Print Media Analysis - Essay Example

Europe is different than America in that it has a common currency without a common government to oversee economic policy (Krugman). The these two articles both tackle the future of the Euro – and attempt to assess the issues involved and the odds of success. The first article, by Timothy Garton Ash, outlines the history of riots and dissatisfaction that have erupted in the European Union since the beginning of this financial crisis, then goes on to outline the steps that would be necessary for preserving the European Union.

It is important to note that this article is from the end of last year, and many things have happened in the interim, but essentially the issues stay the same, which is that the relationship between the EU’s poorer and richer countries is fraying. Krugman’s article indicates that the fall of the Euro, and possibly the EU, is imminent, and he faults failed economic policy, as well as the fundamental nature of the EU, as the problem. Interestingly, both of these articles come from and espouse a liberal perspective, though in very different, and somewhat contradictory, ways.

Krugman’s article faults conservative measures, such as budget cuts and austerity, for the depression’s continuance, but dislikes the EU as a structure, while Ash treats the large, overarching government of the EU as a good thing. The ideological spin of the Krugman article is inherently liberal, especially in his visceral attacks on austerity measures. He indicates that any good economist could have indicated (and did indicate) that austerity measures would lead to a depression (Krugman).

This is a fundamentally liberal perspective, as it calls for higher government spending. Conservatives would argue that the deficit explosion is too much to handle, and that the Greece and other country’s addiction to debt is the fundamental issue, and that the austerity measures are the only method of stopping the explosion of such debt to unmanageable proportions. Ash’s article also takes a liberal perspective, in most ways. Firstly, it inherently treats the large government of the EU, with some centralized authority and one of the most byzantine bureaucracies on the planet, as good thing, talking about how it should be “saved” and the methods in place to do so.

A conservative would likely be for smaller government, and find the dissolution of the European Union not at all problematic. He focuses much more than Krugman on the political situation on the ground, observing that the German declaration that funds going to Greece must come with “government oversight” (from Germany), and how Greeks with a national memory of the Second World War find that troubling (Ash). Liberal ideologies are present in both of these articles, but in two different ways.

Kruger demonstrates socio-economic liberalism, seeing large government spending as a good thing, while Ash sees large governments as inherently good and worth saving (something that Kruger disagrees with, calling the Euro a “failed experiment”). Though conservatives talking about these issues might have some good points – for instance, that it irresponsible for a country as small as Greece to drive up debts that are unmanageable in order to provide social programming. Consistently spending more money than is available is an irresponsible thing to do, and conservatives are right to point that out. However,