An EU summit in Brussels on Thursday, the first since the summer break, will see more of the same – no big breakthrough, but a tug-of-war over a German push for yet more fiscal discipline in the eurozone, with governments and parliaments pressed to surrender powers over budgets and economic policy-making.
Almost everyone else is fed up with this joyless, hectoring, endless campaign from Berlin. But there is no sign of the Germans giving up. It will fall to the French under the relatively untested leadership of President François Hollande to lead the resistance. On Sunday the French prime minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, spelled out an agenda diametrically opposed to Germany's.
In this tussle, Britain, as has become the pattern, will stand on the sidelines, increasingly disengaged in the creation of a two-tier Europe – a federalised eurozone of 17 countries for now, plus the other 10.
It may be a maddeningly slow process. But it all adds up to a seismic shift in the politics of Europe, the way power is wielded and policy-making discharged. There are multiple factors and dynamics involved: east versus west, north versus south, big versus small, EU institutions versus national governments. But in the end, the latest European dispensation will probably be settled by the big three – which in essence may mean the Germans are up, the French are down, and the Brits are out.
Read more: Europe prepares for another Franco-German tussle in Brussels | World news | The Guardian
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