Polish plumbers and the problem with national stereotypes

In 1614, the Scottish writer John Barclay published a slim Latin book with the grand title Icon Animorum , or The Mirror of Minds . In it, he marched the nations of Europe across the stage: the proud Spaniard, the scheming Italian, the frivolous Frenchman, the solemn German, the valiant but volatile Pole. It was caricature rather than anthropology, closer to pantomime than scholarship. Yet it stuck. Europeans have always loved pinning people like butterflies, neatly labelling them with adjectives The trouble is that these stereotypes don’t always stack up.

The more Europe laughs at others, the more it risks being trapped in its own cartoon

Look at our recent history. In 2005, during France’s referendum campaign on ratifying the proposed constitution of the EU, the ‘no’ campaign cre