Art & Creativity Quote by Jacques Chirac

Europe, in Chirac's telling, isn't a cathedral revealed by blueprints. It's a worksite held together by compromises, temporary scaffolding, and the stubborn decision to keep building anyway. Calling "the construction of Europe" an art is a politician's sleight of hand: it elevates bargaining into craftsmanship and turns messy trade-offs into something almost noble. The phrase smuggles in a moral defense of incrementalism. If integration is art, then impatience looks philistine.

"It is the art of the possible" is the real tell. Chirac borrows the classic definition of politics, but he repurposes it as a warning and an alibi. A warning to idealists who want Europe to move faster than voters, budgets, and borders will allow; an alibi for leaders who prefer the safety of half-steps and opt-outs. The subtext is blunt: you don't get a "true" Europe; you get the Europe that can survive elections in Paris, referendums elsewhere, and the constant veto power of national pride.

The context matters: Chirac governed in the era of Maastricht aftershocks, euro anxieties, enlargement debates, and recurring French ambivalence about sovereignty. France wanted Europe big enough to matter geopolitically, but not so supranational that Paris felt managed from Brussels. This line flatters that tension. It frames Europe as a perpetual negotiation rather than a finished identity, and it asks the public to accept friction as the price of ambition.