HOUJARRAY FORESIGHT TALKS 2024

MAISON JEAN MONNET, BAZOCHES-SUR-GUYONNE SEPTEMBER 13-15

“ Le futur ne doit pas être abandonné au rêve. La notion de probabilité est un moyen d’orientation dans l’incertain.”   Bertrand de Jouvenel.

 “We are in a moment where we need to be faster, respond faster, making foresight more practicable, more usable, more mainstream and this is to be the moment to make foresight more Monnet wiselike”.

Ricardo Borges de Castro, EPC, inaugural session AJM Foresight Talks Houjarray 2023

“We could label our current culture as ‘Being in Transfer: Our new Life Condition’ which was the title of an exhibition on Contemporary Culture, Art and Science, by Ars Electronica in Esch-sur-Alzette, European Cultural Capital in 2022.” Revd.Lucas Cyrillus Vael O.S.B.

AN INTRODUCTION

No doubt we are in times that are a changin', as Bob Dylan phrased it in an iconic song of 1964, showing his exceptional lyrical wisdom that marked several generations until today.

Discussing the challenges the EU, Europe and the world are facing now and in the future is more relevant than ever as part of the process to face all these with a sense of reality and with a steady hand, be it at a higher speed than before, but without giving up on the dreams that make us great as humans.

Our proceedings start with a focus on the nature of the concepts and the changes. What are the mechanisms that lead to that transformation, and why are they being anxiously criticized by many established institutions? By what means can they be rightly understood, integrated or accomplished? These are the questions Cyrillus Vael O.S.B. will put forward to provide a broader contextual background to the geopolitical discussions we’ll have in Houjarray at the Maison Jean Monnet.

Researchers Andrea Renda from CEPS (tbc) and Sarah Bressan from the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPI) in Berlin will introduce us to the concept of strategic foresight, the tools it offers and how to use them, as a guiding principle for the discussions in the 3 working groups that will alternate with the plenary sessions during the weekend. 

To complete the inaugural session we’ll have also a short presentation by Domenec Ruiz Devesa, President of UEF, former MEP and now advisor to HRVP Josep Borrell, reflecting on the Méthode Monnet, its enduring inspiration for politicians today and the work of the Action Committee for the United States of Europe I &II as a source for action today.

Three working groups will apply different lenses for the foresight talks:

·        WG1: European strategic autonomy, with a focus on economic security, the EU's industrial agenda (Letta & Draghi reports), Global Gateway, Team Europe (moderated by CEPS) 

·        WG2: How to bolster EU support for candidate countries in the face of malign interferences by third states (moderated by REUNIR)

·        WG3: Global Governance, Indo Pacific, Maritime Politics, Defense (moderated by AJM & AEJ Belgium). 

Building upon short impulses and the diverse experiences and insights of the participants, threats and opportunities will be discussed with a view to formulating recommendations for the incoming EU leadership.

The European Union risks getting stuck in a rut. Geopolitical stability is waning, several paradigms are fading, and some interdependencies have turned out to be vulnerabilities. The need for more Europe is growing, but internal political paralysis is holding the EU back.

Every time Jean Monnet was confronted with new and difficult problems, his first act was to take stock, to draw up what he called a ‘balance-sheet’ that opened the way to innovative solutions. These balance-sheets were the result of deep study, not of negotiation, and presented an ‘overall view’ of required change, with goals, available resources, and constraints to be observed.

Balance-sheets have recently been drawn up on climate risks by the European Environment Agency, on the internal market by Enrico Letta, on European competitiveness by Mario Draghi, and reports on civilian and defense readiness  by Sauli Niinistö are forthcoming.

The analysis is crystal clear: Europe has its strengths but is on a dangerous path of decline and vulnerability. In view of the proliferation of reports, the question remains what needs to be prioritized to buck the current trend. The answer is simple: as in life, safety comes first. The EU will need to invest massively to defend its future self and manage global interdependencies to its advantage. To do that, it will need to reconsider its modus operandi to be able to make bold decisions.

Based on the discussions during the Houjarray Foresight Talks 2024, conducted over the mid-September weekend at the Maison Jean Monnet where the Schuman Declaration was conceived, bringing together a wide range of experts and citizens from all over Europe (beyond the EU), we estimate that three priorities deserve the full attention of the new incumbents of the EU institutions. 

Firstly, we call on the EU to keep investing in global governance in the spirit of Jean Monnet and, when considering the discussion about European autonomy in sectors of strategic importance, not to forget to look for resilience and interdependencies for structural and lasting value creation. This also means to keep investing in it by strengthening international law and building inclusive partnerships, speaking about the 'international' rules-based order to assuage sensitivities present in several non-Western countries. We further underline that ‘The Global Gateway’ is an attractive instrument to boost sustainable prosperity around the world. Leveraging partnerships, e.g.with like-minded countries in the Indo-Pacific region, the globe’s growing economic center of gravity, will help in restoring the EU’s international standing.

Secondly, In view of the fragility of decision-making within NATO and in order to shore up the European security order and integrate Ukraine and the other candidate countries, the EU will need to become a security provider in its own right. This requires beefing up military muscle, defining a doctrine of deterrence (including nuclear), mainstreaming preparations for enlargement, and applying conditionality in a principled and flexible manner.

Finally, inspired by the original Schuman plan which is a one-point-plan which states that “action must be taken immediately on one limited but decisive point” we must ask ourselves, "What is the most essential resource of economic power today? What has the biggest potential of division and destruction today? What has the greatest potential of community, sharing, solidarity and prosperity?" Our answer is clear: Data and talent  are the coal and steel of today!  

Data is the strategic resource of today. On this, the EU is weak and fragmented. It has no major digital industry and relies mainly on platform infrastructure and suppliers from outside Europe.  The EU could be a stronger actor and a standard-setter if it pooled its capacity into a European Digital Community (EDC) which connects citizens. Bringing forward in this way talent, giving talent the means to make sense of the data and imagine solutions, is what may help European countries to answer the many challenges they are facing today and tomorrow. 

Therefore, inspired by the success of the First Action Committee for the United States of Europe, which contributed to the establishment of the EEC, the accession of the United Kingdom, the formalization of regular European Council meetings from late 1974 onwards, and the first direct election of the European Parliament, we in the Jean Monnet Association, in close collaboration with other European partners, are working on a new civil society initiative to relaunch an Action Committee with direct participation of politicians and high-level officials in order to push for an acceleration of the European integration process which we consider necessary to confront the challenges we are facing in an effective manner. 

Fifty years after the conclusion of the successful ‘Monnet Committee’, whose successor in the 1980s under the leadership of Max Kohnstamm played a notable part in bringing about the Single Market, we believe the time is right for a Third Action Committee to define the next stage of the European Integration process.

* Title taken from a 1965 oddball comedy film shot in black and white directed by Gottfriend Reinhardt and starring Alec Guinness. In 1976 there was also a French slapstick movie ‘La situation est grave…mais pas désespérée!’ from Jacques Besnard , an adaptation of a theatre play from Pierre Germont with movie stars Maria Pacôme, Michel Serrault and Jean Lefebvre.

Houjarray & Brussels, September 23, 2024.