Jacques Attali is a French economist, writer and senior civil servant. He is a former adviser to President François Mitterrand and was the first president of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. He writes a column for L’Express. This appeared on June 7.
If the coming months see the European Union continue to disintegrate, in keeping with the most pessimistic scenarios that we have been sketching here for years now, it will soon cease to exist altogether….
The sequence of events is pre-determined: letting Greece go bankrupt, not rescuing the Spanish banks and not responding to the demands that will come from Italy and France. And there you go, 60 years of effort down the drain.
What hope remains when the solution is technically so simple (as we’ve said repeatedly here: with the creation of a federal Eurozone) and yet so impossible politically? The hope that the people will wake up. And how?
By means of a Franco–German accord putting the following question to the entire Eurozone in a referendum on the same day: “Are you ready to relinquish part of your sovereignty to maintain your comfort and well-being?”
At least one can dream this will happen.
Eric Koch’s new book, The Golden Years: Five Stories, was launched on Saturday, March 16. The book is available from the 
