The time has come for Europeans to ask themselves the unthinkable: can their vaunted social model endure? It is a question I have wished to avoid. But it is irresponsible to persist in doing so. Something is rotten in the state of western Europe. The continent retains valuable assets from the past. But these are showing symptoms of decay. The underlying cause seems increasingly evident: the hypertrophy of the state.

Symptoms are not hard to find:  this is a continent of high and persistent unemployment, declining productivity growth, rapid ageing  and growing fiscal strains; it is  also one whose once-proud role in knowledge-creation is in decline.