Elected from 1999 to 2019 to the European Parliament, French Minister of European Affairs in the Balladur government and Minister of the Budget in the Juppé II team, Béarnais Alain Lamassoure continues his European commitment by steering a European Observatory on the teaching of history. Unveiled in December in Strasbourg, its report offers the first diagnosis on a crucial subject for consolidating peace on the continent.
Why did you launch this work on the way history is taught across Europe?
At the end of my political career, I wondered if the awakening of extremist anti-European movements was not linked to poor teaching of history. What if this, instead of serving to reconcile people, did not result in transmitting hatred of others to the rising generation. When they entered the Union in 2004, the ten countries of central and eastern Europe still had a vision of Europe from the 1930s.
“In Catalonia, in Euskadi, in Scotland, in Flanders, we have returned to nationalist readings going as far as lies.”
Can we prevent different readings of history from coexisting?
No, but you have to be able to compare the stories. There are thus three contradictory versions of the battle of the Champ des Merles (1389) : Serbian, Kosovar and Turkish. This is why I am delighted that these three countries are in our observatory. To reconcile the Bosniaks after the Balkan War, the European Union wanted all children to be educated in the same schools: we had just forgotten to specify that to learn the same history, they would also have to be in the same classes .
Is history everywhere oriented by the “national narrative”?
Everywhere, no. But often. In Catalonia, in Euskadi, in Scotland, in Flanders, we have returned to nationalist readings going as far as lies: Christopher Columbus would have been Catalan (he was Genoese, Editor’s note) and the original version of Don Quixote would have been written in Catalan, not in Castilian! In Scotland, since education has been devolved, children have been told that their people were oppressed by the English, forgetting how much the Scots benefited from British imperial expansion.
“We will not guarantee peace in Europe by producing 50% amnesiacs and 50% nationalists”
In these countries at least, history is taught. This is not the case everywhere…
No. In Scandinavia and the Netherlands, countries marked by the “woke” ideology according to which white men are responsible for the misfortunes of the world, it is believed that telling the story could give young people conquering ideas. Result: the very principle of its national education was deemed unconstitutional in the Netherlands where students are offered a choice of themes linked to the past, without chronology or connection between them. In Scandinavia, history is completely submerged in the “humanities”.
With what consequences?
Countries seen in Europe as models are sometimes governed by elected officials who are ignorant of history. And worked by a far right more extremist than the National Rally in France. In The Hague, Geert Wilders claims to govern with the center right while making neo-Nazi remarks. In Stockholm, the “Sweden Democrats” are in the majority. As for the Danish socialist government, it is copying the program of the far right on immigration.
Does this worry you?
Yes. European reconciliation made people believe that the normal state of societies was peaceful, whereas the Ukrainian war shows the opposite. And we will not guarantee peace in Europe by producing 50% amnesiacs and 50% nationalists. On the contrary, it is by teaching history, comparing stories and refusing to exalt the patriotic fiber that we will achieve this.
Do some countries practice this recipe?
We see that those who have had a global adventure – France, the Iberian countries, Ireland, Italy – partly escape purely national readings. But history is linked to the construction of nations and its teaching is discussed everywhere. In France, where a strong historical school exists, two poles – one national (Pierre Nora), the other global (Patrick Boucheron) – clash. Germany, due to its Nazi past, has developed good history teaching, but it depends on the competence of each of the 16 Länder.
“Apart from closed dictatorships such as Russia, the opening of archives and their availability on the Internet means that our national histories are discussed abroad”
There are as many systems as there are countries and even regions. How to make stories dialogue?
Our objective is more modest: to recall the importance of teaching it, to take stock of the situation, to raise awareness. The moment is right because in the face of the populist and extremist wave, a reasonable majority exists across Europe and is looking for solutions. Apart from closed dictatorships such as Russia, the opening of archives and their availability on the Internet means that our national histories are discussed abroad.
This does not prevent watertight “bubbles” from developing and “alternative truths” from prospering…
Indeed and this justifies the concern. This is why I invite universities, parliaments and the media to take up the subject. Europe is in the process of inventing a model for governing a multinational group in peace. But to succeed and inspire other countries around the world, our political scientists, our lawyers, our historians must take an interest in it.
Who are the participating countries?
Launched under the French Presidency of the European Union in 2019, the Observatory on History Teaching in Europe (OEHE) is not limited to the European Union but encompasses the 46 member states of the Council of Europe. An original organization financed by voluntary contributions, it brings together at this stage a core of 18 countries (including two, Ukraine and Moldova, with observer status) which have agreed to compare the way in which they teach this discipline: France , Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Luxembourg, Slovenia, Serbia, Georgia, Greece, North Macedonia, Turkey, Cyprus, Malta, Andorra, Armenia, Albania.
Contacts are being made with Germany, Italy, Poland, Bulgaria, and soon with the Baltic, Scandinavian and Eastern European countries, to flesh out the diagnosis. Russia was excluded due to the invasion of Ukraine and the deterrent effect of its possible presence on the countries of the former Soviet bloc.
2024-01-05 03:05:25
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