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It doesn't surprise me either, because I'd never be able to use a phrase like "the principles and know-how of the EU" with a straight face. (To be fair, you could replace "the EU" with almost any large bureaucracy.)

>>HankSt+(OP)
Sure. But the EU is not just your average bureaucracy. It's an entity that has as one of it's specific goals the following[1]:

> combat social exclusion and discrimination

[1] https://european-union.europa.eu/principles-countries-histor...

>>marius+t4
Any large bureaucracy has similarly lofty official goals

>>graeme+yr
I understand we're all old and cynical here, but one of the tenets of discussions on HN would be to take someone's arguments at face value, so I prefer to believe that the EU as an organization actually wants to diminish social exclusion and discrimination. I'm not sure if I'd give the same credit to any other capitalist entity, but the EU does not have the implicit goal of increasing revenue for its shareholders to subvert any of the others stated.

>>marius+aB
Lots of countries have has similar goals and lofty promises in its constitution.

I take your argument at face value (in that I take it that you believe the EU has that goal at some level). I just to not expect it, as an organisation, to consistently promote that goal (for much the same reasons lots of countries fail to serve their citizens).

Profit making businesses have the explicit goal of making shareholders better off. Management usually choose to balance this against other goals (ethics, the good of wider society, their own interests...), just as the EU has the explicit aim you state, but, similarly, has other conflicting aims.

>>marius+t4
There's always "you're not our target audience" exception.