A European values debate
Why is Europe suddenly full of people talking about values and virtue?
TELETHON, a French television show, is an icon of popular entertainment, an outpouring of visual jollity and charitable fund-raising. But this year it turned into a battleground over religion and public life. A few days before the event, the Archbishop of Paris unleashed a missile: the telethon is fine, he said, except when it raises money for the destruction of human embryos (ie, for stem-cell research). On a continent where bio-ethical questions are usually debated by committees of experts behind closed doors, this blast from a religious leader against mass-market television had an unexpected whiff of America's notorious “culture wars”, in which Christians and secularists man the barricades over moral matters.
Nor is this the only example of morality and religion figuring more prominently in European public life. In last month's Dutch election, the prime minister, Jan Peter Balkenende, clung to his lead partly by campaigning for “Dutch standards and values” in the face of a “moral crisis”. Poland's Law and Justice party was elected on the promise of a “moral revolution”; one of its coalition partners declared that its programme was “based on the social teaching of the Catholic church”. And Ségolène Royal, the French Socialists' official presidential candidate, has said that “the battle with the right in this campaign will above all be a battle of values.”
None of this is entirely new, but it is unusual. European politics is normally about jobs, money and welfare. Is the politics of morality becoming more widespread in Europe (just as, ironically, it may be becoming less influential in America)?
As a general rule, “moral politics” comes to the fore in two possible ways. It may be forced into the public realm by the conviction and organisation of religious voters (for example, conservative evangelicals in America). Or politicians can willingly adopt its language, perhaps in response to genuine moral concerns—but perhaps also because political parties no longer differ significantly on economic policy and need values as a way of distinguishing themselves from their rivals.
Much of the values talk in Europe fits this last explanation. Both Ms Royal and her main centre-right rival, Nicolas Sarkozy, say they stand for a break with the past. But by talking about values, Ms Royal hopes to define her brand of change as warm and fuzzy, in contrast to the harsher Mr Sarkozy, who talks a lot about la rupture. Germany's Christian Democratic chancellor, Angela Merkel, ran on an economic-reform ticket. But signs of reform fatigue have led her party to sing the praises of patriotism and family values. The more European voters balk at economic reform, the more politicians yammer on about values. In these circumstances, the politics of morality can seem little more than skin deep: essentially an electoral tactic, suitable for a moment when reform is not a plausible way to win votes. But a more interesting question is how far the first explanation for the growth of values politics in Europe—that it reflects the influence and activism of religious groups—has any validity.
God and the old continent
At first blush, it is tempting to say it has none. Europeans are much less likely than Americans to say that they believe in God. Far fewer go to church on Sundays. There is nothing that resembles America's religious right. Nor do Europeans have public groups, such as Focus on the Family, or the religious broadcasting networks that represent and inspire them. And, with due respect to the Archbishop of Paris, rather fewer Europeans get steamed up about matters that infuriate American evangelicals, such as stem-cell research, abortion or gay marriage (Spain and Belgium recently legalised this practice without much fuss). For these reasons, the debate over personal and public virtue in Europe is less specifically religious, and also less influenced by religious voters and organisations, than its equivalent in America.
Yet there are more similarities with America than one might think. For a start, there is a sizeable group of European believers with strong social and political views rooted in their faith: Muslims. They are hardly in the mainstream, but Muslim willingness to stand up and talk about politics (eg, when they denounce cartoons of Muhammad in European newspapers) may encourage, and could perhaps even provoke, other religious groups to do the same.
Some Europeans are also echoing two broader concerns that tend to animate America's religious right: alarm about the increasing secularisation of society and rejection of almost everything to do with the 1960s (especially the moral relativism that says “your truth is as valid as my truth”). In Britain, the head of the Anglican church frets that “churches [are] standing in the middle of a secular and unfriendly environment”, and the Archbishop of York complains that “Christianity is being systematically eroded from public view.” Germans are rediscovering as fashionable things that became deeply uncool in the 1960s: bourgeois values, big families, even Latin lessons.
Europeans are never going to engage in the harsh controversies of America's culture wars. They are motivated more by such things as the decline of marriage, the breakdown of the traditional family, immigration and a dire demography. For them, questions of public morality often revolve around what it means to be a decent, tolerant society. The characteristic issue is the Islamic headscarf, where debate is about balancing individual rights (to wear a veil) with social obligations (to show your face). Americans are more overtly religious, with a corresponding focus on personal morality. For them the most potent issue is abortion, which involves questions about when life begins and what counts as murder that have too often been left to the courts, not the political process. Europe's debate on politics and values is less intense and less church-dominated than America's. But it may be about more than mere electoral tactics.
TELETHON, a French television show, is an icon of popular entertainment, an outpouring of visual jollity and charitable fund-raising. But this year it turned into a battleground over religion and public life. A few days before the event, the Archbishop of Paris unleashed a missile: the telethon is fine, he said, except when it raises money for the destruction of human embryos (ie, for stem-cell research). On a continent where bio-ethical questions are usually debated by committees of experts behind closed doors, this blast from a religious leader against mass-market television had an unexpected whiff of America's notorious “culture wars”, in which Christians and secularists man the barricades over moral matters.
Nor is this the only example of morality and religion figuring more prominently in European public life. In last month's Dutch election, the prime minister, Jan Peter Balkenende, clung to his lead partly by campaigning for “Dutch standards and values” in the face of a “moral crisis”. Poland's Law and Justice party was elected on the promise of a “moral revolution”; one of its coalition partners declared that its programme was “based on the social teaching of the Catholic church”. And Ségolène Royal, the French Socialists' official presidential candidate, has said that “the battle with the right in this campaign will above all be a battle of values.”
None of this is entirely new, but it is unusual. European politics is normally about jobs, money and welfare. Is the politics of morality becoming more widespread in Europe (just as, ironically, it may be becoming less influential in America)?
As a general rule, “moral politics” comes to the fore in two possible ways. It may be forced into the public realm by the conviction and organisation of religious voters (for example, conservative evangelicals in America). Or politicians can willingly adopt its language, perhaps in response to genuine moral concerns—but perhaps also because political parties no longer differ significantly on economic policy and need values as a way of distinguishing themselves from their rivals.
Much of the values talk in Europe fits this last explanation. Both Ms Royal and her main centre-right rival, Nicolas Sarkozy, say they stand for a break with the past. But by talking about values, Ms Royal hopes to define her brand of change as warm and fuzzy, in contrast to the harsher Mr Sarkozy, who talks a lot about la rupture. Germany's Christian Democratic chancellor, Angela Merkel, ran on an economic-reform ticket. But signs of reform fatigue have led her party to sing the praises of patriotism and family values. The more European voters balk at economic reform, the more politicians yammer on about values. In these circumstances, the politics of morality can seem little more than skin deep: essentially an electoral tactic, suitable for a moment when reform is not a plausible way to win votes. But a more interesting question is how far the first explanation for the growth of values politics in Europe—that it reflects the influence and activism of religious groups—has any validity.
God and the old continent
At first blush, it is tempting to say it has none. Europeans are much less likely than Americans to say that they believe in God. Far fewer go to church on Sundays. There is nothing that resembles America's religious right. Nor do Europeans have public groups, such as Focus on the Family, or the religious broadcasting networks that represent and inspire them. And, with due respect to the Archbishop of Paris, rather fewer Europeans get steamed up about matters that infuriate American evangelicals, such as stem-cell research, abortion or gay marriage (Spain and Belgium recently legalised this practice without much fuss). For these reasons, the debate over personal and public virtue in Europe is less specifically religious, and also less influenced by religious voters and organisations, than its equivalent in America.
Yet there are more similarities with America than one might think. For a start, there is a sizeable group of European believers with strong social and political views rooted in their faith: Muslims. They are hardly in the mainstream, but Muslim willingness to stand up and talk about politics (eg, when they denounce cartoons of Muhammad in European newspapers) may encourage, and could perhaps even provoke, other religious groups to do the same.
Some Europeans are also echoing two broader concerns that tend to animate America's religious right: alarm about the increasing secularisation of society and rejection of almost everything to do with the 1960s (especially the moral relativism that says “your truth is as valid as my truth”). In Britain, the head of the Anglican church frets that “churches [are] standing in the middle of a secular and unfriendly environment”, and the Archbishop of York complains that “Christianity is being systematically eroded from public view.” Germans are rediscovering as fashionable things that became deeply uncool in the 1960s: bourgeois values, big families, even Latin lessons.
Europeans are never going to engage in the harsh controversies of America's culture wars. They are motivated more by such things as the decline of marriage, the breakdown of the traditional family, immigration and a dire demography. For them, questions of public morality often revolve around what it means to be a decent, tolerant society. The characteristic issue is the Islamic headscarf, where debate is about balancing individual rights (to wear a veil) with social obligations (to show your face). Americans are more overtly religious, with a corresponding focus on personal morality. For them the most potent issue is abortion, which involves questions about when life begins and what counts as murder that have too often been left to the courts, not the political process. Europe's debate on politics and values is less intense and less church-dominated than America's. But it may be about more than mere electoral tactics.
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