Europe in 2057 – Weakened, but spirited

It is 2057 and the EU is celebrating its 100th birthday. Twelve years ago few thought it would get this far, after the disastrous 2045 war when the Union’s army intervened clumsily in the war of the ‘stans’ to protect its final oil reserves in what was once known as Uzbekistan.

Its humiliation by Indian and Russian forces combined, and the US peace initiative at the New UN (NUN) leaning heavily in China’s favour given their joint alliance, had reduced the EU’s global power to levels not seen since 2007 when most other global players saw it as little more than a trade bloc. And then the final straw of being thrown off the NUN Security Council in 2046.

Since then bitter internal debates have consumed the Union. Some pointed back to the EU’s definitive decision in 2025 to tell Turkey and Ukraine that they would never be welcome as the turning point that had weakened the Union’s hand in investing in central Asian energy fields and given it no friendly neighbours or political routes into the region. The RUTES - Russia, Ukraine, Turkey - energy supply cartel after 2030 had tightened the screw on energy prices and contributed to a decade of collapsing EU competitiveness and domestic political problems in the face of power cuts, falling incomes and unemployment.

The English - out of the Union after the break-up of the UK in 2020 - had crowed from the outside, their trade and energy network with the RTU meaning they had avoided the 2030s collapse. The Union had retaliated by cutting preferential trade links citing human rights abuses, not least England’s growing repression of its once independent media.

But somehow the Union had staggered on - and had reached 38 members in 2025 - having lost the English but gained independent Wales and Scotland, the seven Balkan countries, Wallonia and Flanders after Belgium’s 2014 split, and of course Moldova after its 2020 federation with Romania collapsed.

As predicted at the start of the century, the EU had aged and political power balances within the Union had shifted as a result. The northern members and France had managed to keep their populations stable and had relatively large young populations as well as their expensive-to-look after older cohorts. Italy, Greece and Spain had fought hard but had finally lost their too many votes in the prime ministers’ Council in 2050, reducing voting power by a third. And with declining political clout also went declining economic clout, as pensions and health costs for the huge elderly population and shrinking workforces and climate change drove everything from tourism to agriculture to the north.

Although China and Russia had grown old too, India, Turkey, the US and Africa were young and all throwing their weight around at the NUN - the former three adding in their trade and competitiveness clout while the African Union regularly condemned the EU for the lack of political rights it gave to the ever-growing, but not much liked, African migrant population in Europe which kept most vital services ticking over.

The memories of the disastrous 2045 war had started to fade a little, with the unexpected boom in the early 2050s from a new find of ultra-deep sea oil off Brittany. And with a tough young EU prime minister elected to lead the prime ministers’ Council in 2052 - Jan Palik from Slovenia who had revitalised the demoralised European Democrats, leading them to victory in the 2051 elections - some small amounts of optimism were starting to return.

Palik was even tentatively reaching out to Turkey in an attempt to forge a separate energy deal unconnected to RUTES, while looking to build a joint EU-Turkey coalition to get reform at the NUN and find some way back onto the Security Council. And given Turkey’s good relations with India since the 2045 war, there was even some chance that with clever diplomatic footwork, the Indians might not block the EU’s return.

And so spirited but limited celebrations were being planned for the EU’s 100th birthday. It had not exactly been Europe’s century so far. But the Union was still there and who knows, with the tentative resurgence in birth rates visible in the previous five years, in the next 50 years the EU might start to match the geopolitical strength of the US, China and India.

• Kirsty Hughes is a freelance writer based in London.

It is 2057 and the EU is celebrating its 100th birthday. Twelve years ago few thought it would get this far, after the disastrous 2045 war when the Union’s army intervened clumsily in the war of the ‘stans’ to protect its final oil reserves in what was once known as Uzbekistan.