I don't know where model is, but what would be ideal: valuing own history, values, societies over not own, being strong outwardly and soft inwardly/on own people (not vice versa as is now), being practical and forward thinking over posing as a "leader in regulation" with suppressing everything meaningful hangover.
There are tons of examples of strategically bad political decisions with long term broad consequences.
Reminds me of "everything is fine" meme.
I think leadership is hard. I’m not sure I buy the idea that a group of countries should be “hard” on anyone.
Migration - EU failed for many years to protect its border against illegal imigration - millions came, half a mil now legalized in Spain.
Overregulation - EU institutions themselves now acknowledge that regulatory and administrative burdens are hurting EU competitivenes
"Integration"/security - imigrants choose rich countries with good social benefits while in some areas inner security drops (car attacks, knife attacks, ra*es)
Greendeal-carbon pricing paid by industries to meet strict quotas, soon also paid by households, very expensive for europeans while having near zero effect on global emmisions in commparisson to China/rest of the world aka too much pain/costs for "nothing".
Digital regulation - via DSA, fight against so called "hate speech" and "disinformation"
Unrealized gains taxes - Netherlands
Exit taxes - France, Germany, Denmark, Netherlands, Spain, Belgium (conditions vary in each coountry).
Demographical colapse - all EU countries have born rate below replacement level 2.1 (average 1.34 for EU in 2024)
Strategic dependency - Europe made itself super dependent on Russia for energy and from military POV on USA, both of these dependencies are now being painfully corrected
Digital ID/CBDC: EU is building digital ID and digital euro, tools with obvious future potential for surveillance and control.
Concerning being "hard" I meant mainly protecting our borders, being hard on enforcing them and our own laws equally on everybody, being strong independent just Europe in general
Obviously I am no expert in (geo)politics, just an average Joe observing concerning tendencies and not liking direction EU is heading.