Europe’s social model closes doors to the poor
Religion & Liberty Online

Europe’s social model closes doors to the poor

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Americans living in Europe were often scolded about the need for big, centralized government to look after the poor, and we heard yet again about the moral superiority of Europe’s social model over America’s market-driven one.

People who follow the Acton Institute and read the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page are too smart and well-informed to fall for such bromides. The American Entreprise magazine also devoted a whole issue debunking Europe’s claims.

But when mainstream publications such as Newsweek International can see the hypocrisy and obvious failings of European protectionism, we may be reaching a tipping point.

This week’s edition has an article on Europe’s increasing reluctance to expand global trade. The biggest culprits are France, Germany and Italy, the continent’s three largest economies but whose political classes, whether they be of the left or of the right, are beholden to trade unions and other opponents of increased competition. (The U.S. Congress is not spared deserved criticism, either.)

Part of the socialist mystique is that the poor are too vulnerable to survive market changes – but the Newsweek article shows how the poor also have the most to gain from increased trade. Europeans must start to understand that this affects not only the poor in Africa and Asia but in their own countries as well.

As Tony Blair recently told the European Parliament, “What type of social model is it that has 20 million unemployed?”

Kishore Jayabalan

Kishore Jayabalan is director of Istituto Acton, the Acton Institute's Rome office. Formerly, he worked for the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace as the lead policy analyst on sustainable development and arms control. Kishore Jayabalan earned a B.A. in political science and economics from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. In college, he was executive editor of The Michigan Review and an economic policy intern for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He worked as an international economist for the Bureau of Labor Statistics in Washington, D.C. and then graduated with an M.A. in political science from the University of Toronto. While in Toronto, Kishore interned in the university's Newman Centre, which led to his appointment to the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations in New York. Two years later, he returned to Rome to work for the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace as the Holy See's lead policy analyst on sustainable development and arms control. As director of Istituto Acton, Kishore organizes the institute's educational and outreach efforts in Rome and throughout Europe.