Thursday, March 29, 2007

Poland misses the "square root" of the problem

By bringing up the issue of how voting should be conducted in the Council of Ministers once again, Poland has done serious damage to their already strained credibility within the EU. Poland's latest proposed is for member states' votes in the Council to be calculated using the square root of a state's population instead of the population itself. This would give Poland much greater influence in Council decisions. Under the rules proposed by the Constitution for Europe, Germany would have 82 votes versus Poland's 38. Under the square root proposal, Germany would have nine votes and Poland six.

While Poland is free to suggest changes to the voting rules, it is the diplomatic temper tantrum that introduced it that hurts Poland's credibility. A senior Polish offical, Ewa Osniecka-Tamecka, told the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza:
"If other countries do not want to discuss our proposal, we will take the last resort," Ms Osniecka-Tamecka said, on the possibility of a Polish veto on constitution talks. The new voting plan would be a "Polish historical rebate" for the fact that "for 50 years Poland for no fault of its own was outside EU integration," Mr Cichocki added.
It is statements like this that are quickly earning Poland a reputation in Europe as being uncooperative. Such a reputation is far more damaging to Poland's interests than any voting system. The EU works on consensus and informal negotiations. Being seen as obstructionist and uncooperative will ultimately result in Poland being ignored most of the time. Especially when the decision can be made using a majority vote.

Tuesday, March 27, 2007

EUobserver.com

The Berlin Declaration, made last Sunday on the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Rome, was issued in German and translated into the other 22 official languages of the EU. Such translations are routine in the EU. Normally, the translators strive to make documents linguistically equivalent in all languages. However, it appears the Berlin Declaration may have been subjected to a "political translation" when translated from German:
The declaration, adopted during the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Rome Treaties in Berlin on Sunday (25 March), says in German that "We, the citizens in the European Union, are united zu unserem Glück " - which means "united in our fortune/happiness."

However, in the other versions of the text the word Glück has been given a less solemn treatment.

"We, the citizens of the European Union, have united for the better," the more down-to-earth English version says.

The word has also disappeared from the Danish version where Glück has been replaced with ''vor fælles bedste" meaning "for the best" and further down the declaration the word has been lost in translation.
With growing skepticism of the Union, would it be very surprising if European leaders had purposefully chosen to "sanitize" the text for more euroskeptic audiences outside of Germany? No. Since the British and the Danish are the most anti-EU populations in the Union, the English and Danish versions of the declaration would have fallen on deaf ears if they included a statement that Europe was united in its happiness.

With growing skepticism of the Union, is it troubling that EU leaders may have purposefully chosen to "sanitize" the text for more euroskeptic audiences outside of Germany? Yes. The Berlin declaration was supposed to be a simple statement about what binds Europe together, not what sets them apart. The possibility that the German presidency could not draft a statement that cold be made universally in all member states and in all languages suggests that Europe is more divided than popularly thought. If true, there is very little hope for finding the political will to reform the Union institutions before 2009 as the Berlin Declaration implores.

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Europe Tries to Bend It Like Beckham in Charity Match

In a charity match celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome and Manchester United's half century of play in European soccer, England's most storied team beat a squad of European all-stars 4-3. This game was filled with all kinds of symbolism. David Beckham, the world's most popular athlete, played his last game in England against his former team as a member of the Europe XI squad. That the most famous British soccer club defeated a team representing the Europe Union can also be seen as symbolic of Britain's tortured relationship with the EU. In the end, Europe got to celebrate its "birthday" with a good game, but Manchester's victory certainly won't do anything to promote a European identity in one of the most euroskeptic member states.

Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Oprah Sacks Rome: The Problem with Self-Esteem in Higher Education and Popular Culture

In a mock graduation speech by Neil Postman I assign to students in my sophomore inquiry course, Postman tells his audience they have a choice between being an “Athenian” or a “Visigoth.” The choice to join one of these two tribes is based upon certain values processed by the individual. To an Athenian, contemplation, experimentation, reasoning, and questioning in the quest for knowledge and excellence are activities held in high esteem. To a Visigoth, such activities are valuable only if they help earn you more money or power over others. The less-than-subtle point I hope to make to my students is that the real value of an education is learning to reject their inner-Visigoth and become an Athenian. Unfortunately, our society is failing to produce Athenians and instead is rewarding our most Visigoth-like tendencies.

Take for example the growing belief in higher education that the current generation of students suffers from a self-esteem problem — a problem of too much self-esteem. A new study by San Diego State psychology professor Jean Twenge, timed to coincide with the release of the paperback version of her book Generation Me, contends that current generation of college students are more narcissistic than their Gen X predecessors. While Twenge does not believe students suffer from pathological narcissism, she does make a good case that narcissistic attitudes have increased because of self-esteem programs adopted in elementary schools about 20 years ago.

Despite decades of survey research backing her up, Twenge has come under heavy criticism from some of her colleagues. Marc Flacks, an assistant professor of sociology, told the LA Times he believed that narcissism was too harsh a description for current students. While acknowledging it was important to discuss why our society rewards narcissistic behavior, he concluded, "This is a bottom-line society, so students are smart to seek the most direct route to the bottom line. If you don't have a me-first attitude, you won't succeed." Flacks is clearly arguing that students should choose to be Visigoths because they will be more successful. He also shifts the debate away from the individual to society, absolving students of any sense of self-responsibility or responsibility to others. However, Generation Me's troubling lack of respect for others (especially authority figures) is not their biggest problem.

My experiences in the classroom suggest Generation Me's biggest problem really is their lack of respect for scholarly knowledge and intellectual inquiry as in end in and of itself. They simply do not see the value in choosing to be an Athenian. This is reflected in a growing anti-intellectualism among students fostered, in part, I think by the refusal of their parents or high school teachers to ever tell them they are wrong or to correct them. Students seem to believe that all points of view are equally valid, no matter what. Gary A. Olson writes in the Chronicle of Higher Education about a typical exchange between a professor and a student:
The student's peremptory dismissal -- "Well, that's his opinion" -- is not an aberration. That assertion and the attitude it embodies have become endemic, not only in society at large but in academe. Apparently, nowadays an opinion will trump a fact, a reasoned argument, an empirically verified observation -- even a treatise by an eminent scholar. An opinion is the great equalizer, and everyone has one. It silences all arguments, squelches all dialogue: That's your opinion. End of discussion.

Olson points out that it is not just students who believe all opinions are equally valid. Faculty members and administrators are not immune from this new anti-intellectualism. Faculty who are denied tenure for failing to meet certain tenure standards are increasingly suing their universities because they feel their negative evaluations are just someone's opinion.

Unfortunately, this anti-intellectualism is not restricted to the higher education. Students merely reflect the society in which they live. One highly visible pop culture example of the self-esteem movement's anti-intellectualism is Oprah Winfrey's devotion to a book called The Secret. The secret of this self-help book is that people need only visualize what they want in order to get it. In a scathing review of the book on Salon.com, Peter Birkenhead points out an obvious problem with this philosophy that seems to take being a Visigoth to an entirely new level:
[The Secret] is indistinguishable from, and inextricably bound up in the Oprah idea of self-esteem, the kind of confidence you get not from testing yourself, but from 'believing' in yourself. This modern idea of faith isn't arrived at the old-fashioned way, by asking questions, but by getting answers. Instead of inquiry we have born-again epiphanies and cheesy self-help books -- we have excuses for not engaging in inquiry at all. Let other people schlep down the road to Damascus; we'll have Amazon send Damascus to us."
The self-esteem movement and pop-psychobabble like The Secret are just one source of the growing anti-intellectualism in our society. Conservatism and certain forms of Evangelical Christianity are another. From topics ranging from evolution to global warming, many conservatives and Evangelical Christians, demand "objective and unbiased" media coverage and school instruction. The problem is the truth, which by definition is always unbiased, it is not always objective. When conservatives admonish school boards to "teach the debate" they ignore the fact that not everything is a debate with two or more equally valid sides. A lot of time there is, but not always. Insisting that there are fits well with the philosophy of The Secret — if you just visualize the existence of a debate long enough it will become the truth. In other words, denying that global warming is a reality will eventually make it go away. Or global warming is "just your opinion."

There is a growing belief in higher education that the current generation of students suffers from a problem of too much self-esteem. While I agree students seem to be getting more self-absorbed over time, their narcissism is not the biggest problem. It is their lack of intellectual curiosity and their unwillingness to engage in the most basic forms of inquiry that pose the greatest challenge to society. Encouraged by the self-help movement, a lack of criticism from their parents and teachers, pop culture icons like Oprah, and a media that panders to conservatives students are embracing, not rejecting their inner-Visigoth. When called on it by an Athenian, they see no harm in this. All I can say to this is I hope Oprah realizes in the end, she is sacking Rome.

Saturday, March 3, 2007

Riots in the "Happiest Place on Earth"

Just last summer, Denmark was being called the "happiest place on earth." That isn't much solace to the citizens of Copenhagen who are witnessing the worst violence in a decade:
As the smoke and tear gas cleared Saturday morning, the police said 188 people were arrested overnight, while more than 200 were arrested the day before …

“In the last 10 years we haven’t had riots like we’ve seen in the past two days,” a police spokesman, Flemming Steen Munch, said.

The violence started Thursday after a police antiterror squad evicted squatters from a downtown building that for years had been a popular cultural center for anarchists, punk rockers and left-wing groups.
The eruption of violent riots in Denmark is a very troubling to me, although its full meaning eludes me. Perhaps it suggests that the serious social issues behind the far more violent riots in France last year are not as isolated as Europeans like to think. The willingness of disaffected youth in Scandinavia, of all places, to resort to violence to challenge state authority does not seem like a good omen for Europe's future.