Recently I found a quote from Raïssa Maritain, the wife of the great philosopher. "Nos amis font partie de notre vie, notre vie et explique nos amitiés (our friends our part of our lives, our lives declares our friendship). "Last week I read in a simple plaque in a town hall somewhere in Belgium: "la comprehension et l'amitie entre les peuples feront l'Europe. "Understanding and friendship between the peoples will make Europe. A sentence from 1958. Then, you could say it so simple in the year when six countries started an Economic Community.
The innocence and generosity from that time is far away. Today the EU is seen as a source of mania, of budget cuts, competition in the labor market, subsidy flows - and are the freedoms and opportunities that the Union also offers to students, entrepreneurs, consumers, travelers almost taken for granted.

The beautiful idea of 'Europe' decreased in the indication "Brussels" and that original nucleus, coexistence of nations and peoples on our old continent, is slowly disappeared out of sight. And yet ... "Understanding and friendship between the peoples will make Europe." Also today.
Confidence is thereby the keyword. Creating trust and regaining confidence. Between governments and between people. It is difficult in an age of distrust. The masters of suspicion (Marx, Nietzsche and Freud) have done their work well.

Of course the situation is very different now than fifty years ago. The fate of the Europeans today is in many ways stronger ringed than ever.Partly through work of the Union itself. She became a victim of her own success. The integration is deeply penetrated in daily life. We see the advantages but also disadvantages - and in this critical time especially disadvantages.

It's one thing to share with six neighboring countries a market for agricultural and industrial products ... It's a complete other thing to mount with almost 30 countries in the world and to share one currency with 17 countries. Certainly the latter requires much moremutual understanding and trust.

Coexistence of peoples and states, is like coexistence of people: it requires effort. "Love is a verb." Everyone must take into account the other, asin a partnership or a marriage. Also in the Eurozone we are together "for better and for worse. "We have certainly experienced this for the last two years with the debt crisis. In that crisis came the realization how much we all are intertwined in the Eurozone and therefore have become dependent from each other. How state debt, housing bubble, pension reform in one country (or lack of it), has a direct impact on jobs or savings in another country. Perhaps we knew already theoretically that we, with the Economic and Monetary Union, have become each other's territory in some way, but by the crisis we know it now also in practice. That was not always a pleasant discovery, I readily admit that. And it makes Europe also not popular with the people. - I will return on this subject in a moment.

But first I want to say something more, even from my own experience, about the debt crisis. That crisis coincidenced almost my first term as President of the European Council. I say in caution: there is no causal relationship between the two ..! No "cum hoc ergo propter hoc (after this, therefore because of this). "However, the debt crisis did shape the role I fill from early 2010. After all, events often drives politics. I did wanted to use the period of my office as President to maintain a common direction during the storm, at the highest level. In this, I see myself ((*) and Ben Knapen has already referred to) as "Guardian of the trust." Ensuring mutual understanding between the head of states of governments, as they come to the table 6 or 7 times a year to make decisions. If they each other do not trust, what can we expect from the people? Leaders must take the lead in this. I am therefore pleased that there is trust at our European table.
That was needed too. The euro crisis was - and still in a sense is- an unprecedented crisis in terms of severity and extent. Our currency was and is forcibly put to the test. The euro was born with two defects, with insufficient supervision (which then also became toothless in 2003 when two large countries undermined the Stability Pact) and with insufficient response during the crisis.
Lack of discipline made it a coin for good weather. And therefore it was that we had to repair middle in the storm our ship in the middle of the storm.

Drastic decisions were required. We tried to tackle the roots of the crisis. In each country, elimination of excessive debt and deficit. Through making our economies more competitive. And also be able to cope with the crisis. From that interdependence and interconnectedness we have drawn the lessons. It has become a long haul of institutional reforms. Responsibility and solidarity were the keywords. And with the result: tougher sanctions. better control on both the budgets but also (and this is new) on the economies. The creation of financial emergency funds. Structural reforms of economies, labor markets and pensions. Tightened banking supervision. And so on.
For some journalistic observers it seemed all little steps, but who is looking back over the full period of two years and add up all those little steps will come to a completely different conclusion. The Union today is incomparably better placed than 3 years ago to intercept shocks and fluctuations.

As guardian of unity of the 27 countries I have always insisted on, and make ensured that all Member States and institutions were involved in this work. European decisions should not be a matter of winners and losers. Each member of the European Council should support the decisions, which member can defend in his own country, whether here in the House of Representatives or in the Greek Parliament. To this end, time is required, and - again - confidence.

The crisis we are currently experiencing, must never be repeated. That I regard as a of the main challenges in my second term. But there is more that should happen.
The word "Europe" has long been a sign of hope, and was equated with peace and prosperity. During the recent crisis that equalization is under pressure. For some, "Europe" became a dirty word. It's a big task to ensure that Europe will become again a symbol of hope. A symbol of a better future for all of us, together.

About that, I want to make some comments. First, we may not underestimate the emotional, psychological impact of the crisis. Our nations experienced two dramatic confidence shocks. In 2008-2009, the credit crisis and confidence in banks. (And when I read the newspapers, I see that you also here in the Netherlands are still struggling on the credit crisis politically ...). In 2010-2011: the euro crisis and confidence in the currency. Not its value, but its existence. We have, as I said, worked hard to overcome this blows.
Yet it will take time this underlying confidence - of consumers, investors, the public - to restore. To reconcile again people with their currency. Here counts in the first place the moral of the results. We must make clear to consumers, to investors, to taxpayers, that the euro is irreversible and that this crisis will be finally overcome. And a return of confidence in itself has a positive effect on economic growth. Certainly in countries like the Netherlands, where the mild recession indeed is mainly a question of trust.

Second, in the euro crisis Europe is for countries on both sides of the debate the culprit. In creditor countries the feeling is alive that the EU "our hard-working citizens"(I speak in clichés) do pay for corruption and mismanagement of the so-called Mediterranean. One may recall that it concerns only loans, contingent loans, which the German or Dutch taxpayers has cost no cents (on the contrairy!). But that will make little impression, and it is true that there is risk in the game.
In debtor countries, however, the EU gets the blame for budget cuts, of the erosion of welfare. This is obviously unfair: a debt of 160 percent of GDP, a public deficit of 15 pc. BNP is anyway untenable (I call the Greek figures) - EU or no EU.

Again here, the recovery of confidence is a matter of perseverance.

Finally, at the end of this thank you, I will share with you a third idea - an idea that touches a part of the dissatisfaction about the European Union (as it was heard very loudly now almost seven years ago in the referendum of 2005, also in the Netherlands) and whereat we can do something.
We have Europe from the beginning designed as a "space" and perhaps underestimated that people also need a "place". A place to feel at home.

The distinction between both terms place and space - in French "place" and "espace" - is explored by the French philosopher Michel de Certeau.Locality or place is associated with an order. An arrangement of elements. No two things can be at the same place. Locality provides stability, security. In the opposite, 'space' is related to motion. It's about direction, about ime. Not for certainty and predictability, but for possibility.

Perhaps you already feel how these abstract notions apply in the work of the Union.

Europe is conceived as a market, an area of free movement for goods, capital, persons, services. Lifting borders, that was the European activity par excellence. Freedoms and opportunities for individuals to undertake actions. And what energy is spent to achieve this goals in the last 50 years by government, ministers, commissioners, parliamentarians, judges. And what a struggle is there has been to make Europe one space!Successive Dutch governments and politicians played here a terrifying role: think of minister Jan Willem Beyen who devised the plan for the market (but my compatriot Paul-Henri Spaak was more convenient and received the honors!). For Europe-as-place was less attention. After all, the Community was founded after a momentum of motion. This post-war mentality also fitted well with the years of economic expansion, the general and increasing prosperity and in all respects a stable political situation (despite or perhaps because of the Cold War). But that world from 1989 does not exist anymore. The term "globalization" summarized how the economic space spanned the world. This was seen more and more as a threat and less more as an opportunity seen, against which one is asking to "protect".

Is Europe a place of safety and security? On itself, the Union is working very hard on it - fighting together against illegal immigration or against organized crime. Yet dominates the idea of a Union that, just by opening a space, uncertainty and insecurity does increase. That brings unwelcome competition. Or do also think of the resistance against the expansion of the Schengen area with Romania and Bulgaria.

Anyway, the successive enlargements worked destabilizing. People in West Europe may have the feeling, especially since 2004 when 10 countries join at the same time: "But where does that Union ends?" As long as there are new countries in the waiting room, sit, it will indeed be difficult to develop a sense of place. The Union is struggling to draw a line. Because the countries does not mutually agree where this line should run. But also because we ourselves hardly allow to say: till this far and no farther. The inability to draw a line is an expression of nobledesire for openness to the outside world, but we also pay a public price.
In the European Council itself is fortunately a great willingness to offer a European perspective to the countries of the Western Balkans. I do not notice any 'Enlargement fatigue'. But one day we have to clarify an endpoint to our neighbors and ourselves.

But simply admit to "fear" paralysis. The answer is not getting back into the fortress Europe. We need to remain an open, aggressive and innovative continent. If we did not have done this after the war, where would we be today? Anxious people are easily digested by mistrust, a lack of confidence.
We may not admit it. Certainly not the leaders.

Otto von der Gablentz wanted to forge a closer bond between the peoples of Europe. He did not want them resembled on each other. It is the difference between unification and living together. Often, one compared the European Union to a house. This does not convince me. Perhaps we are in this too close together. Our Union must both offer space and a place.
What do you think therefore of the metaphor of the street? Europe as a street, with currently 27 houses, acting on itself, but also doing things together. With relations between neighbors and friends. Attention and understanding for each other. For everybody in the street. And the windows kept open. No dead end street. No alley on the edge of the Eurasian continent. A bustling street: our Europe.