The Brussels Business Page #7

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they turned up in person.

Talking to other members

at their own level.

So it functioned like a club,

like any other club, ...

... like a church

club or dance club.

When they met, ...

... if you put the Italian

car manufacturer ...

... and a German chemical

manufacturer together ...

... they discovered that they

have common problems.

They are all worried

about barriers to trade.

They are all worried about

skill of young people ...

... who were

trying to get jobs.

They are all worried about

the world financial system.

And so, all the time we

are meeting this way ...

... and these people would give

48 hours, which is a lot of time, ...

... and then all

go home. And ...

... we would hope they

would spread the message ...

... to their own colleagues,

to their own countries ...

... and to their own governments,

to their own politicians.

You know, to talk

more widely about it.

Saying that we need to build

Europe that works better.

Because without

Europe we are lost.

Left behind was a clear message

to the following EU summit ...

... for the heads of

goverments a few days later.

Adopt this

single market ...

... and monetary union,

infrastructure projects, ...

... flexible labor market,

deregulation, ...

... downsized public services,

austerity measures ...

... and so on, a whole

Neoliberal agenda for them.

It was the message of the

ERT you could find it ...

... also elsewhere in kind

of a business circles. But ...

... what we found

very scary was the ...

... very close cooperation

and personal links also ...

... between ERT and the European

Commission, in particular.

So basically, our picture got

confirmed by American scholar ...

... steppin' in to the topic,

Maria Green Cowles.

I was interested in ...

... doing something about Europe,

something about the EU.

Here in the US

we really didnt ...

... know much about the

single market program ...

... until our business people here

in US brought it to Congress.

And all of sudden there was this big

disscusion about fortress Europe ...

... and that the European Community

at the time was creating this entity ...

... that would prevent American firms

for beeing able to do business there.

And if you ask me to think

what was the role of business ...

... behind the single

market program ...

... what I could read and what have

been published at that time, ...

... really have suggested that it was

largely government led initiative.

But once I started

asking questions ...

... in meeting with different

people in Brussels ...

... it started a whole

different story.

I start to talking with some

of the CEO's and then ...

... particularlly with the Corporate

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