France would vote to leave the EU if it held a referendum, the country’s most celebrated living philosopher has said, as he warned that Europe has become “sad, grey and technocratic,” reports the Daily Telegraph.
Bernard-Henri Lévy, who is respected on both sides of the French political divide as a writer and activist, said his fellow countrymen would “probably” abandon the EU if they were given the chance.
He also complained that Europe was being stifled by bureaucrats who have turned the continent into what he described as an intellectual wasteland with no space for “dreams and ideas.”
“If there was a referendum in France, they would probably vote to exit,” he said in an interview with the Daily Telegraph.
“One of the problems of Europe – which is the explanation for this populist reaction like a Brexit – is that this Europe is not desired any longer. And it does not create desire.”
“This is because the pattern it shows is so sad, so grey, so technical and so technocratic,” he said.
“And why is it as such? Because it does not make enough space for dreams and ideas and values, and so on."
Mr Henri-Lévy, who is known simply as “BHL” in France, has previously described Europe as “on the edge of being destroyed” and in a “state of emergency.”
And the 67-year-old said he feared that Europe would be brought even closer to collapse if Britain voted to leave the EU.