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The Sunday Telegraph - Europe must stop fighting itself. By Niall Ferguson

But the best argument for reforming the EU’s system of governance is that it may be now or never. The true significance of Sarkozy’s victory in France, it now becomes clear, was not so much economic as political. The slogan that won him the election was not the pseudo-Thatcherite “work more, earn more”. It was his promise to rescue France from a “national identity crisis”. The fact speaks for itself that, before leaving for Brussels, Sarkozy held a meeting with the National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen. Sarko did not steal his voters by promising them lower marginal tax rates.

All over Europe, the politics of identity threatens to trump the economics of individualism. You can see it in the polls, which reveal that between 40 per cent (Austria) and 80 per cent (Hungary) of European voters favour strict limits on foreign workers. You can see it in the recent populist attacks on hedge funds in Germany and on private equity in Britain. Above all, you can see it in Sarkozy’s success. If I had to hazard a guess about Gordon Brown’s strategy in the year ahead, it would be to turn New Labour into National Labour. Those recent Brown speeches about British identity were merely the preliminary barrage. Starting tomorrow, expect him to outflank a liberal Conservative leader who hesitates to articulate traditional Right-wing views.

Mmph. Maybe.