Boring!

So I just finished my World Geography assignment and let me tell you I feel smart.
I had to read a pro side and a con side to the unification of Europe and then weigh in with my opinion. It is really boring so feel free to not read it but I felt smart after posting this. You should have read some of the others... I'm just saying. Below is my post.

I believe that you can look at this several ways. As noted on page 67 uniting all of the countries would take the currency from many to just one. A united Europe with one currency would bring in a lot more money with tourists. I for one would probably visit other European countries instead of picking one and sticking to it my entire vacation. It is such a hassle exchanging currency not to mention the money I lose when doing that. The lost money is money that I could have spent on goods in the different countries. I would like to think that if more people spent more money in a “united Europe” then that would boost their economy. While this is just one good point to have the United State of Europe I must say that I disagree with them uniting.

In just looking at the pros and cons I feel that the cons far out weigh the pros.

To start with not every country is on the same page religiously. Pages 62 and 63 talk about the immigration Europe is facing. With so many Muslims now becoming involved with Europe it would never be feasible to try and have one major religion. Page 63 states that many men unskilled and uncompetitive in EU get involved in petty crime or the drug trade and end up harassed by the police, they turn to their faith for solace and reassurance. How are they going to feel if they are ostracized for their faith?

While some of the smaller countries may benefit from getting assistance the larger countries are going to be footing the bill. The bigger you are the harder you fall. I imagine that the larger countries have made a much larger deficit in their budget in an attempt to sustain and better their situation and are going to need all the money they can get to bail themselves out. Who would get to decide where the money goes and how it is spent. Unification would be a major change and not one that could happen over night.

The next issue I see is the language barrier. Page 58 points out that the 590 million people speak numerous languages and not all of them are mutually understandable. It also raises a good question of how is one determined as the “official” language. School curriculum would have to change; the new official language would need to be required. Attempting to get the entire country speaking the same language I believe would take more than a few decades. The old faithfuls who would hold on the the “old” ways would have to die off and I think it would take a few generations before their influence disappeared and the new “norm” actually became the accepted norm.

In my opinion there would be far too many people who would be feeling suppressed and controlled to have the European unification to be anywhere successful. The statement on page 67 “...ultimate goal….the creation of a federal United States of Europe, a worthy competitor and countervailing force in a world dominated by another federation, the United States of America”

That is a scary statement. If that is their ultimate goal, to compete with the USA, then I feel that they are not ready for unification. Their focus should be to better the lives of their people not to be able to dominate who they think is their biggest competitor.