Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Global cities
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter
  • Membership

No More Walls In Europe: Tear Them Down!

Zygmunt Bauman 27th July 2016

Zygmunt BaumanProfessor Bauman, it seems like new walls are rising, again, in Europe. The reasons politicians push for the decision to build these walls – either real or “bureaucratic” – refer to the issues of migration and security. How do you judge what is happening? What are the risks in this rush to “securitization” of the continent?

We need to study, memorize, and do our best do draw practical conclusions from Pope Francis’ analysis (in his “thank you” speech on the occasion of receiving the European Charlemagne prize) of the mortal dangers signalled by “new walls rising in Europe”; walls raised – paradoxically and disingenuously – with the intention/hope of cutting out small plots of land safe for its residents from the hurly-burly world full of risks, traps and menaces. Having pointed out that “creativity, genius and a capacity for rebirth and renewal are part of the soul of Europe”, that in the last century Europe bore witness that “a new beginning was indeed possible” – and in the effect “laid the foundation for a bastion of peace, an edifice made up of states united not by force but by free commitment to the common good and a definitive end to confrontation” so that “Europe, so long divided, finally found its true self and began to build its house” – Pope Francis notes, with deep concern and sorrow, that if “the founding fathers of united Europe” – “heralds of peace and prophets of the future” – inspired us “to build bridges and tear down walls”, the family of nations they prompted to create seems of late

to feel less at home within the walls of the common home. At times, those walls have been built in a way varying from the insightful plans left by the original themselves builders. Their new and exciting desire to create unity seems to be fading; we, the heirs of their dream, are tempted to yield to our own selfish interests and to consider putting up fences here and there. To feel less at home within the walls of the common home. At times, those walls have been built in a way varying from the insightful plans left by the original themselves builders. Their new and exciting desire to create unity seems to be fading; we, the heirs of their dream, are tempted to yield to our own selfish interests and to consider putting up fences here and there.

People seem to be more and more scared by the series of attacks that are happening in our cities. Whatever the real reasons behind these attacks – which may vary – the perception is one of a growing level of insecurity. How can politics address this fear without falling in a witch-hunting scheme?

The roots of insecurity you mention go deep; they are sunk in our mode of existing, marked by weakening inter-human bonds, the crumbling and falling apart of communities, the tendency to recast our common social problems into individually suffered worries – and “subsidiarizing” the task of fighting them to the bereaved individuals left to stew in their own juices. Our uncertainty and the resulting sense of insecurity are existential: they are born and daily reborn out of the on-going replacement of human solidarity with mutual suspicion and cutthroat competition. The fear they beget is diffuse and spread over all aspects of our life pursuits and therefore unanchored, seeking vainly a target on which it could be focused – a palpable, visible target within reach, one that we could try to control. But in our (selectively) globalized world, a playground of powers emancipated from political control and powerless politics incapable of controlling them, the gap between the grandiosity of tasks and mediocrity of tools to handle them and perform with them is widening; the “natural habitat” of existential insecurity, the space subjected to the vagaries of deregulated, let off-the-leash and politically uncontrolled economic powers, continues thereby to widen too – and so does the thirst for a reduction of the unbearable complexity of any challenge to a simple, possible instant, short-cut measure and for strong leaders who as irresponsibly and deceitfully as boisterously and bombastically promise to apply in exchange for unconditional obedience of their subjects…


Become part of our Community of Thought Leaders


Get fresh perspectives delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for our newsletter to receive thought-provoking opinion articles and expert analysis on the most pressing political, economic and social issues of our time. Join our community of engaged readers and be a part of the conversation.

Sign up here

The EU seems to be divided in its response to the migration problem. It also seems to be divided on issues like security – Viktor Orban yesterday asked the EU to follow Trump’s model in this. Is the dream at the very root of the European Union about to be destroyed by these forces?

All in all, we are witnessing today throughout Europe a worrisome tendency to reclassify urgent socio-political issues as the problems of the security organs and policing. It does not spell well for the spirit that inspired the founding and the expansion of the European Union. After all, a major, perhaps the defining feature of that spirit was the vision of Europe in which military and policing security measures will gradually but steadily and consistently become redundant.

From Trump to the EU, fear seems to dominate the political discourse. Is our society destined to be dominated by fear?

This is indeed a sombre and upsetting prospect (though by no means a predetermined, inescapable destiny). Promises of demagogues are catching, but fortunately short-lived. Once new walls have been built, more armed guards deployed on airports and in public places, more refugees refused asylum and more migrants deported, their irrelevance to the genuine roots of our uncertainty and the fears and anxieties they generate will become, fortunately, transparent. Deregulated market forces will go on playing havoc with all and any of our existential certainties. Demons that haunt us (fear of losing our place in society, suspected fragility of our life-achievements, the menace of social degradation and exclusion) won’t evaporate and disappear. We may come back to our senses and acquire immunity to the siren songs of the haranguers and rabble-rousers striving to build political capital on leading us astray. The big question, however, is how many people will need to fall victim and find their lives wasted before this happens.

Religion – particularly Islam – is more and more indicated as a factor that can stop integration. In Germany, movements like Pegida openly describe Islam as the mask of throat-cutters. How do you think societies and politicians might operate to prove this equation wrong?

Let’s avoid the dangerous mistake of extrapolating long-term tendencies (let alone inevitable futures) from current fads and foibles. As the uniquely perspicacious German sociologist Ulrich Beck suggested, at the bottom of our present confusion lies the discrepancy between finding ourselves already cast in a “cosmopolitan situation” (being doomed to cohabit permanently with different cultures, ways of life, faiths) – and the lagging far behind in the urgent task of the development and appropriation of “cosmopolitan awareness”. Putting paid to that discrepancy – bridging the gap between the realities in which we live and our capacity to understand their logic and requirements – is not a task to be performed overnight.

To sum up our current predicament, let me again quote from the impeccable insights of Pope Francis. In the already referred-to speech, he confessed:

I dream of a Europe where being a migrant is not a crime, but a summons to a greater commitment on behalf of the dignity of every human being … I dream of a Europe that promotes and protects the rights of everyone, without neglecting its duties toward all. I dream of a Europe of which it will not be said that its commitment to human rights was its last utopia.


Support Progressive Ideas: Become a Social Europe Member!


Support independent publishing and progressive ideas by becoming a Social Europe member for less than 5 Euro per month. You can help us create more high-quality articles, podcasts and videos that challenge conventional thinking and foster a more informed and democratic society. Join us in our mission - your support makes all the difference!

Become a Social Europe Member

And he asked:

What has happened to you, the Europe of humanism, the champion of human rights, democracy and freedom? Francis questioned. What has happened to you, Europe … the home of poets, philosophers, artists, musicians, and men and women of letters? What has happened to you … the mother of great men and women who upheld, and even sacrificed their lives for, the dignity of their brothers and sisters?

These questions are addressed to all of us; to us, who – as humans are and can’t but be in all times and all places – are made by history while making it, knowingly or not. It is up to us to find answers and give them; in deeds as much as in words.

I believe that the most awesome obstacle to finding the answers is our dilatoriness in seeking them.

This interview was conducted by Davide Casati and was published in abbreviated form in Corriere della Sera.

Zygmunt Bauman

Zygmunt Bauman is Emeritus Professor at the University of Leeds and one of Europe’s foremost sociologists. He is author of 'Liquid Modernity' (Polity 2000) and many other books on contemporary society.

You are here: Home / Politics / No More Walls In Europe: Tear Them Down!

Most Popular Posts

Russia,information war Russia is winning the information warAiste Merfeldaite
Nanterre,police Nanterre and the suburbs: the lid comes offJoseph Downing
Russia,nuclear Russia’s dangerous nuclear consensusAna Palacio
Belarus,Lithuania A tale of two countries: Belarus and LithuaniaThorvaldur Gylfason and Eduard Hochreiter
retirement,Finland,ageing,pension,reform Late retirement: possible for many, not for allKati Kuitto

Most Recent Posts

Ukraine,fatigue Ukraine’s cause: momentum is diminishingStefan Wolff and Tetyana Malyarenko
Vienna,social housing Vienna social-housing model: celebrated but misusedGabu Heindl
social democracy,nation-state Social democracy versus the nativist rightJan Zielonka
chemical,European Union Which comes first—Big Toxics’ profits or health?Vicky Cann
Russia,journalists,Ukraine,target Ukraine: journalists in Russia’s sightsKelly Bjorkland and Simon Smith

Other Social Europe Publications

strategic autonomy Strategic autonomy
Bildschirmfoto 2023 05 08 um 21.36.25 scaled 1 RE No. 13: Failed Market Approaches to Long-Term Care
front cover Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship

ETUI advertisement

The future of remote work

The 12 chapters collected in this volume provide a multidisciplinary perspective on the impact and the future trajectories of remote work, from the nexus between the location from where work is performed and how it is performed to how remote locations may affect the way work is managed and organised, as well as the applicability of existing legislation. Additional questions concern remote work’s environmental and social impact and the rapidly changing nature of the relationship between work and life.


AVAILABLE HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound Talks: does Europe have the skills it needs for a changing economy?

In this episode of the Eurofound Talks podcast, Mary McCaughey speaks with Eurofound’s research manager, Tina Weber, its senior research manager, Gijs van Houten, and Giovanni Russo, senior expert at CEDEFOP (The European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training), about Europe’s skills challenges and what can be done to help workers and businesses adapt to future skills demands.

Listen where you get your podcasts, or for free, by clicking on the link below


LISTEN HERE

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

The summer issue of the Progressive Post magazine by FEPS is out!

The Special Coverage of this new edition is dedicated to the importance of biodiversity, not only as a good in itself but also for the very existence of humankind. We need a paradigm change in the mostly utilitarian relation humans have with nature.

In this issue, we also look at the hazards of unregulated artificial intelligence, explore the shortcomings of the EU's approach to migration and asylum management, and analyse the social downside of the EU's current ethnically-focused Roma policy.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

WSI European Collective Bargaining Report 2022 / 2023

With real wages falling by 4 per cent in 2022, workers in the European Union suffered an unprecedented loss in purchasing power. The reason for this was the rapid increase in consumer prices, behind which nominal wage growth fell significantly. Meanwhile, inflation is no longer driven by energy import prices, but by domestic factors. The increased profit margins of companies are a major reason for persistent inflation. In this difficult environment, trade unions are faced with the challenge of securing real wages—and companies have the responsibility of making their contribution to returning to the path of political stability by reducing excess profits.


DOWNLOAD HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube