What makes europe different

Europeans eat smaller portions than Americans, because all the plates are small, from olden times. Instead of being born with arms, Europeans are born with baguette extremities. In Europe, there are only four actors, who appear in every TV show, movie, and commercial. Three of the actors are men with eccentric teeth.

Men in Europe carry purses. The purses are usually filled with blueprints of the Louvre, deeds to villas that you can buy for one dollar, and cheese that is being aged. Europeans are less safety-conscious than Americans, which is why, on average, a European has three fewer toes than an American.

Europe is the continent of romance, which is why, each year, millions of Americans travel there for vacation. Few are ever heard from again. Investigations are pending. In Britain, France, Spain and the U. However, in the four countries, majorities across ideological groups express this view.

In Western Europe, those with a college degree are more likely than those with less education to say their country should have UN approval before using military force, although majorities across both groups share this view. Double-digit differences are also evident in Britain 15 percentage points , Germany 11 points and France 10 points. This is not the case in the U. The view that their country should have UN approval before using military force to deal with threats is far more prevalent among American liberals than among conservatives.

The same ideological difference is generally not evident in Western Europe. Compared with the U. Opinions about international engagement have changed somewhat in the U.

In the U. Political ideology is also a factor in Germany, France and Spain. In these three countries, those on the right are more likely than those on the left to take the isolationist view when it comes to international engagement. Belief in cultural superiority has declined among Americans across age, gender and education groups. As in past surveys, older Americans remain far more inclined than younger ones to believe that their culture is better than others.

As is the case on other measures, opinions about cultural superiority vary considerably by educational attainment. In the four Western European countries and in the U. Finally, among Americans and Germans, political conservative are especially likely to believe their culture is superior to others. American opinions continue to differ considerably from those of Western Europeans when it comes to views of individualism and the role of the state. Unlike in the U. American opinions about the role of the state also vary considerably across age groups.

No such age difference is evident in the four Western European countries surveyed. Americans also distinguish themselves from Western Europeans on views about the importance of religion. But travelling overland was difficult and took a long time, so the merchants wanted to reach India by sea. The problem was, Africa was in the way — and it is very big! However, if the world really was round as people were beginning to believe , European ships ought to be able to reach India by sailing west.

So, in , Christopher Columbus and his sailors set out from Spain and crossed the Atlantic. But instead of reaching India they discovered the Bahamas islands in the Caribbean Sea, near the coast of America. Other explorers soon followed. In —, Vasco da Gama — a Portuguese naval officer — was the first European to reach India by sailing around Africa. In , another Portuguese explorer — Ferdinand Magellan, working for the King of Spain — led the first European expedition to sail right around the world!

In other words, they took over the land, claiming it now belonged to their home country in Europe. They took their beliefs, customs and languages with them — and that is how English and French came to be the main languages spoken in North America and Spanish and Portuguese in Central and South America.

Sailors returning from these distant lands reported seeing strange creatures very different from those in Europe. In the s, European explorers went deep into Africa and by European nations had colonised most of the African continent.

Meanwhile, back in Europe, scientists were finding out more and more about about how the universe works. Geologists, studying rocks and fossils, began wondering how the Earth had been formed and how old it really was.

In the s, people were asking other important questions too — such as how countries should be governed and what rights and freedoms people should have. The writer Jean-Jacques Rousseau said that everyone should be equal. Another writer, Voltaire, said the world would be better if reason and knowledge replaced ignorance and superstition. Other European inventions from the 19th and 20th centuries helped create the world we know today.

For example:. Today, roughly a quarter of the people working in Europe are producing things needed for the modern world: food and drinks; mobile phones and computers; clothes and furniture; washing machines and televisions; cars, buses and lorries and lots more besides. In other words, they work in shops and post offices, banks and insurance companies, hotels and restaurants, hospitals and schools, etc. Sadly, the story of Europe is not all about great achievements we can be proud of.

There are also many things to be ashamed of. Down the centuries, European nations fought terrible wars against each other. These wars were usually about power and property or religion. European colonists killed millions of native people on other continents — by fighting or mistreating them or by accidentally spreading European diseases among them. Europeans also took millions of Africans to work as slaves.

Lessons had to be learnt from these dreadful wrongdoings. The European slave trade was abolished in the s. Colonies gained their freedom in the s. And peace did come to Europe at last. Regrettably, there have been many quarrels in the European family. Often they were about who should rule a country or which country owned which piece of land. Sometimes a ruler wanted to gain more power by conquering his neighbours or to prove that his people were stronger and better than other peoples.

One way or another, for hundreds of years, there were terrible wars in Europe. In the 20th century, two big wars started on this continent but spread and involved countries all around the world. They killed millions of people and left Europe poor and in ruins. Could anything be done to stop these things happening again? Would Europeans ever learn to sit down together and discuss things instead of fighting? We Europeans belong to many different countries, with different languages, traditions, customs and beliefs.

Yet we belong together, like a big family, for all sorts of reasons. The Second World War ended in It had been a time of terrible destruction and killing and it had started in Europe. How could the leaders of European countries stop such dreadful things from ever happening again? They needed a really good plan that had never been tried before. A Frenchman called Jean Monnet thought hard about this. He realised that there were two things a country needed before it could make war: iron for producing steel to make tanks, guns, bombs and so on and coal to provide the energy for factories and railways.

So Jean Monnet came up with a very daring new idea. His idea was that the governments of France and Germany — and perhaps of other European countries too — should no longer run their own coal and steel industries. Instead, these industries should be organised by people from all the countries involved and they would sit around a table and discuss and decide things together. That way, war between them would be impossible! Jean Monnet felt that his plan really would work if only European leaders were willing to try it.

He spoke about it to his friend Robert Schuman, who was a minister in the French government. Robert Schuman thought it was a brilliant idea and he announced it in an important speech on 9 May The speech convinced not only the French and German leaders but also the leaders of Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

It would work for peaceful purposes and help rebuild Europe from the ruins of war. The ECSC was set up in The common market Bored at the border… Queues like this used to be part of normal life in Europe. It was set up in This held things up and made goods from abroad more expensive.

The point of having a common market was to get rid of all those border checks and delays and customs duties, and to allow countries to trade with one another just as if they were all one single country. The Second World War had made it very difficult for Europe to produce food or to import it from other continents. Europe was short of food even in the early s. So the EEC decided on an arrangement for paying its farmers to produce more food and to make sure that they could earn a decent living from the land.

It worked well. So well, in fact, that farmers ended up producing too much food and the arrangement had to be changed! Nowadays, the CAP also pays farmers to look after the countryside. They had more money to spend, more food to eat and more varied things in their shops.

Other neighbouring countries saw this and, in the s, some of them began asking whether they too could join the club. Over these years, the club was changing. For example, EEC countries were working together to protect the environment and to build better roads and railways right across Europe. Richer countries helped poorer ones with their road building and other important projects.

To make life easier for travellers, most EEC countries had got rid of passport checks at the borders between them.

A person living in one member country was free to go and live and find work in any other member country. The governments were discussing other new ideas too — for example, how policemen from different countries could help one another catch criminals, drug smugglers and terrorists. For many years, the eastern and western parts of Europe had been kept apart.

People were oppressed and many of those who spoke up against the regime were sent to prison. When more and more people fled from the east to the west, rulers in the east became afraid. They erected tall fences and high walls, like the one in Berlin, to prevent people from leaving their countries. Many who tried to cross the border without permission were shot. Finally, in , the separation ended. Soon, Germany was reunited.

The peoples of the central and eastern parts of Europe chose for themselves new governments that got rid of the old, strict Communist system.

Before a country can join the European Union, its economy has to be working well. It also has to be democratic — in other words, its people must be free to choose who they want to govern them. And it must respect human rights. Human rights include the right to say what you think, the right not to be put in prison without a fair trial, the right not to be tortured and many other important rights as well. The former Communist countries worked hard at all these things and, after a few years, eight of them were ready: Czechia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia.

On 1 January , two more former Communist countries, Bulgaria and Romania, joined the group. Croatia joined the EU on 1 July , bringing the total to 28 countries. Never before have so many countries joined the EU in such a short time.

The EU tries to make life better in all sorts of ways. Here are some of them. The environment belongs to everyone, so countries have to work together to protect it. The EU has rules about stopping pollution and about protecting for example wild birds. These rules apply in all EU countries and their governments have to make sure they are obeyed.

Climate change — also known as global warming — is another problem that countries cannot tackle alone. EU countries have therefore agreed to work together to lower the amount of emissions they produce that harm the atmosphere and cause global warming.

The EU is also trying to influence other countries to do the same. Now there is one single currency, the euro, which all EU countries can introduce if they are ready for it. Having one currency makes it easier to do business and to travel and shop all over the EU without having to change from one currency to another. It also makes the economy more stable in times of crisis. Today, 19 countries use the euro as their currency. If you compare euro coins you will see that on one side there is a design representing the country it was made in.

The other side is the same for all the countries. People in the EU are free to live, work or study in whichever EU country they choose and the EU is doing all it can to make it simple to move home from one country to another. When you cross the borders between most EU countries, you no longer need to show your passport. The EU encourages students and young people to spend some time studying or training in another European country. Some of the money they earn goes to pay for hospitals and schools and to look after the elderly.

It helps people to set up new businesses and provides money to train people to do new kinds of work. Life is not easy for everyone everywhere in Europe. In some places there are not enough jobs for people because mines or factories have closed down. In some areas, farming is hard because of the climate or trade is difficult because there are not enough roads and railways. The EU tackles these problems by collecting money from all its member countries and using it to help regions that are in difficulty.

For example, it helps pay for new roads and rail links and it helps businesses to provide new jobs for people. In many countries around the world, people are dying or living difficult lives because of war, disease and natural disasters such as earthquakes, droughts or floods. Often these countries do not have enough money to build the schools and hospitals, roads and houses that their people need. It also buys many things that those countries produce without charging customs duties.

The European Union has brought many European countries together in friendship. The EU has brought peace among its members. It is also working for lasting peace among its neighbours and in the wider world.

We have talked about some of the things the EU does: there are many more. In fact, being in the European Union makes a difference to just about every aspect of our lives.

What things should the EU be doing or not doing? How can we have our say? Find out in the next chapter. The original words are in German, but when used as the European anthem it has no words — only the tune. You can hear it on the internet. The countries are in alphabetical order according to what each country is called in its own language or languages as shown in brackets. As you can imagine, it takes a lot of effort by a lot of people to organise the EU and make everything work.

Who does what? The European Parliament represents all the people in the EU. It holds a big meeting every month, in Strasbourg France , to discuss and decide the new laws being proposed by the European Commission. It consists of members from all EU countries. Based on their size, the large countries have more members than the small ones. The members of the European Parliament MEPs are chosen every 5 years, in an election when all the adult citizens of the EU get the chance to vote.

New laws for Europe have to be discussed by government ministers from all the EU countries, not only by the members of the European Parliament. After discussing a proposal, the Council votes on it. There are rules about how many votes each country has and how many are needed to pass a law.

In some cases, the rule says the Council has to be in complete agreement. Once the Council and the Parliament have passed a new law, EU countries have to respect it.

In Brussels, a group of women and men one from each EU country meets every Wednesday to discuss what needs to be done next. These people are put forward by the government of their country and approved by the European Parliament. Their job is to think about what would be best for the EU as a whole, and to propose new laws for the EU.

These laws are then approved by both the European Parliament and the Council. In their work they are helped by experts, lawyers, secretaries, translators and so on. They run the daily work of the European Union.

It has one judge from each EU country. One of the challenges facing Europe today is to make sure that young people can have jobs and a good future. There are other big problems today which can only be tackled by countries around the world working together, for example:.

So we need to make sure that everyone can have their say in what the European Union decides. How can we do that? Do you have any good ideas? What are the most important problems you think the EU should be dealing with and what would you like it to do about them?

Why not discuss and jot down your ideas with your teacher and your classmates and send them to your MEP? You can find out who he or she is and where to write to them on the following website.

You can also contact the European Commission or Parliament at one of the addresses at the end of this book and perhaps even arrange for your class to visit these two institutions.

Europe: a beautiful continent with a fascinating history. For centuries Europe was plagued by wars and divisions. But in the last 60 years and more, the countries of this old continent have at last been coming together in peace, friendship and unity, to work for a better Europe and a better world. This book for children aged roughly 9 to 12 years old tells the story simply and clearly. Full of interesting facts and colourful illustrations, it gives a lively overview of Europe and explains briefly what the European Union is and how it works.

Have fun exploring! Hint: you can find the answers to all these questions in this publication. Want to play games, test your knowledge and explore Europe further? Go to Learning Corner. Every 5 years. We mentioned some of them in earlier chapters.