The world of the next 25 years will not be the world of the last 25 years. Let’s therefore not follow the old schemes from the turn of the century, as they lead us nowhere.

For Europe, one of the defining issues will be an irreversible change in transatlantic relations, as we have known them since at least 1989.

We can witness it almost every day and it has two main aspects: Geopolitical and economic.

Geopolitically, The United States is losing interest in Europe as a global player and ally. Consider its new strategies - NSS, NDS. Their focus is to maintain dominance in Western hemisphere (thus a lot of attention to Canada, Greenland, Mexico, Latin America) and to deter/prevent China, in particular, from dominating the Pacific theatre.

That’s why they do not want to waste more resources on European security, particularly on security. That’s why they want to get rid of the the problem of the war in Ukraine - they see it as our problem, no longer their problem and they prefer to reach a deal with Russia on this issue. And that, sooner or later, would force Europe (EU) to adopt some form of its own “strategic autonomy”. This, however, poses a risk. Once again, it could be stolen by federalists, who - under the banner of "strategic autonomy" and also defence, security etc. - would try to sell more unification, more centralization, further transfers of power to supranational institutions. We must not allow this to happen. We must be ready to come up with our own vision of "strategic autonomy", built not on escalation or confrontation, pursued by people like Merz or Macron, but rather on building a new modus vivendi and a new stability on the whole continent (which, geopolitically is not just Europe, but rather the wider Eurasian space). We can see new political forces emerging … that seem to understand that. But what we need most to achieve this is strength. National, sovereigntist, traditionalist, conservative forces are too fragmented, too divided. We must change this, in order to build a future majority in EU institutions - European Parliament (EP), European Commission (EC)- and to set the agenda.

Economically, let’s forget about anything close to a transatlantic free-trade area. The US does not hesitate to protect its own market by quotas, tariffs and other instruments, if they feel it necessary. They won’t stop, regardless of the administration - America First is a sign of the times. Economic globalisation, free trade and the removal of barriers are all in decline. Paradoxically, now it’s mostly the Global South that pursues free trade. Not the world’s most “capitalist” country, the USA. We must find our own response to that, not copy and paste any other power. On the one hand, we must be ready to protect our economies against unfair practices. On the other, we must not isolate ourselves from the rest of the world, because trade and exports remain major driving forces behind our economic growth and wealth and because energy security depends heavily on sources located elsewhere and beyond our control. So again, rather than economic confrontation, we should identify our main trade partners and markets and building modus vivendi (we have no time here to explore the phenomenon of AI further, where EU is dramatically lagging both the US and China with profound consequences).

To sum up, what should or will the EU look like in 2050?

It shouldn’t try to fight in a higher weight category than it really belongs to. It won’t be a global player like the US or China.

It will be less federalist.

It will be less transatlantic.

It should be more open to other parts of the world, outside Euro-Atlantic civilisation, particularly Asia.

It should not aspire to become a confrontational military power, but rather a power capable of building and maintaining a stable modus vivendi with its neighbours and partners.

Jan Zahradil — Former Member of the European Parliament (Czech Republic)