Redrawing the Social Contract

When the angry twenty-four-year-old who tells me that the Social Contract between the state and its citizens is broken, is my son, I take notice and listen. Alejandro is an angry young man representative of many of his generation. He is well educated and travelled, he speaks many foreign languages yet insecurity pervades as to what the world has in store for him and his generation as job security becomes more scarce, as stable political systems try to reinvent themselves to cope with growing governance issues, and as mass protests have become the norm across Europe. He also represents the epitome of European integration and its emphasis on diversity. On the other hand, with a Greek father and a Spanish mother, his two countries have been among the most severely hit by the decade-long economic crisis with the highest rates of youth unemployment in the EU, standing at nearly 40% in Greece and 33% in Spain as per July 2018.

The ongoing “yellow vests” protests in France are indicative that something is amiss, in particular in the most developed and richest part of the world. At a time when human development indicators worldwide are increasingly positive with less people living in poverty, life expectancy growing, and more getting an education, while those belonging to middle class outnumber those living in poverty for the first time in history, the growing malaise in the developed world is a cause for concern.

If we were to add that the options for Alejandro and his generation, the so called ‘millennials’ is that even when they find employment, their wages are too low, thereby increasing their chances to live on the verge of poverty. With limited opportunities in the early stages of their careers, the frustration of millennials with politics, politicians, and public institutions grows. This in turn has a potential impact on their radicalization and their turn towards populism together with other vulnerable population groups such as the working poor, and the NEETS (Not in Education, Employment or Training).

In other words, their feeling of being marginalized or disempowered creates a volatile social mix that needs to be debated, understood, and tackled both within countries as well as EU-wide. In this electoral year for Europe, where European Parliament elections are to be held in late May, this growing sense of deepening inequality is bound to be reflected in the composition of the new European Parliament with possible dilatory effects on the functioning of European institutions.

The need for a more inclusive economy comes to the fore. Is the current growth model sustainable when, on the one hand, statistics show that employment rates in the EU are at a record level according to the European Commission with over 329 million people active parts of the workforce while, on the other hand, much of it is insecure work at low wages and fewer working hours than in 2008 when the economic crisis took hold? How does work or how can it add value to society? This is another crucial aspect of today’s general malaise that needs to be redefined. The emphasis of high growth rates coupled with the effects of hyper-globalization is under question as its seems to enhance pessimism with the political process and inequality in the workplace or due to lack of access to it. In fact, across the democratic space that is Europe, the diversity and democracy mantra beyond borders is increasingly challenged by the rise of xenophobia as a response to the inability of states to effectively address local development challenges that address job security and proper wages. Part of the response of part of the political system is that the influx of immigrants and asylum seekers from Europe’s poorer neighbourhoods is responsible for the lack of opportunities across the continent for Europe’s youth, the working poor, and the NEETs.

Effectively, something has to change. The Social Contract is in dire need of reassessment and rewriting otherwise the triptych of democracy, economic growth, and globalization cannot sustain itself for much longer. And if what happens in the developed world is the bellwether for the state of the rest of the globe, whatever advances in the standards of living and the human development indicators may eventually stall or regress.

It may be time to for Europe to seriously reconsider what it stands for. It needs to aspire to and promote a more resilient, inclusive, and compassionate society and economic model in order to ensure the viability and growth of the democratic space and its diversity that embody it. Otherwise, the Social Contract will find itself unable to be reformulated without further and potentially destabilizing polarization, dissension, and division that would lower the quality of the normative aspects of integration and a more equitable economic environment to the detriment of the millennials and other disadvantaged groups with real grievances and concerns. Advancing the causes of dignity (economic and social) and freedom (human rights, rule of law, and democracy) is a must.