Friday, November 02, 2012

"We are all in this together; therefore, we must all be responsible" vs. "... we need to help each other out"

--- Robin Niblett, director of Chatham House, a London-based think tank, quoted in CS Monitor  "Is Europe really on the brink" 29 October 2012, page 5.

A fascinating contrast of views of responsibility vs. solidarity, framed here as the German vs. Southern perspectives. The "we must all be responsible" view would be the Conservative response in the US, and "we need to help each other out" would be the Progressive one. From the article:
"There is no conviction yet that Germany is willing to commit to the kind of mutualization of debt that is fundamental to the survival of the euro," says Dr. Niblett at Chatham House. "They define Europe's collective responsibility rather than solidarity. That means: 'We are all in this together; therefore, we must all be responsible,' not, 'We are all in this together, so we need to help each other out.' Making that transition from the former to the latter has not yet happened in Germany."