Europe and America: What Shared Values?

onedomino · #1 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 09:39 AM

The other day on this message board, I disagreed with the common refrain that Bush is the main reason for anti Americanism abroad. I said that there is a lot more to it than that. Anti Americanism in Europe predates the Bush Presidency by many years, if not decades. Far beneath the superficial relationship that Europe has with Bush, the reasons for anti Americanism pertain to fundamental social and economic differences between Europeans and Americans. These differences are expressed by European educational systems. While attending school, I have lived in Asia and Europe; in particular Shanghai and Munchen. The anti Americanism I observed was far more intense in Europe than in Asia. These attitudes, contrary to popular belief, have not much to do with Bush. Sure he is a “cowboy,” and compared to the elitists in European universities (and American universities for that matter), “inarticulate and not very bright.” But that is just icing on an anti American cake that has been baking for decades. For those who think electing the American Left in November 2008 will offer a respite from generally increasing anti Americanism abroad, think again:

Quote:

Europe’s Philosophy of Failure

By Stefan Theil

Complete article: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/c...?story_id=4095

In France and Germany, students are being forced to undergo a dangerous indoctrination. Taught that economic principles such as capitalism, free markets, and entrepreneurship are savage, unhealthy, and immoral, these children are raised on a diet of prejudice and bias. Rooting it out may determine whether Europe’s economies prosper or continue to be left behind.

Millions of children are being raised on prejudice and disinformation. Educated in schools that teach a skewed ideology, they are exposed to a dogma that runs counter to core beliefs shared by many other Western countries. They study from textbooks filled with a doctrine of dissent, which they learn to recite as they prepare to attend many of the better universities in the world. Extracting these children from the jaws of bias could mean the difference between world prosperity and menacing global rifts. And doing so will not be easy. But not because these children are found in the madrasas of Pakistan or the state-controlled schools of Saudi Arabia. They are not. Rather, they live in two of the world’s great democracies—France and Germany.

What a country teaches its young people reflects its bedrock national beliefs. Schools hand down a society’s historical narrative to the next generation. There has been a great deal of debate over the ways in which this historical ideology is passed on—over Japanese textbooks that downplay the Nanjing Massacre, Palestinian textbooks that feature maps without Israel, and new Russian guidelines that require teachers to portray Stalinism more favorably. Yet there has been almost no analysis of how countries teach economics, even though the subject is equally crucial in shaping the collective identity that drives foreign and domestic policies.

Just as schools teach a historical narrative, they also pass on “truths” about capitalism, the welfare state, and other economic principles that a society considers self-evident. In both France and Germany, for instance, schools have helped ingrain a serious aversion to capitalism. In one 2005 poll, just 36 percent of French citizens said they supported the free-enterprise system, the only one of 22 countries polled that showed minority support for this cornerstone of global commerce. In Germany, meanwhile, support for socialist ideals is running at all-time highs—47 percent in 2007 versus 36 percent in 1991.

It’s tempting to dismiss these attitudes as being little more than punch lines to cocktail party jokes. But their impact is sadly and seriously self-destructive. In Germany, unemployment is finally falling after years at Depression-era levels, thanks in no small part to welfare reforms that in 2005 pressured Germans on the public dole to take up jobs. Yet there is near consensus among Germans that, despite this happy outcome, tinkering with the welfare state went far beyond what is permissible. Chancellor Angela Merkel, once heralded as Germany’s own Margaret Thatcher, has all but abandoned her plans to continue free-market reforms. She has instead imposed a new “rich people tax,” has tightened labor-market rules, and has promised renewed efforts to “regulate” globalization. Meanwhile, two in three Germans say they support at least some of the voodoo-economic, roll-back-the-reforms platform of a noisy new antiglobalization political party called Die Linke (The Left), founded by former East German communists and Western left-wing populists.

Many of these popular attitudes can be traced to state-mandated curricula in schools. It is there that economic lessons are taught that diverge substantially from the market-based principles on which the Western model is based. The phenomenon may hardly be unique to Europe, but in few places is it more obvious than in France and Germany. A biased view of economics feeds into many of the world’s most vexing problems, from the growth of populism to the global rise of anti-American, anti-capitalist attitudes.

More: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/c...?story_id=4095

onedomino · #2 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 10:23 AM

It is for more than one reason that economists often maintain that America's future pertains especially to its relationships in Asia.

"Education" in France and Germany:

Quote:

“Economic growth imposes a hectic form of life, producing overwork, stress, nervous depression, cardiovascular disease and, according to some, even the development of cancer,” asserts the three-volume Histoire du XXe siècle, a set of texts memorized by countless French high school students as they prepare for entrance exams to Sciences Po and other prestigious French universities. The past 20 years have “doubled wealth, doubled unemployment, poverty, and exclusion, whose ill effects constitute the background for a profound social malaise,” the text continues. Because the 21st century begins with “an awareness of the limits to growth and the risks posed to humanity [by economic growth],” any future prosperity “depends on the regulation of capitalism on a planetary scale.” Capitalism itself is described at various points in the text as “brutal,” “savage,” “neoliberal,” and “American.” This agitprop was published in 2005, not in 1972.

…French students … do not learn economics so much as a very specific, highly biased discourse about economics. When they graduate, they may not know much about supply and demand, or about the workings of a corporation. Instead, they will likely know inside-out the evils of “la McDonaldisation du monde” and the benefits of a “Tobin tax” on the movement of global capital. This kind of anticapitalist, antiglobalization discourse isn’t just the product of a few aging 1968ers writing for Le Monde Diplomatique; it is required learning in today’s French schools.

…Equally popular in Germany today are student workbooks on globalization. One such workbook includes sections headed “The Revival of Manchester Capitalism,” “The Brazilianization of Europe,” and “The Return of the Dark Ages.” India and China are successful, the book explains, because they have large, state-owned sectors and practice protectionism, while the societies with the freest markets lie in impoverished sub-Saharan Africa. Like many French and German books, this text suggests students learn more by contacting the antiglobalization group Attac, best known for organizing messy protests at the annual G-8 summits.

One might expect Europeans to view the world through a slightly left-of-center, social-democratic lens. The surprise is the intensity and depth of the anti-market bias being taught in Europe’s schools.

http://no-pasaran.blogspot.com/

Psychoblues · #3 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:00 PM

Naw, I think Bush is just a fuckin' idiot and the world recognises, as you do, that fact. To use him as an excuse for American ignorance is at very least dishonest on your part. But, carry on.

onedomino · #4 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Psychoblues

Naw, I think Bush is just a fuckin' idiot and the world recognises, as you do, that fact. To use him as an excuse for American ignorance is at very least dishonest on your part. But, carry on.

What an unbelievably dimwitted remark. Typical of your brainless and hateful responses. You do not call yourself Psycho for nothing. It fits perfectly.

Psychoblues · #5 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:14 PM

You gotta be shittin', 1dominoe.

"brilliant and typically thoughtful. did you even read the articles nitwit?"

I won't return the neg rep feature for you but you expose yourself for the fraud that you are.

onedomino · #6 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Psychoblues

You gotta be shittin', 1dominoe.

"brilliant and typically thoughtful. did you even read the articles nitwit?"

I won't return the neg rep feature for you but you expose yourself for the fraud that you are.

I regret that the board limits the number of times I can neg rep your wasted posts. You excrete some of the most foul posts on this board and anyone who can read sees that. You are just a low-life troll looking for a fight.

Psychoblues · #7 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:23 PM

You're killin' me ass breath!!!!!!!!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by onedomino

What an unbelievably dimwitted remark. Typical of your brainless and hateful responses. You do not call yourself Psycho for nothing. It fits perfectly.

Your quote, not mine. "keep it up, assbreath."

Still not willing to discuss the topic? I thought so. Thanks for the other neg rep you genuine piece of shit for a conservative voice.

onedomino · #8 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Psychoblues

You're killin' me ass breath!!!!!!!!!!

Your quote, not mine. "keep it up, assbreath."

Still not willing to discuss the topic? I thought so. Thanks for the other neg rep you genuine piece of shit for a conservative voice.

Discuss the topic? What a joke. Look at your moronic response to my first two posts. What's to discuss? Your abuse of language? The single, lonely brain cell rattling around in your empty head?

Psychoblues · #9 (**permalink**) 01-11-2008, 11:46 PM

Why would I find it even complimentary advisable to debate with a jerk that uses his neg reps for argument?

Quote:

Originally Posted by onedomino

Discuss the topic? What a joke. Look at your moronic response to my first two posts. What's to discuss? Your abuse of language? The single, lonely brain cell rattling around in your empty head?

Kiss my ass, 1donny, and go to hell, too.

tigerbob · #10 (**permalink**) 01-13-2008, 01:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by onedomino

Far beneath the superficial relationship that Europe has with Bush, the reasons for anti Americanism pertain to fundamental social and economic differences between Europeans and Americans. These differences are expressed by European educational systems.

That's one hell of a big sweeping generalisation. Hmmmm, just social and economic, huh? Wow.

Political? Nah.
Historical? Nah.
Language? Nah.
Cultural? Nah.
Religious? Nah.
Environmental? Nah.

So it all comes down to the way they teach economics in France. Who'da thought?

Kathianne · #11 (**permalink**) 01-13-2008, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tigerbob

That's one hell of a big sweeping generalisation. Hmmmm, just social and economic, huh? Wow.

Political? Nah.
Historical? Nah.
Language? Nah.
Cultural? Nah.
Religious? Nah.
Environmental? Nah.

So it all comes down to the way they teach economics in France. Who'da thought?

French and English philosophers, English government, literature, religious culture if not beliefs, actually the whole point is silly.

onedomino · #12 (**permalink**) 01-13-2008, 03:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tigerbob

That's one hell of a big sweeping generalisation. Hmmmm, just social and economic, huh? Wow.

Political? Nah.
Historical? Nah.
Language? Nah.
Cultural? Nah.
Religious? Nah.
Environmental? Nah.

So it all comes down to the way they teach economics in France. Who'da thought?

So what is your point? That those characteristics were not included in the analysis? Maybe next time. If you bothered to read the articles then you would have observed that the differences between America and Europe in economic and social education leads to differences in the way our societal and economic systems are constructed. And that the way some subjects are taught in Europe leads to anti Americanism. Was that too difficult for you to understand? The further point was that these differences, especially anti Americanism, are often said to be a function of how much Bush is hated. And that is false.

Shogun · #13 (**permalink**) 01-14-2008, 09:46 AM

I agree with Tigerbob

onedomino · #14 (**permalink**) 01-14-2008, 11:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shogun

I agree with Tigerbob

That figures, since he completely missed the point of the article. I did not claim "that it all came down to the way they teach economics in France" as he put it. What I said was that reasons for anti-Americanism were delivered and expressed in European education. Tell me Shogun, have you ever sat in a European classroom? On what basis do you disagree with the fact that anti American attitudes are expressed in French and German classrooms. I have actually studied in Germany. Have you?

Shogun · #15 (**permalink**) 01-14-2008, 12:34 PM

I guess you also have a similar critical eye for American classrooms that convey the same criticism for the tenants of your particular political persuasion? Germany and France don't criticize our democracy because such is our positive reputation with elective processes. If they criticism of dog eat dog capitalism then they are not the only ones who react to their observations. We do it here too. Here's a brainiac idea for you: Stop crying about how everyone on the playground hates us while disregarding the reality of American action on the world stage. Go ahead and review the last 8 years and see if you can figure out how Euro might take notice, eh Freedom fry?

If Euro sees the US as a political bully (Either for us or against us) with a record of failed foreign policy (PHANTOM WMDs) then it's probably due to more than some random batch of German and French teachers.. regardless of your personal example.

Which, might I add, only conveys your lack of understanding statistics.