EA-3167 13 hours ago |

The author seems to gloss over the fact that the impetus for Europe's "rapid rise" was that they colonized a large fraction of the planet and extracted vast resources. The rise of European living standards, especially initially, was built on a brutal drop in living standards (and just living) for millions of people. Only after that settled down with the help of TWO WORLD WARS did we start to enter the modern "Europe is actually pretty nice" era.

And... it's not really an era now is it? It's just recent history, and as the rise of the AfD and other far right entities show, it's not a given that this the future of Europe. Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the reaction to immigration from the MENA region... these relatively modest shocks have gone through the European sociopolitical systems like wildfire.

So I appreciate his optimism, and it is optimism, but it isn't particularly grounded in reality.

RicoElectrico 13 hours ago | root | parent |

Excuse me? East of Germany most countries did not own any colonies.

EA-3167 13 hours ago | root | parent |

I made some assumptions based on the author's assertion that "Europe is on top of the world." East of Germany, most countries are not that, and didn't have the arc the author describes.