Bongiovanni's message should be heeded especially in Brussels Berlin and Paris - John Peet
Political Editor The Economist Francesco Bongiovanni returns with a sequel to The Decline and
the Fall of Europe a book Guardian journalist Nils Pratley labelled 'a wake-up call for the
twenty-first century'. Since 2012 Europe has been confronted with new unexpected game-changing
challenges such as the refugee crisis and its human tsunami the surprise of Brexit and the
explosion of 'alternative' politics. Europeans have finally come to realize that the
open-societies that they have been comfortably living in are under threat and fragmenting
leaving their survival uncertain. Minorities are falling prey to an Islamist ideology that
conveys values and customs diametrically opposed to European ones. Terrorist acts have become
the 'new normal' part of daily life. The North-South cleavage brought aboutby the eurozone
crisis is now completed by a deep East-West cleavage born from the refugee crisis. Against this
backdrop a Germany that is not all that it seems has become Europe's de-facto ruler but is
unfit to lead while Trump's America cannot be counted on as it once used to be forcing Europe
to fend for itself. A beacon of stability and prosperity in the past a naive and unprepared
Europe facing new and terrifying challenges is today more than ever torn apart increasingly
unstable and adrift.
