Opinion Corner 3 - How Europe is viewed in the United States
Public support for the EU has shot up in the United States over the last five years as the divisions over the Iraq war have dissipated. In 2004 only 39% of respondents in a Pew survey said they had a favourable view of the EU. By 2009 this figure has risen to 56% - the biggest jump of all the countries polled.
Pull-out figure: 39% to 56%
But before EU public relations types crack open the champagne, American political commentators from across the political spectrum are quick to point out that that:
Most Americans know and care very little about the EU. “The impact of the EU on the country at large is nil,” says Christopher Caldwell, a senior editor at the Weekly Standard magazine. Admits Craig Kennedy, President of the German Marshall Fund of the United States: “The EU is a big, complicated institution American people don’t understand very well.”
While the U.S. public view the EU favourably, most Washington D.C.-based policy experts see the Union as a fine idea in theory but weak, divided and self-obsessed.
Martin Walker, Senior Director, Global Business Policy Council
(title + player)
Video Interview: 41”01 (sous-titres FR)
P10_USA_01_WALKER
Pull-out quote: “The EU keeps on failing to live up to its own rhetoric”
Pull-out figure: 39% to 56%
But before EU public relations types crack open the champagne, American political commentators from across the political spectrum are quick to point out that that:
Most Americans know and care very little about the EU. “The impact of the EU on the country at large is nil,” says Christopher Caldwell, a senior editor at the Weekly Standard magazine. Admits Craig Kennedy, President of the German Marshall Fund of the United States: “The EU is a big, complicated institution American people don’t understand very well.”
While the U.S. public view the EU favourably, most Washington D.C.-based policy experts see the Union as a fine idea in theory but weak, divided and self-obsessed.
Martin Walker, Senior Director, Global Business Policy Council
(title + player)
Video Interview: 41”01 (sous-titres FR)
P10_USA_01_WALKER
Pull-out quote: “The EU keeps on failing to live up to its own rhetoric”