Ryszard Legutko’s argues the EU was built as an artificial construction and then sold to Europeans as a democratic fairy tale.
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Ryszard Legutko – The EU Was Built on Lies
MCC Brussels
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12.686 weergaven 17 jan 2026
Does Europe have a soul? Ryszard Legutko’s argues the EU was built as an artificial construction and then sold to Europeans as a democratic fairy tale.
Legutko is a heavyweight Polish philosopher and professor at the Jagiellonian University, and former MEP (2009–2024), bringing both philosophical bite and inside-the-EU experience to his critique
of Brussels.
Speaking at the Battle for the Soul of Europe 2025, Legutko takes aim at the EU’s founding logic. He argues that “ever closer union” hard-wires permanent integration into the system, so those who
oppose further centralisation are treated as illegitimate by design. In his account, the EU is therefore not a representative democracy in practice, but an “enlightened oligarchy”, with real power
concentrated in institutions like the Commission and exercised in line with the strongest member states and political forces.
He also takes aim at the European Court of Justice for elevating itself above national constitutions, before closing with a practical Q&A on what comes next, coalition-building, and the case for stronger regional alliances.
Original video/link; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upPfF43k4HU
Transcript
Well, does Europe have a soul? Probably not. If we consider as our highest authority Jac Delore, one of those who managed to propel integration to a new level of centralized bureaucracy.
Toward the very end of of his reign, the law said that we need to give Europe a soul donor.
Otherwise, as he put it, the game will be up. The presupposition was clear. If we need to give Europe a soul, it means it doesn’t yet have one. When Jacqu deauor spoke of Europe, he meant, of course,
the European Union.
Since he was supposedly Catholic, many assumed that he meant a Christian soul and that he could have been referring to the founding fathers, Schuman, the Gasper and others who were devout
Catholics and envisioned a future Europe or so they said as Christian as well as Romano Greek.
But the EU was different and who else if not Jacob should have known it.
I therefore believe that his words meant something else, namely that the union is a purely artificial construction and that until we endow it with a strong identity, so strong that we can metaphorically
call it the European soul, it has little chance to survive. But has there ever been a chance for the emergence of a European soul in this sense?
The question can be asked differently. Does the creation of the EU belong to a European tradition of responsible politics? Or do its roots lie rather in a different tradition, one that generated no political
experiments, deprived people of freedom, and deceived them with harmful projects.
In other words, does the European Union reflect wisdom and prudence or recklessness and hubris?
I lean I tend to lean toward the latter. For one thing, I think that the union was built on the lie and that it’s the same kind of lie that other designers of the future were using to cover up the ugly methods
from which brave new worlds were supposed to be born.
Let’s take one of the key principles.
Article 10.1 states, I quote, “The functioning of the European Union shall be founded on representative democracy,” unquote. Is this really the case? The first thing that comes to mind that contradicts
the quoted sentence is the distinction between democratic and populist parties which determines European politics today.
The concept of populism is not mentioned in the treaties and given its vagueness, it is difficult to provide a precise legal definition. If the practice of marginalizing the so-called populist parties were to
have legal support, article 10.1 should have read, “The functioning of the European Union shall be founded on representative democracy with the exclusion of populist parties.
However, one one could respond that anti-pop populist practices deviate from the principles and are not the principles themselves. But I submit that marginalizing the uh opposition is inherent in the
EU system.
In article one, we read and I again I quote, “This treaty marks a new stage in the process of creating an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe.” Uh, end of quote. Integration is thus presented
as a one-way process. And since the union is to be ever closer, it is obvious that legitimacy is implicitly denied to those who reject the project of neverending integration and do not wish for further
uh centralization of the union.
And do the European nations truly want an ever closer union? Apparently not. Because if they did, there would be no need for lying to them.
The term Monet method has entered the language to describe the formation of the integration process.
Jean Monet, one of the fathers of integration, became famous for saying that the peoples of Europe had no experience in the complexities of Europe’s institutions.
So it was justified for a small small group of leaders to make consequential decisions without consulting the citizens. The idea was to prevent people from decisions sorry uh prevent people from
noticing the changes made and when the people finally discovered them it would be too late and they would have become accustomed to the changes anyway.
The Monet method, sometimes called integration by stealth, was widely accepted, though not acknowledged. But occasionally the truth spilled out. When following the rejection of the constitutional
treaty in 2005, the treaty of Lisbon was proposed the former patron Valerie Jiscar Desta admitted with astonishing cander all previous propo that’s what he said all previous proposals will be included in
the new text but will be somehow masks masked and concealed unquote.
Indeed, these are not merely declarations. From the outset, the assumption was made that integration would divide the peoples of Europe into two groups. Enlightened, self-proclaimed,
enlightened leaders and not so enlightened masses on whose behalf decisions must be made to create an ever closer union.
Thus the actual system of the union was not a representative democracy but a kind of enlightened oligarchy. And we when we examine the treaties we see that enlightened oligarchy is embedded in
the text itself.
Take the European Commission. Who are the commissioners? They are said to be proposed by the governments and once appointed to be independent of these governments.
All in all, the commission is supposed to be a body with strong political, even partisan roots, which at some point miraculously transforms into something like a group of impartial
sages managing Europe.
How this body detached from any democratic foundation can acquire such immense power over governments elected by universal suffrage is puzzling. It is as if the president of some country
elected by parliament rather than by univers universal suffrage were given all the prerogatives to run the country and this we know never happens.
The presidents of uh Germany, Italy or Hungary elected by national assemblies do not run their countries and even to de to imagine they could would be preposterous.
Naturally the commission is not uh a council of wise men and it’s and its power to govern must come from somewhere. It certainly come can derive it certainly can derive from wisdom even if the
commissioners possessed it which they don’t.
The commission must rely on those who actually wield power within the union and who conditionally grant a large portion to it. And those that wield power are the strongest member states and
the strongest political parties. And having borrowed its powers from the big guys, the commission can exercise it by subordinating the weaker players.
But one might respond, the treaty of the European Union does explicitly provide checks for the commission should it extend its power too far.
Article 5 lists three principles that should constrain the commission. The principles of conferral, proportionality, and subsidiarity. But this article is dead. I’ve never heard of um the commission being held accountable for violating systemically violating.
Let me add this article. And I think anyone who dared to sue the commission could have no chance. A special protocol stipulates that while those who think the commission violated the principle
of subsidiarity may submit alternative proposals, but ultimately it is the commission that decides everything. And what the the protocol says is I quote, it may decide to maintain, amend,
or withdraw the proposals unquote.
So much for the principle of Roman law that no one is a judge in their own case. The treaties explicitly granted the commission this privilege. To make things worse, the treaties make the commission
quote unquote guardians of the treaties. One can thus logically conclude that the oligarchic character of the commission is a guarantee that the EU will continue to be a representative democracy.
Let us take another European institution, the European Court of Justice. The ECJ is to inherently political. It is the governments, the political bodies par excelance that send their candidates to the court.
But the actual admission is based on co-optation conducted by a committee of several people appointed by the president of the court.
As one might imagine, these seven or eight individuals ensure that those selected will follow the orthodoxy and political line, always siding with the ruling oligarchy and the ever closer
union directive. Through its rulings, the ECJ has managed to put itself above the national constitutional tribunals and above national constitutions, which left the citizens practically unprotected
by national legal systems.
Undermining what we have always believed to be non underminable that is the national constitutions and being undermined by a body with such tenuous legitimacy is something unprecedented in a
civilized world and not only did this uh shocking step fail to generate a proper response but it was hailed as a significant progress of the rule of law.
The latest examples is the ECJ’s attempt to impose recognition of so-called same-sex marriages on countries whose constit constitutions do not recognize such unions.
The perplexing thing is that this pursuit of arbitrary power by the ECJ did not begin now but dates back to the early 1960s long before master and the creation of the EU. What I find partic particularly
disconcerting is that the dosility with which the ECJ’s assault was met.
Why didn’t the governments hold this process when it was in its early stages? Why didn’t they just refuse to accept the rulings as having absolutely no justification in the European treaties?
Even those governments that declared their strong sovereignist stance such as the goalies in France or Margaret Thatcher in the UK finally capitulated.
If they had opposed the European court’s morbid ambitions, we would have been better off today. What was feasible uh then is much more difficult now. It is not that the big guys have no power to do
it, but that doing it today would have ignited a revolution that the EU might not have survived.
To generalize the above, why is so little said about all these lies? When’s this leaping to the idol? There are many reasons. I will mention only one. uh we are witnessing a rapid erosion of European or even western identity. The traditional components of European identity, Christianity, Greece and Rome have lost their significance.
Whether the union would have looked different had the Europeans not squandered their legacy, we obviously do not know. However, the fact is that after spurning it, they have created an identity void
which various profits of political movements have been trying to fill.
The last 100 years or more provide ample examples. The oligarchy in charge of the European integration has been taking advantage of the existence of this void and attempting to create a new European man, believing that the old European one no longer exists. They therefore think that they should provide the new Europeans with a new collective identity. And having buried Christianity, Greece and Rome, they probably believe that to give them a new soul, the kind of Jac Delore once spoke of is just a question of sufficiently strenuous indoctrination and social engineering.
To conclude, contrary to all the hopes cherished by Schuman de Gasperbury and others, the conception of integration culminating in the European Union belongs to a part of our tradition that has
been animated by a revolutionary spirit and ideological hubris.
Although this tradition has this tradition has brought us little good and much harm, it is still alive in Europe.
Even the spectacular failure of the communist experiment did not extinguish its flame. A good metaphor already mentioned before by Monica I think for this tradition is Mary Shel’s story of Frankenstein the young scientist who wanted to create a perfect being but instead created a monster.
The founder of European integration also wanted to produce a perfect political entity and what they in fact produced looks more and more like its opposite. My argument, let me repeat, has been
that the error lay in the conception, not in subsequent mishaps or miscalculation. [Applause]
Thank you. Because I think so many of the discussions around the European Union try and avoid grappling with the questions of origin and why I think there’s a lot of political and intellectual cowardice
that goes on when people try and grapple with the what the European Union has become and they pretend that if only we could just go back a few years it was all kind of better then.
And I guess my question to you is well why is that? And because on one level you can understand politically people uh don’t want to be seen as leading another kind of exit from the
EU. They don’t want to be advocating in their countries. Something that seems very radical which is to completely do away with the European Union if it was a it was a kind of conceived in a in in a in a
Frankenstein fashion to to begin with.
But I’m struck when I speak to people across Europe that even in private, even supposed patriotic candidates or parties or politicians in private will also say, “Oh, it’d be fine. We just need to go back a
decade, two decades, three decades.” What do you think it is that accounts for this kind of lack of, as it were, courage to get to grips with the the foundation of the of the union?
As I said, we do not know much about what was going on uh at that time and there were several uh arguments and and the the language that the founding fathers used was rather obscure. So you
can find uh anything that you want that uh the the nations will exist or the nations will cease to exist uh and then uh that it will be a European state or there won’t be a European state or the the
concept.
European the the the European Union or the well the states your the United Yeah, the United States of Europe was uh used by many people and no clear meaning was attached to it. So those who are
enthusiastic about integration believe that there was something um great right morally good and uplifting in the act of uh uh creating the idea uh of of European integration.
Also, we have to be aware that uh the Christian Democrats were not the only group that suggested the the creation of uh in integrated Europe. There were philosophers, writers, uh George Orwell
wrote an essay on European integration. Ortega said also advocated European integration. There were rather I would say strange ideas. And last but not least, the communists who became quite
influential later on as early as early 1940s, right? They came up with this uh concept of a European state. And mind you in almost every uh document you you can read there was inherently this idea
what later on was called mon method that is do not speak openly about the actual plans or how you want the integration to to proceed.
People should not know too much because if people know too much then the whole project will fizzle out.
You dwelled upon an alternative reality. What would have happened in if Europe since decades would remain faithful to its legacy of Christianity, Rome and Greece.
But we are where we are. Uh my question is as follows. Um well in fact it is a question asking you to comment on the speech by president of Poland Carl Navaratski in Charles University in Prague uh
10 days ago. Um what he said there was that first EU project should should go back to its boots and uh step back to observing those article five which you quoted.
I mean the the the the the proper reducing competencies which were uh taken over by Brussels. Uh and that would be a scenario of action within the treaties but scaling back all the wrong things
which you rightly rightly indicated. Great. But at the same time he indicated eventuality of going back from Lisbon treaty to Nice treaty if you read properly one of his seven point two of his seven points.
So question is please do comment. Thank you. Great. Thanks. Why don’t you address that quickly and then we’ll get the the the or do you mind if I take two and then you can reflect a bit.
Thank you so much. Yeah. at the back start speaking and they’ll bring the microphone up. Yeah.
So, thank you very much. My question is do we have a credible alternative? We have an internal debate now. We know that we don’t want the federal state at least many people including me.
I don’t want the European federal state. But we have also an external reality. We are demographically small. We are economically smaller. We have no strategic weight as Europeans.
So what kind of Europe can we develop that it is still a credible and strong actor to defend our interest in the world while at the same time preserving our soul, our identity, our national traditions.
So is there a way an credible alternative to that European Union that we have developed in the meantime with all its mistakes and so on and that we probably all want to reform.
Thank you very much. Great. Thanks. We’ll take the gentleman at the front and then you’ll come back. Yeah. Are you saying that Europe has not a soul? Something like that. I would like to say that yes,
Europe has a soul.
The soul of Europe was the core of the concepts and ideas which shaped the modern civilization. Concepts such as democracy, human rights, uh freedom of speech, scientific method, tolerance.
Without a doubt, the S of Europa was a massive producer of talents around the continent and meaningful disciplines, sciences, arts, literature, music, philosophy and so on.
There’s not other place over the world where mankind has reached this magnificent peak of seen here. Considering the current situation and the new rise in AI technology which will even have a stronger
impact in the culture decline, how does Europe adapt its own real identity to this day and age not only to survive and evolve but to be a light a hope for other nations as historical has been.
Thank you. Thanks. I’m just one I’m going to do Risha. I’m going to take the last person who wants to speak and then I’ll give you five minutes to address all those questions, but I’ve noted them down
as well so I can prompt you if needs be. But yes, at the back. So I would be interested in your opinion in on the most recent scandal uh regarding the European External Action Service, the
corruption there and Mrs. Fedica Mogarini’s uh role at the College of Europe and her arrest.
So if you could comment on that, that would be great. Thank you. Great. Thank you. So yeah, you you’ll remember them, but if you want to prompt, I can go through them. But we’ll begin maybe with
this the speech of Navajki.
Well, the easiest answer is to the last question. Well, the the fish shots from the head down. So what else is there to add? uh but uh well what I my my argument was that uh there is not much you can
do within the treaties as they exist now it’s true that the treaties have been uh extended or or sidstepped or or violated uh but there is little in the treaties that can prevent the big guys from doing it the
commission or the strongest political players with the commission as it is, with this uh voting system in the council, with the parliament which is a a completely uh uh useless institution which should be
dismantled as quickly as possible.
And and I and I said that when I was also when I was an MEP, not that I’m no longer an MEP and uh um so it’s it’s It’s it’s difficult to uh make any uh move for improvement and nobody is interested in
improvement. No
European institutions and I think the big guys are even uh less interested in doing they are more interested in expanding the the power. There is nothing in the treaties that can prevent them from uh
pursuing such policies.
Uh so the the idea of going back to some previous stages and previous stages of integration of course were superior to what we have now but I I just don’t imagine how you can go about it. uh as in
politics you have to create uh a coalition common interest and make exert pressure right and then start uh uh well negotiations which might lead to a compromise.
The problem is that we don’t have such an agent, such a coalition uh that can pursue the the the the policies of reforming the EU unless we have such a coalition, a a group of uh of states are
organizations that can challenge the European Commission that can uh uh veto uh the decision in in the council.
There is not much uh uh we can do. I Well, I was delighted to hear what uh President Navrosk, President of Poland said in Charles University in Prague. uh not because I I I think it’s feasible in the foresee
future but at least these things were said and uh we have to be aware that words matter especially that the European Union has managed to create a sort of verbal theater self- congratulatory right self
indulgent uh anything you said should be in favor of European Union.
If you are not in favor of the European Union, you’re a fascist enemy. So these things have to be said. The European Union is an oligarchy. The European Union has done a lot of damage.
The EF the European Union is based on on lies. It’s not just the the politicians lie, but the system is based on and so on and so on. Very very well said. Um, if I could then draw your attention to one of the
other questions which I think bedevils all us who have our criticisms of the EU and even fundamental ones as you do which is this question of what could come after or next even if if first step as I agree is to begin to speak the truth about about what we’re faced with but we also have to have at least at some level a position a kind of picture of what we want to get to.
I’m not entirely convinced that we really do need to club together because the world is really so dangerous, etc., etc., but I’d be interested in in your view.
What do we counterpose to the the current status of the the European Union?
Favor of some kind of cooperation, institutional institutionalized co cooperation. uh but uh that that is extremely difficult because of the uh for many reasons uh but one of the reasons is the uh inequality of the of political actors.
Well, if you on the one hand you have you have France and you have Germany and on the other hand you have uh Cyprus with all due respect to to Cyprus.
you see that there is not uh much uh that there is too much asymmetry between these two sides and this is not the kind of asymmetry that uh can be annihilated by by the treaties right so uh so so so I think that uh what we can do is create if we indulge in in political fantasies right we should create some some kind of regional alliance es stronger alliances.
Therefore, I believe that V V4 should it be revived, it has a future of becoming such a uh such a regional alliance that can act uh in a coordinated way and and change the the the
crush the the petrified system of power that exists that that exists today. So I I think we should rather go this way uh than uh than uh I don’t know make some big plans for for a new European
organization.
Brilliant. Uh Rich, it seems insane, ridiculous that we only allowed ourselves 30 minutes for this conversation. We could speak probably for the whole afternoon and get your get lots of your expertise,
but uh you’ve been really enlightening even though we kept you to a short time.
I’m sorry, but you were very enlightening. Uh, can we give uh Richard a very warm uh thanks?