2018 will be a year of decision for the EU too

2017 went on record as a rather difficult year for the European Union. Britain's decision to leave the Union, the debates created by the Union's small countries beginning to place a greater burden on the international organization both economically and politically, rising racism and the right-wing parties coming to a more effective position, and, in parallel, the growth of rising demands for nation-states. These were the issues that had occupied the EU's agenda for the last few years, but 2017 was lived in such a way that these debates were conducted far more harshly and visibly.

All of this points, for the EU, to an identity crisis in addition to a political and economic crisis. European politicians at first approached with tolerance, out of simple vote calculations, the appearance within the system of updated versions of the fascist ideologies that the Union had to some extent managed to suppress after the Second World War, but over time they flinched on seeing that the system was beginning to fall under the control of these dangerous approaches.

Interestingly, in this period in which the identity crisis deepened, Turkey and Turkey's leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan appeared as an element of hate speech. Leaders who fell for the allure of "the unbearable lightness of attacking Erdoğan" began to notice during 2017 that they had sacrificed the European identity to their short-term interests, but it seems to be too late.

The far-right racist discourse and xenophobia, which at first were a means of controlling the system, have in the course of time triggered marginalization and produced a fragmented political structure. The nearest and most instructive example is Germany. Although more than three months have passed since the elections, the coalition talks have not reached a result, and Germany enters 2018 without a government.

The failure of the coalition talks between the Christian Union parties (CDU/CSU), the Free Democratic Party and the Greens, which is also called the Jamaica coalition because the combined colors of the parties resemble the Jamaican flag, and which was initially greeted with great fanfare through the rhetoric of participation, reminded once again how valuable the politics of the center, which has lost its value along with populist politics, is for Europe. For one of the reasons cited for the failure of the coalition talks is that the far-right populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD), with 12.6 percent of the vote, began for the first time in its history to be represented in Parliament.

The cause cited behind both Merkel's electoral failure and her failure in the coalition talks is the failure of her refugee policy. That Merkel, who has sat in the Chancellor's seat since 2005, has failed three times within one year shows that for her too the final whistle is close to blowing.

It is impossible for this political weakness formed in Germany not to affect the processes in the EU, which is entering a critical turning point for itself. As will be recalled, in November 23 EU member countries reached a decision for Europe to form its own army and issued a joint declaration. That the EU must have its own autonomous power is an issue that has been constantly debated since the end of the Cold War. The Europeans, who came very close to this goal in the late 1990s, faced the accusation of their Transatlantic partner the US that "the EU is undermining NATO", and gave up the search for an autonomous military force.

I had previously stressed that the unease created in Europe by Trump's talk, throughout his election campaign, of Europe's not contributing to NATO spending, which EU Commission President Tusk described as "an existential threat to Europe", was something politicians advocating an autonomous Europe wanted to turn into an opportunity.

The decision taken in November 2017 is a step in this direction, but because it was taken in what is perhaps the EU's historically weakest period, it is a candidate to be a "premature birth". Will the EU be able to free itself from its Transatlantic ties? We will certainly be watching the Europeans' initiatives on this in 2018. But considering that there are nearly 35 thousand American soldiers in Germany alone, it is impossible for curiosity about how far they will be able to achieve this not to grow.