Hopes for a Europe united through democracy from west to east are fading and being annihilated by the ongoing, if not expanding Balkan war, an exceptionally high sustained unemployment rate and a loss of faith. Wall, European nations are united only through their identity crises: percentage of narcissism, doubt and the weariness of democracy. In the countries of the former Warsaw Pact, with the notable exception of the Czech Republic, ex-communists have regained power, they are more “ex” than communists. In Western Europe, with the notable exception of Germany, scandals have tarnished public confidence in democratic principles.
Since the Pyrrhic victory of the Maastricht referendum in France in 1992 (a bitter crusade that left the country almost stagnant, 51% in favor of the treaty, 49% against, and aroused skepticism among member countries in the long run), Europeans seem more fearful than they think. it can lose to the European Union (EU) in terms of sovereignty and identity of what it can lose through its customers to gain more opportunities and influence in the world. reform, economic and financial union, and not uncommon foreign and security policies. Fixed on how to “make” Europe, they have lost sight of the ethical values and the basic cultural and political objectives that constitute their “why”.
Europeans are painfully aware that their priorities are divergent. Around France, southern countries are searching across the Mediterranean towards the Maghreb with a growing sense of vulnerability and fear. The northern countries, around Germany, give priority to the next enlargement of the EU. In Bosnia, Europeans have exposed their divisions (rather than sending them), their lack of political will, and their inability to understand the ethical and symbolic burden of being too wary of the suffering of other Europeans. Not counting on America to avoid fighting. Worse, the protracted war has strained and divided the Atlantic alliance. In the end, Europeans are only guilty of other Europeans. The accusation of non-intervention and indifference is superior to that of politicians and the military. interference.
An end-of-siècle atmosphere had been established even before 1989, but the collapse of communism added dramatic disorientation to the uncertainty and unrest in the major western European countries. loss in the face of a lack of unusual goals, dreams of new frontiers, and unifying visions. This temperament has been renewed through miserable experiences, of which Sarajevo and Bihać are only the saddest.
Western Europeans once took it for granted that their economic expansion would continue indefinitely, so they have not noticed a slow deterioration in their competitiveness and economic functionality vis-à-vis non-European bottom-up economies. Unemployment, the nascent post-communist democracies were perceived as tough, low-wage competition in agriculture and metal production, spaces historically governed across Western European countries.
In 1989, Eastern Europeans celebrated their “return to Europe” and were warmly welcomed by their Western brothers and sisters. Today, we are once again faced with the age-old question of who belongs to the European family. The Europeans learned that, even though everything had won, they had the epochic mission they needed: the heroic task of the reunified Europe. In addition, the main points turned out to be uncomfortable. Since the wonderful years, 1989_91, Europe has shown that it still deserves the “Old Continent” Label.
However, this obscure and increasingly popular description corresponds to the only component of reality. Contrary to what some Asians claim, Europe is not about to succumb to a suicidal mix of industrial protectionism and war on its periphery. The economic recovery of the United States is slowly affecting Europe. New countries join the EU with no enthusiasm or alternative, but a club gaining new members can’t be so bad. Appreciating the EU’s functionality in industry and security, European elites can only draw one conclusion: when the EU speaks with one voice, as in the Uruguay Round negotiations of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, it ceases to be a market to become a global player. When, as in the Balkans, there are 12 chancelleries and no chancellor, the impotence of the EU resonates.
DEFINING EUROPE
To define where Europe begins and ends is to build the EU and an Atlantic partnership for the post-Cold War world. The new era in Europe has been heralded through a dizzying proliferation of establishments. New establishments have emerged, such as the North Atlantic Cooperation Council. , the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Baltic Cooperation Council and the Black Sea Council. The existing establishments have been developed, adding the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), with its blind and prompt acceptance of the successor republics of Transcaucasia and Central Asia of the former Soviet Union and the post-Yugoslav States, and the long-standing Council of Europe, renewed by admitting the democracies of Central Europe, eastern and southern.
The proliferation and expansion of these intertwined establishments, the jumble of agreements, organizations and committees (criticized by some as a alphabet soup whose lack of project creates “a hodgepodge of universalist slogans” rather than pictorial proposals) has made an even worse mess. The issue is not the number of netpaintingss, but their degree of team spirit and their geographical policy and practice of very important political and economic issues. Without that team spirit, there is a danger that each State will decide on the establishments or forums that it believes the most productive will serve its objectives. This may simply be the “renationalisation” of foreign policies in Europe, encouraging unilateralism disguised as multilateralism.
Defining where Europe begins the right thing deserves not to be too difficult. We know which establishments survived unscathed at the end of East-West antagonism and deserve to be protected and evolved despite existing tensions: the European Union plus the Western European Union (WEE), a Sleeping Beauty Safety Partnership that was awakened through the Maastricht Agreement; NATO, the clearest imaginable manifestation of the indissoluble security partnership between the democracies of Europe and North America; and the Council of Europe, which represents the cultural unity of the continent through its usual human and civil rights standards.
The real question is where Europe stands or, more precisely, how far European integration can go. It is clear that the EU can no longer arrogate to itself the unreserved name of “Europe”, which seemed justified through the post-Yalta dichotomy. The collapse of the Soviet empire left a security vacuum between Germany and Russia, the domain where European wars traditionally began. So far, the EU and NATO have responded cautiously to this challenge. The EU has alluded to his personal tastes by distinguishing the 4 Visegrad countries (Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia), Romania, Bulgaria, Slovenia and the 3 Baltic states as partners in agreements arrangements – some planned and others already concluded – that open the door to their imaginable accession to the EU.
Since, of the 12 members of the EU, 11 belong to the Atlantic Alliance (in an EU-15 the ratio will be 11: 4), these encompassing plans will go directly to the alliance. Finland’s accession will make Russia an immediate neighbour of the European Community. for the first time, with a non-unusual border several hundred kilometers long. This border may be extended with the accession of Poland, Latvia and Estonia. The accession of the Baltic republics, belonging to Russia’s “close foreigner”, to the EU will turn those countries’ tensions with Russia over their giant Russian ethnic minorities into a European problem.
The accession of Hungary and the applicants from South-Eastern Europe, Romania and Bulgaria, would turn Serbia, whose long-term policies are in the dark, into a neighbour of the EU and would confront it with a multitude of minority problems, adding those of ethnic Hungarians in Romania, Serbia and Slovakia. In addition, plans to enlarge the EU would shift the gap between Germany and Russia eastward to Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova, i. e. Russia’s western “near abroad” minus the Baltic republics. The EU that comes with the countries of Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe dictates a massive, non-unusual foreign and security policy programme and close policy coordination between the EU and the US. USA Within the framework of NATO.
The first steps have already been taken. The EU has intensified the political debate with a number of applicants for membership and presented them with the status of “partnership” within the WEO. The question remains whether more can be done. Fortunately, the risk to the safety of applicants for membership remains a hypothetical case. You may only have one transient window of opportunity. The EU therefore envisages full political accession of these countries, at least those of Central and Eastern Europe, and long-term economic aid and transition agreements. The European Community took similar measures for Greece, Spain, Portugal and the former East Germany after becoming flexible democracies. Why not start over by substantially improving the settlement agreements?
To be manageable, the transition to the EU club will have to be done in stages. Including the EU’s economically and structurally more complex eastern neighbours around the year 2000 does not mean the long-term exclusion of other post-communist countries, the discrimination that opposes them. or discouragement from their efforts to achieve political and economic stability. Wouldn’t that inspire those countries to see what other fledgling democracies have achieved?
CHALLENGES
The lack of courage on the part of Western Europeans, particularly in defining the future of NATO, proves to be the greatest impediment to resolving the external, security and defence disorders of enlargement. European trans-European network projects in the transport, energy and telecommunications sectors are more than symbolic, but the flexible trans-European industry is more important, especially in terms of fairness: the EU has benefited more from the post-Cold War period. industry than the post-communist countries. The latter’s low labor prices are not perceived as unfair competitive advantages, but are perceived as engines of economic expansion and industry.
Western European protectionism creates a vicious circle: there is no EU club without economic recovery, there is no sustainable economic recovery without major for the EU Therefore, a main task of Western European political leaders is to convince their electorate that the short-term disadvantages (presumed or real) of the Eastern festival will be offset by the medium and long-term advantages. This would possibly seem very difficult politically, given that two or 3 GOVERNMENTS of EU countries a year are mocked through national election campaigns.
Western Europe benefits from the emergence of new markets in the East, but more important is the healthy strain of dealing with lagging reforms of its economies, where structural dislocation has weakened Western Europe’s competitiveness in recent decades. Labour prices in Germany, France, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark are just one example. By accepting the challenge of new competition in the East, though not definitively, Western Europe will also improve its position vis-à-vis fast-growing economies. of the Asia-Pacific region.
Expanding to the north and east does not require neglecting the south. The June 1994 European Council will accompany Cyprus and Malta in their enlargement plans, thus making countries such as Israel and Egypt long-term neighbours of the EU. Increasing Islamic fundamentalism in the Maghreb and middle East or excluded from the Middle East peace procedure through US diplomacy, reaching an agreement with countries on the other side of the Mediterranean completes a post-Cold War enlargement strategy. more in this regard. New treaties will have to be signed aimed at strengthening economic ties with Israel and the Arab countries, which are now engaged in a courageous reconciliation process, which would perceive that maintaining ties with the EU implies respect for external conduct criteria and the promotion of regional peace. The EU will also have to participate in the Algerian quagmire, as it is more than a French post-colonial backyard; it may simply confront the EU with destabil destabilation, violence and attacks on human rights.
A third impediment to the EU’s eastward enlargement is the loss of the team spirit and power that will accompany its expansion to 20 or 25 Member States. A solution will have to be found at the 1996 EU Intergovernmental Review Conference. it carries a threat of institutional dilution and paralysis. Transitional arrangements will give rise to a tangle of complex structures. The more economic and security interests are reconciled, the less member states will agree.
Competition for monetary resources and political influence is bound to intensify. It is very likely that you will want to rethink the questionable formula for allocating subsidies under the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy. The net beneficiaries of the EU budget, in particular some Mediterranean Member States, will oppose the inevitable reallocation of regional funds, which may even turn some of those countries into net payers. Monetary Union (EMU).
The decisive question is whether the EU will be able to broaden a new consensus on the direction and speed of deepening integration, thus paving the way for a successful enlargement through the inclusion of new members. supranational and intergovernmental technique, in other words, between those who are willing to transfer significantly more national sovereignty to Brussels and those who are not. compatible. Reconciliation of the two perspectives was deferred until the 1996 Intergovernmental Review Conference; it is doubtful that the answer is less difficult to find in an EU-15 than in an EU-12.
Safeguarding and effective eu establishments will require a shift from unanimity to qualified majority voting and new veto rules for qualified majority voting, which presupposes that all parties are willing to give up more pieces of national sovereignty. Faced with demands for further enlargement to the east, proponents of a supranational technique would find further enlargement unacceptable.
THE GERMAN QUESTION
This end result can prove fatal, especially from the German point of view. It is important for Germany to paint with strong democracies in all directions, and post-war history has shown that European integration is an effective stabilizer, politically and economically. A united Germany considers its long run to be inextricably connected with that of adjacent nations, of which it possesses more than any other country in Europe. German-Russian relations. Germany’s approval of NATO’s eastward enlargement indicates that its politicians have abandoned the bad habit, followed by the Cold War Ostpolitik era, of being concerned about the reaction of hawks in Moscow.
As a potential member of EMU (in 1997 or, more likely, in 1999), it will have to ensure that financial integration is supported, adding a single European currency. through closer political integration between the components of EMU. History shows that a financial union without a strong political column is doomed to failure.
More importantly, the “German question” did not find a complete answer with the reunification of 1990. The integration of this colossus into the European environment remains a problem. EMU is not only an economic project, but also a means to overcome what some understand as the financial hegemony of the German Bundesbank. European integration and Atlantic ties have become central elements of Germany’s explanation of the state and cosmopolitan mentality of its post-war generation; They have also been a means of building foreign trust and obtaining foreign aid to repair national unity. A united Germany desires the confidence of its neighbors and partners to save them from contemplating coalitions to balance and engage their demographic, economic and political overweight. Concern about coalitions is not paranoia as long as European leaders continue in a nineteenth-century policy of checks and downs.
Some Europeans, especially in Britain, argue that the only major challenge left for the EU is its eastward enlargement and that a closer union would only help Germany achieve the European hegemony it achieved in either global war. However, enlarging the EU without deepening it would weaken France’s position and strengthen Germany’s. The more Member States the EU has, the smaller each part of the strength pie is. But in terms of influence, Germany– surrounded by countries that see Bonn (or Berlin) as the centre of gravity – would probably be the only big beneficiary. However, German political elegance is in a position to relinquish some of the sovereignty it has gained through unification, believing almost unanimously that this is the only way to escape the traps of beyond foreign policy. Such an opportunity deserves to be seized through Germany’s European partners as it arises.
THE VIEW OF FRANCE
For more than 40 years, special dating between France and Germany has been the indispensable element of Europe’s impressive post-World War II reconciliation and increasing unification. However, tensions are occurring in dating. it was held through a non-unusual threat, the Soviet Empire; however, it presented a delicate balance: France’s external weight as an independent nuclear force and permanent member of the UN Security Council made it the dominant political and strategic member of the couple. France can therefore settle for the impressive dynamism of the German economy. As long as East-West antagonism maintained the department of Germany, the French bomb can counter the German mark. Of course, we deserve not to idealize the past. Not even before. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, France had suspicions about Germany’s motives, and Germany was disappointed by France’s inability to go beyond Germany’s competitive past.
This fragile balance of imbalances has changed, Germany is united and aware of its new centrality in Europe, it has ceased to behave like an economic giant and a political dwarf, although it has not yet fully triumphed over its tendency for intelligent intentions to matter. more than smart actions. He is slowly learning to take the political initiative. A safer Germany now faces a France that is less secure in its identity and European orientation, less because French elites suspect Germany than because they are uns sure of its ability to balance Germany within Europe. France can only live on its demographic inferiority. France’s destabilizing political debates on the eve of the presidential election are aggravating its distrust of its external position and the rationality of its European choice.
For France, the EU was a way to gain strength and influence. France, on its own, can simply not maintain its policy of greatness, it can only do so throughout Europe. Today, many members of the French political and economic elite blazenly wonder if they have not mistakenly worked to advance German interests. They consider Germany’s accession to the central and eastern European countries to the EU as proof of Germany’s efforts to expand its sphere of action. A recent article published through the parliamentary organization of the German Christian Democrats that contained a reference to federalism, to which France may never adhere, is described through some elements of the French nationalist right as an attempt to create an alibi for German movements toward nationalism and unilateralism. When former Socialist Defense Minister Jean-Pierre Chevènement denounces Jacques Delors, a possible candidate to succeed François Mitterrand, as the “candidate of the German CDU,” he reminds France of the worst years in its political history.
However, despite such suspicions, evident at the time of German reunification, most French people are convinced that there is no choice for the privileged Franco-German appointments and their role as the “hard core” of the European Union. This policy recognises the necessity and inevitability of enlargement, but also points out the dangers of europe’s dilution and the danger of slowing down the European network, which would lead the less dynamic members to impose their pace on the maximum dynamics. They do not need to remain alone in unconditional organization with the Germans. But the options are not abundant.
Britain, as a medium-sized nuclear force with a culture of army intervention, may also simply be France’s herbal strategic ally, but this would possibly be difficult to translate into concrete action, even if a rapprochement between the two permanent members of the Army is perceived. The UN Security Council that fought aspect by aspect in the Persian Gulf and Bosnia. Britain may slowly realize that its special rendezvous with the United States is over and that its initial ambition of an Athens for the new Rome — an enlightened and cultured mentor to a heartless king — has not brought the expected benefits. The United States is committed to a European strategy of enlargement and deepening, as advocated through Germany and France. Britain’s only option today is to continue its integration into the EU, not only as an actor in a flexible industrial area, but as a key political force in this supranational political project. Today’s European dilemma is that you can’t deepen the EU with Britain, but you can and can’t do without it either.
Italy’s precarious political and economic scenario does not allow him to be a full spouse in the envisaged EMU or a strategic spouse of France. The neo-fascists in Rome’s existing coalition government might be less worrisome than their long-term diplomacy. they want to take back Istria from Slovenia, and their statements have raised concerns. These trends, which are not limited to Italy, underline the concept that the importance of borders must be reduced, not emphasised, in the new Europe.
Spain, France’s future wife, is also involved in domestic problems. The other EU countries are too small to exert influence. They may only be under the direction of an exceptional usuality, and such a user is not provided anywhere.
A DIVERSE EUROPE
If a fundamental consensus on further integration cannot be reached at the 1996 Intergovernmental Review Conference, the only option might be the “variable geometry” enshrined in the Maastricht Treaty. For example, not all EU members would be registered in the Economic and Monetary Union. Not all of them would participate in the integration of defence within the framework of the WEOC; some states, such as Turkey, will be registered in the WEO as full associate members without belonging to the EU; some EU members, such as France and Germany, would be located in all circles and constitute a de facto core, or “hard core”, while others would not, either by selection or because they do not meet certain requirements. This core can simply stabilise the EU’s transition period, while the variable geometry can smoothly lead to a Europe à la carte de los angeles: an EU more like a supermarket of characteristics than a popular package.
In fact, the EU will continue to attract new members. The Swedish referendum in favour of the EU was a marvel for Europeans in favour of further integration – and they still have a majority. During the Cold War, there were fears of the finlanization of Western Europe. Today we can expect a “Scandinavianization” of the EU, which will bring a new flavor to European politics, societies and cultures.
Europeans do not have to pursue desirable objectives; they are within reach, but they will have to recognize that the fate of their continent depends on whether their old continent rejuvenates or sinks into passivity, pessimism and old rivalries, whether it learns the classes of the twentieth century in its last decade or repeats the mistakes of the past. European integration and transatlantic partnership were the key to good fortune in Western Europe in the post-war period, and this will be the case in the post-Cold War future.
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