A Grand Illusion? An Essay on Europe.

Many recent books about Europe have been either glorifications of the past of that continent or premature celebrations of supranational integration. This volume by Tony Judt, a collection of essays based on three lectures, is quite different. It is a welcome antidote to the Euro-romanticism of many U.S. political observers and of their tendency to exaggerate the importance of institutional factors. The author, a well-known scholar of modem European, in particular French, history, touches upon a number of themes: the collective national ego of the French, marked by wishful thinking about the global role of their country; the continued fear of Germany and the implications of German reunification for European stability; the fiscal pressures on the welfare state in all European countries; the consequences of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the problem of postcommunist Eastern European identities; and the special problems of extra-European immigrants.

The book does not present new information; it deals with a number of perennial questions and restates aspects of conventional wisdom, but it does so in an interesting and literate …