A cynical British view on European unity －欧州統合に対するイギリスのシニカルな見方－

(The UK Prime Minister discusses the British policy on Europe with his top civil servant)

Civil Servant: Minister, Britain has had the same foreign policy objective for at least the last 500 years: to create a disunited Europe.  In that cause we have fought with the Germans against the French; with the French and Italians against the Germans; and with the French against the Germans and Italians.  Divide and rule, you see?  Why should we change now when it’s worked so well?

Prime Minister: That’s all ancient history, surely?

Civil Servant: Yes, and current policy.  We had to break [the EU] up, so we had to get inside.  We tried to break it up from the outside, but that wouldn’t work.  Now that we’re inside we can... set the Germans against the French; the French against the Italians; the Italians against the Dutch...

From 1980s political comedy tv show, “Yes, Prime Minister” 

Britain’s recent decision to leave the EU reminded me of an old episode from the tv show “Yes, Prime Minister”, from the late 1980s.  The writers of the comedy show imagined a civil servant having to explain to the naive British Prime Minister that we don’t really trust our European partners, and that we only joined the EU (at that time still called the EEC) in order to make sure that it didn’t work.

I can imagine the civil servant bemoaning the decision to leave the EU.  Without Britain constantly complaining, arguing and messing things up, perhaps the EU will start to work well.  They might create their own European army, move to integrate their economies better, and speak with a more united voice on the world stage.

And how will Britain achieve its long-term goal of keeping Europe disunited then? 

 

Vocabulary:

a civil servant – someone employed in a government job; someone tasked with carrying out government policy

foreign policy – a country’s relations with other countries, and diplomatic goals

an objective – a goal; something one wants to achieve

disunited – not united; divided or separated

to bemoan – to complain or express great disappointment about

to mess something up – to make something fail, break, perform badly etc.

to integrate – to bring together; to make two or more things come together to work as a whole