Discours sur l'Europe, demain… 🇪🇺🇫🇷

La Sorbonne, 25 avril 2024 A few quick reactions to the speech by President Macron. Overall, very coherent and well-delivered with customary confidence and a speech peppered with interesting concepts and references.

1/ President Macron starts by contending that “European sovereignty” is not today just a French idea or desire. It is shared by Europe. I do not think this is as audacious a claim as it sounds, as policy agrees at the EU level proves his point.

2/ However, the flip-side is that France cannot own the concept of sovereignty, even if it husbanded the notion. This is why President Macron’s reference to the importance of the prevailing “strategic unity” in Europe is crucial to the idea.

3/ President Macron refers to the “mortality” of Europe. Very interesting, and this certainly did not appear in the 2017 speech. President Macron is speaking of Europe as a life form (Europe can die if we let it). This gives adds a spin to the “destiny” referred to in 2017.

4/ Defence features strongly, as expected. Unlike 2017, out go references to the EU’s alphabet soup of initiatives. President Macron speaks of the EI2 and the EU RDC. He also calls for more “strategic intimacy” between European armies. Nuclear dimension name-checked too.

5/ unlike 2017, the defence industry features prominently with talk of consolidation, standardisation & need to lower dependencies on non-EU providers. Non-French viewers will probably take exception to some of these points, but President Macron is right that the EDTIB is vital.

6/ like 2017, strong reference to “Une puissance Europe” which embodies the need to help develop new European growth and production model, protect borders, defend interests and European culture. President Macron touches on the cultural dependencies young Europeans have today.

7/ Europe lives in a world constrained of natural and critical materials, of powers that do not respect free trade rules. Europe needs to develop a new economic paradigm based on investment and defending our own economic interests. Need to produce more in Europe.

8/ we turn to the Single Market and regulation. Very clear, and restated view, by the President that European champions in strategic sectors are needed but SMEs should not be at a disadvantage to US and Chinese competitors in the EU. Regulation needs to be less complicated.

9/ and regulation needs to be flexible for national needs. Subsidiarity stressed. The President states that it is no longer the case that “industrial policy” is seen as an un-European notion. We need it for our competitiveness, he claims: “Made In Europe”.

10/ at the end President Macron states that Europe is not just a geography but a place of ideas: human rights, liberty, rationality. Europe needs to find right balance between tradition and modernity.

11/ long, but good speech. Clearly, President Macron was making some campaign pitches, but more importantly he was extremely clear to the next Commission on what we need more / less of in the EU. Watch here: