Expert Opinion

No exercise in the history of international cooperation has been declared dead, dying, or comatose as often as the European Union. Its goals have repeatedly been called into question, every disagreement among its leaders is interpreted as another sign of crisis, and its silence in the face of critical international problems is offered as evidence of its irrelevance.

For the doubters, the last few years have been a festival of doom, with the division over Iraq, the collapse of the constitutional treaty, the muddled response to the global economic crisis, and - most recently - the trials and tribulations of the euro. In the face of these multiple assaults on its credibility, even the most ardent champions of the EU have found themselves reviewing their opinions.

Strength through crisis

The EU has, it seems, become typecast as a failure, an irrelevance, and a sideshow, and attempts to suggest otherwise are usually met with disbelief and the recitation of its myriad woes, whether it's listless labor markets, its aging population, or the crisis of European multiculturalism. So low has it sunk in the estimation of many that European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso was moved not long ago to bemoan "the intellectual glamour of pessimism and constant denigration" that was doing so much damage to Europe's image.

But the litany of problems should come as no surprise. Jean Monnet, one of the founders of the EU, once warned that Europe would be "established through crises" and that the "outcome will be the sum of the outcomes of those crises."

And if we think about just one of the challenges facing the architects of European integration - forging political agreement in a part of the world where, until World War II, war and conflict was almost routine - even the most ardent of eurosceptics must concede the immensity of what has been achieved. The EU cannot take all the credit, to be sure, but it has been central to the building of a durable European peace: Europeans no longer threaten each other, nor do they threaten others, nor are they threatened by others. This is no mean achievement.

Vacuum in leadership

But there is more. In a world desperately seeking leadership, we are faced with uninspiring choices. There is the United States, now discredited in the minds of many because of its failed militarism, corporate greed, uncontrolled public spending, and social conservatism. There is China, vast and growing, to be sure, but critically handicapped by its disregard for democracy. There is India, also vast and certainly more democratic than China, but still hobbled by crushing poverty and no more than a regional player at best. Brazil and Russia, too, have been nominated as great powers, but without much conviction.

Then there is the European Union, routinely left out of most discussions about great power, its vague shape on the geopolitical radar emphasized every time there is another international crisis, when the instinct of almost everyone is to turn to the Americans. Few seem to much care what the Europeans think.

But how we understand the global role of the EU depends on how we understand power, and in this regard our imaginations are limited by two distracting conventions.

First, even in the era of globalization, we still define power mainly in military terms. It seems that whoever has the biggest military, and the ability to commit it with the greatest geographical flexibility, is the only power worth taking seriously. And yet the record shows clearly that military power offers no guarantees (history is littered with victorious Davids and hobbling Goliaths), and the dynamics of the new international system have thrown up multiple problems for which military power offers few solutions: terrorism, illegal immigration, climate change, drugs, and failed states, among others.

Close look at power tropes

Second, we still tend to think of power and influence in terms of states. You cannot be a great power, it seems unless you are a self-contained state with a government that can make decisions, as well as wielding military and economic clout. The idea that 27 often fractious European states could offer leadership and direction is surely absurd.

But consider the evidence. The EU is the wealthiest marketplace in the world, with half a billion educated and relatively wealthy consumers. It accounts for the biggest share of international trade, and is the biggest source of, and magnet for, foreign direct investment in the world. It is home base for the largest number of listings on the Fortune magazine Global 500 list of the world's biggest corporations.

Seventeen of its member states have a single currency that offers the only real competition to the dominance of the US dollar. It is by far the biggest source of official development assistance in the world. And if it is such a failure, why are so many more countries lining up to join the club?

Quietly impressive

This is an impressive resume, all the more so if we consider that the power of attraction (soft power) is just as important in the new international system - if not even more important - than the power of threats and coercion (hard power). The United States is heard on the international stage because its weapons allow it to be heard. But this does not mean that the EU has been unable to marshal its economic tools in order to make its own kind of mark; it's just that we don't hear about it quite so often.

The EU is a superpower, in the sense that it has both the means and the willingness to influence events at a global level. It has many problems and imperfections, to be sure, but which great power does not? And it has survived 60 years of predictions that it will fail.

Surely it is time to take a new look at the nature of power, to look beyond the EU's short-term problems, and to acknowledge that of all the world's leading actors, the EU may be in the best place to help redefine the nature of the international system.

John McCormick is the Jean Monet Chair of European politics at Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis. His most recent book "Europeanism" highlights the political, social and economic particularities of Europe and Europeans.

Editor: Jennifer Abramsohn/Rob Mudge