the 0t toman empire col lapsed.This also has to do with t .he soviet union and i ts hegemonialposiLion relat ive to most of eastern f urope: nort-hwesterneconomic and cultural penetrat ion would probablv have beeneven more pronounced had it not been ior the poli t ical/ni l i tarybaLance created after the second wor ld war. In fact , I wouldsee the whole qamut of NE, sE and sw revolut ionafy populismbeLween Lhe world wars, f rom Lenin/stal in via East-souLheastEuropean dictators (pi lsudski, Antonescu) and Kemal AtatUrk toMussolini, Franco and salazar as the second circle Lrvino tor ise against the f irst " Pei ta in could also be seen in t-his f ight .Af ter al l , V ichy is rocat-ed far south of par is.

In this Paper we are concerned both with the east--west. andthe north-south axCs. They are both important in any under*standing of Europe. The east-west axis prevai ls s ince theEast has mil i tary power, the South not. But i t is importanLto start thinking not only in terms of contradict ions and con-


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f l icts a lonq the west-east gradient , but also alonS the north-south gradient , pitLing northern furope noL only againstsouthern Europe, but against more of the south, the Mediter-ranean region as such. Thinking should not 1"9 too much be-hind real i ty. And real i ty today is that . the northwesterncorner once more is penetrat ing into the South, using theEuropean Community as i ts instrument, probably wit .h a secondupr is ing in the coming.

Concretely the contemporary povler-gradient has forms thatate well known to anV observer of current wor ld af fairs. Thusthe mil l tary pol i t ica l headquarters of the wor ld are in thenort .h: Washington and Moscow to ment ion the super-powers,NAT0 (ln Brussefs) and the Warsaw Treaty 0rganizat ion (wr0) toment ion the al l iances. I t is they who use the Mediterraneanfor the deployment of their ships, not the south that usesthe northern waters for the deplovment of l theirs" The blocksystem meets at t imes in a network of eonferences in the northwith the super-powers and al l iances meet ing each other; thereis very l i t t le contact of a pol i t ical ly/ni1itar i ly meaningfulkind beLween their more per ipheral members in the south. fcon-omical ly the headquarters are al l in the north: New York forthe American Economy, Brussels for the European Community,Moscow for the CMEA system. This is where decis- ions are takenreqardinq the south, not v ice versa. The economies of thesouth are shaped by the demands from the north, noL vice versa.


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WiLh the integrat ion of Portugal, Spain from Southwest and Greece( later Turkey) from Southeast into the Iuropean Community the break-away Lendencies of a more or fess fascist tvpe wi l l have Deenreversed--at least for a whi1e. The inter-European currencyis the do11ar, and the inter- furopean t ingo fngl ish--with theInternat ional Herald Tr ibune the closest there is to a Euro-pean newspaper.

Then, the third eirc le Aqain, we could do t .he same ex-ercise and div ide Lhe world in four parts, with a f irst . wor ldof r ich capital countr ies, a second worfd of not-so-r ichsoc ia l is t countr ies, a third wor ld of very poor. mainly capital istcountr ies and then a fourth world. the world SE corner of Eastand Southeast Asian countr ies headed by Japan. But we do notneed that much specif ic i ty. Suff ice it Lo say that the f irstcountry to get into the wor ld capital ist market f rom t"he thirdcirc le, Japan, already is second to none in very many f ieldsand that there are ot.her countr ies in the same reqion fo l lowingsuit . Japan was the f irsL country to pract" ice t-he precepts ofthe New Internat ional Economic 0rder one centurv before i t wasconceived--how many wi l l or can fol low in its wake remains tobe seen.

But the point to be made here is very simple. The Lhirdcirc le is not a passive or dependent var iable any longer. Thereare ef f ,or ts Lo co-opt, to tame ( tr i lateral Commission, 0ECD,


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furopean Communit .y, Lhe UN SysLem for that matter , in part) .The f irst wor ld is certainly not a part of i t yet profoundlymoved by the third circ le--and feels immensely threatened bynon-f irst circ le re l ig ions and ideologies. The spir iLual/cultural chal lenge was seen by the youth of the late I950stravel l ing east to sources of wisdom, and the economicchallenge above al l in Japan, but also in 0PEC and NIE0. Butthe mil i tary chal lenge is not yet there, only as terror ism.0f course, i t . wi l l come--one day i f the f irst wor ld cont inuesto dominate.

The pressure on the rest of Europe f,rom the northwesterncorner was t remendous. Northwest had the basic instruments,science and technoloqy, industry and commerce, ef f ic ient pol i t ics andmil i tary and a feel inq of despair must have enqulfed the rest .Fascism and communism Can both be Seen fn l-hiq nprqnoct ive, asquick ways of catching up. They are both based on a popularappeal, on mobil izat ion of the masses, ult imately for thenat ion-state. They both aimed at bui ld ing stronq states.They were both defensive relat ive to the out"side, want ing tobecome sel l- re1iant . And they could both point to the obvious:the northwest became stronq f irst and democrat- ic 1ater, evenmuch later .

0ne interest ing quest ion is why the East of Europe becamecommunist and the South fascist , and the SouLheast of Europeboth fascist and communist , in that order usua11y. Dif f icult


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to say. From the point of view chosen here some could beaLtr ibuted to "chancerr . There was a basis in the highlyvert ical, hierarchical structures created by the caLhol ic and0rthodox churches both of which went a long with the singleparty, author itar ian state construct ions. Maybe the twochurches predispose for the two ideologies, with the 0rthodoxchurch bei ng more al l -embracing, God loves a1t of us, andmote opt imist ic. However that may be , essent ial was popularmobil izat ion and the b ui lding of a strong state, as a bulwarkagainsL the Northwest in the at tempt to become at feast as r ich,good and strong as they. England was the centerpiece of theNorthwest and the country to the southeast, GermaFy r becamethe centerpiece of the reat ion, with both fascist and socia l is tfeatures, and violent ly ant i-Br i t ish.

The Second In/or ld War was the clash between Northwesrand fascism, and between fascism and the Northeast , the SovietUnion. I t was actual ly the f i-ght of the South against LheNorth in Mussolini 's terms ( tne second cominq of the Romanempipe): of , the Center against the rest f rom Hit ler 's pointof view (Neuoldnung). The North won, of course, being stronger.But the two parts of the North also fe11 out aqainst eachother , and the Nort .hwest learned again that resistanee agains LNorthwest dominance could take communist . not onlv fascist form.New types of l penetrat ion were tr ied: Marshall a id and in-corporat ion in the European Community. And this is, more or


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l "ess where we stand today with the EC making great inroadsinto the South. even the Southeast.

It is lmportanL to try to understand the giant forcesat work here. The Northwest had an edge over the othen nanl-qwhich they do not want to give up; the rest of Europe admj-reand imit .ate, yet want to preserve their ident i ty, autonomyand perhaps also t ry to obtain par ity relat ive Lo the North-west. And thus i t is that in the second circ le Europe we havethose who try to become self - rel iant and Lhose who prefer tobecome a per iphery. A strugqle thaL wi l ] cont inue st i l l fora long t ime, with an equil ibr ium more l ike what we had dur ingthe Middle Ages as t.he only stable outcome. No eff ,or t todominate Europe from any self -appointed cent-er wi l l succeed.be that f rom the Northwest or the Northeast--or f rom the CenterThere is so much strength in Europe, so much tradit ion to pre-serve that t -here wil l always be independence movements againstLondon and i ts successor Washington/New York; aqainst B er l inand Rome; against Moscow and against Par is (and Brussels) i fthey should try to st .ep into any "vaccum" when/ if the sl, iper-powers lossen their gr ip. I f anythinq is the lesson fromfuropean history this is i t .

Europe- A Macro-Historical Overview

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