The following article will be published in a special issue about ThinkYoung at the November-December edition of the European Business Review.

What if Steve Jobs had been European?

When I was younger, my Ethics teacher in high school used to write this question on the blackboard: What if Einstein had been born in Africa?. We would then passionately argue about poverty, inequality and the lack of opportunities in the Southern hemisphere.  

But some weeks ago, when Steve Jobs died just the day after I attended the Lisbon Council's Digital Agenda Summit about innovation, I didn't ask myself what our fate would be if Jobs had been born in poor Ethiopia. Instead, I wondered: What if he had just been raised in Europe?  

Just the fact that the question popped up in my mind is meaningful enough. Some years ago, Europeans used to be the lucky avant-gardes who made the world jealous. Now, we are pitied. And we pity ourselves with our attitude towards the financial crisis.  

One would argue that this recession is the cause of Europe's lack of innovation. But above the economic situation, the laws and the measures being debated these days, the problem is this self pity attitude that the crisis has infected into us. Just as a depressed person who does not break with the past, our depressed Europe seems to take pleasure on keeping the wound open.

Austerity, being as necessary as it is to lower the debt and keep the markets calmed, only makes the depression grow. At least in the behavioral aspect that is key for innovation. How are we supposed to be innovative if all we keep in mind is to cut expenses? And how are we supposed to grow and help come out of this crisis if we are not innovative? Catch 22 right in front of us.

This problem would be less serious if our self pity was only circumstancial and due to the crisis, but it might have also been one of the causes of the crisis itself. Because going further, there is also something intrinsecal to the European identity that explains our current status. Former Spanish prime minister Felipe González described it pretty well on one of his quotes about the European Union: The problem is that we are a think tank, and we should become an action tank.

He was referring to the way decisions are made in the EU institutions, but the characteristic it reflects is also representative of some aspects of the European identity. Because, after all, you are what you eat... And also what your Government does. And no matter how far Europeans generally are from their institutions, we are influenced by their workstyle. And viceversa. Just like them, we are too bureaucratic and too academical to be as innovative as other parts of the world.

If Steve Jobs had been European, he might have been a young member of the lost generation too worried about finding a job to focus on his creativity. He might have been too exploited in an unpaid internship to have time to develop his idea. Or he might have actually managed to make it true, but then failed to find financing. Or someone who would trust him and give him an opportunity to make it happen. Maybe he would have had the opportunity to get scholarships, but have found too many bureaucratic obstacles to be effective. And considering the critical circumstances in the continent, it is also possible that he would have ran into someone who would steal his idea. 

But even earlier than all this, maybe Steve Jobs would have never had the big innovative idea. Just because maybe, he would have been raised in the world of theories, too far from practice. If he had been born in the 90s instead of the 50s, he might actually have been lucky enough to have some sort of exchange program or internship, which would mean he would have gotten some international and practical knowledge. But even in this case, once after graduating, he might have been thinking what many young Europeans are thinking right now. There are three ways out to the labour market: through land, sea and air. He would probably choose Silicon Valley, like other Europeans who now run 60% of the companies there, Sao Paulo or Tel Aviv, but Europe is unlikely to have been on his list.  

And this is something the European Union can't afford to let happen. Who knows how many young Europeans have the potential to become the next Steve Jobs. We all need to give them the right education, the right opportunities and the right atmosphere to make their ideas happen. They are the future. And the way out of the crisis.

Leire Ariz is the Media Officer at ThinkYoung.

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