DRASTICALLY REDUCED ABILITY OF OLD EUROPEAN POWERS TO EXERCISE “ACQUIRED INFLUENCE” IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
- The result of the last vote in the UN General Assembly, in which Germany was surprisingly overtaken by Austria and Portugal in the race for a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council, is not an isolated case. It is an indicator of a deeper structural erosion of the diplomatic weight and influence of the known “old European powers”. Although the EU’s bearer countries still have considerable economic power, technological capacity and historical prestige, they are finding it increasingly difficult to convert that weight into global political influence. This gap between “internal strength” and “external relevance” is becoming one of the key features of the contemporary European crisis.
The fact that almost half of the states in the General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) did not support Germany, despite its huge financial support for the UN, exposed once again the unpleasant dilemma in the international public, which is “does European diplomacy still produce trust or just administrative inertia without political capital”?!
Lost European credibility due to political hypocrisy of the Brussels liberal elites
For the past two decades, European states have relied on a model that combined economic liberalism, export dependence, and the assumption that “normative power” would be a sufficient substitute for geopolitical strategy.
But the reality of the new multipolar world denies that approach. The energy crisis, due to wrong energy policies, also created a process of European deindustrialization. Germany, as an industrial engine, has faced a decline in competitiveness, rising costs and a weakening of the export model that for decades fed its diplomatic self-confidence.
At the same time, the Franco-German axis, traditionally a pillar of European integration, is showing signs of fatigue and political fragmentation. France increasingly acts with unilateral initiatives, while Germany hesitates between economic pragmatism and geopolitical commitments. In that context, European foreign policy increasingly appears to be reactive rather than strategic.
The cases of Libya, Syria and Afghanistan, where European states followed the US or lagged behind, show the limited autonomy of the European security architecture. Additionally, the war in Ukraine accelerated the militarization of European politics, but without a clear doctrine of long-term stability.
Increasing military budgets does not automatically translate into political influence, especially when diplomatic strategy remains uncoordinated.
At the same time, the European Union’s enlargement policy, especially towards the Western Balkans, is facing growing mistrust. Candidate countries increasingly perceive the EU as a bureaucratic closed system that sets conditions without a clear perspective for membership.
– All this creates a difficult paradox. The European Union acts as a global promoter of rules, but it is increasingly difficult to apply those rules to its own geopolitical perimeter. This creates an impression of double standards, which directly undermines her soft power. The neoliberal economic model, with its focus on deregulation, privatization and fiscal discipline, further weakened social cohesion in many European countries. Growing inequality and stagnant wages have eroded trust in institutions. At the same time, the migration crises opened the door for political polarization, which further strengthened the sovereignist and Eurosceptic movements – says our interlocutor who works in one of the key European institutions and has direct insight into what is happening both officially and unofficially in the backrooms of Brussels.
He adds that there is indeed a political cacophony that “directly affects Europe’s ability to act with a single voice in international, world institutions, such as the UN.”
Erosion of the “single” Europe
The vote in the UN, in which larger and economically stronger states were overtaken by smaller ones, symbolically confirms this erosion, says our interlocutor. Namely, in global politics, perception often weighs more than statistics. European powers increasingly face a world in which historical prestige does not guarantee automatic support. Africa, Asia and Latin America are responding less and less to arguments of “historic merit” and more and more to concrete economic and security offers.
In that sense, European diplomacy often appears to be moralistic, but not pragmatic. It sets value frameworks, but does not always provide material incentives or geopolitical consistency.
Systematic diplomatic work often yields greater results than size alone
The case of Germany in the UN is not a defeat due to one policy, but an accumulation of several factors, namely energy vulnerability, political fragmentation, insufficient strategic lobbying and fatigue from European “normative arrogance”. At the same time, the growing competition among European states themselves for influence in international institutions weakens the common position. Austria and Portugal, in the specific case, have shown that systematic diplomatic work often brings a greater result than size in itself, says our interlocutor, creating a soft illusion about the way Macedonian diplomacy should work precisely on its known challenges, regardless of the fact that it is not a member of the EU, but is still a member of many international institutions, including the UN, where Macedonia has a lot of work waiting for it.
Is Europe still a geopolitical actor or more of an economic space without a single external strategy?
This conversation opens up a broader perspective, namely whether Europe is still a geopolitical actor or more of an economic space without a single external strategy.
According to our interlocutor, the answer to this question is becoming more and more uncertain.
– The US, China and new regional powers are redefining the global architecture, while Europe often reacts after the fact. Such a position reduces its bargaining power. The end result is clear. Economic weight without political cohesion does not automatically create global influence.
On the contrary, it can become a burden that reveals internal inconsistency.
Europe today does not suffer from a lack of resources, but from a lack of strategic synchronization. And that is its biggest diplomatic deficit in the new geopolitical era – emphasizes our interlocutor from Brussels. PR
