What's happening in Europe? - The European Union: a critical opinion

By Gerrit Jan Bouwhuis

In nine contributions to this journal several developments in Europe were addressed. Two articles addressed especially the European Union as a project itself. In article four I described the history of the project. In article nine I described the situation after the elections for the European Parliament June 9th this year. In this article the reader may find my personal opinion about the project. And subsequently, I formulate what kind of European Union I would like to see and why.

The European Union: an overview

The European Union is an organisation with a lot of power. Nowadays, it now includes 27 countries with a total of 450 million inhabitants. The whole Union is managed by seven major bodies. In addition, there are approximately 40 agencies. There are 27 commissioners and 720 members of the European Parliament. The EU has 60,000 civil servants. EU regulations amount to 80,000 pages.

In terms of legal structure, the EU is an organisation “sui generis”. That is to say: it is not a standard organisation, such as a Treaty organisation (a group of cooperating countries) or an autonomous country. The EU is something in-between, unique, and with its own legal structure. Part of this structure is that the EU has its own powers. The EU is therefore partly sovereign. It shares this sovereignty with the Member States. Three types of powers  (competences), are distinguished:

• Exclusive powers.

  The EU creates binding regulations and also enforces them. In areas where the EU has exclusive competence, it also concludes international treaties. The EU has exclusive competence in the important areas of the internal market, competition policies, trade policy and monetary policy (for countries that have the Euro). You could call this the “economic engine block” of the EU.

  
  

• Shared powers.

  In areas with shared competences, the EU can be declared competent, a decision taken by the European Council. Once this has happened, the EU sets rules and the countries can no longer do so (“Member States cannot exercise competences in areas where the Union has done so”). There are many areas where this is the case, that is to say, where important competences have been transferred to the EU. This includes parts of social and economic policy, agriculture and fisheries, the environment, transport, energy and internal freedom, law and security. In practice, the EU is important in a number of areas. Examples: agriculture, energy, climate, migration. This block also contains a number of areas in which tasks are also shared, but where the countries remain dominant (“Union exercise of competence shall not result in Member States being prevented”). This concerns, for example: research, space travel, development cooperation, foreign, security- and defense policy; employment and social policy.

• Supporting powers.

  Finally, there are areas where the EU is only supportive. The EU can only coordinate and supplement. This concerns areas such as public health, industry, education and culture.

To sum up: in many policy areas the EU is very important. In that areas national authority has been reduced substantially. Two additional points are important for a good understanding of the underlying mechanisms:

• The EU Treaty. 

  The EU Treaty includes the formula “ever closer union”. The official goal is therefore an EU with ever more powers. There is no limit to this. Officially, there is a kind of limit, namely the principle of subsidiarity: what can be done at a lower level, should not be done at a higher level. However, it seems in practice this principle is a dead letter.

  
  

• The mechanism of bureaucracy.

  There is a strong law for public bureaucracies: they tend to expand. There are many studies on this. In business, this is not possible: no more profits, no more business. In the public sector, this is possible; in fact, it is one of the biggest problems of the public sector. I think in Brussels this problem is squared: a bureaucracy at a distance; a large arena to operate in; 450 million people; 27 commissioners (far too many) who all want to play their role; 40 agencies; 60,000 civil servants. You can never prove it, but I think this constellation guarantees an almost autonomous process consisting of thousands of small decisions moving in one direction: more power to Brussels. But... more and more power to Brussels, less and less sovereignty for the countries, is that good? Should we want that? That is the key question. What kind of Europe do we want?

Where lies the demos? 

With the concept of demos, borrowed from the Greek popular assembly, I mean the “animated” bond of all citizens of a country who together form a sovereign people.

The EU was born after the Second World War. And that was no coincidence. The Second World War was horrific, the low point of a nationalism that had been growing stronger since the 19th century. Never again a war. And never again this nationalism. Clear and correct. But: what exactly are we saying with this?

My impression is that the reaction to WWII among many people was that they didn’t want to have to do with the whole idea of ​​separate countries. Any special feelings for one’s “own” country, any idea of ​​“a specific culture of one’s own”, was discredited. That is only allowed in sports, no more. In other words, an ideological undercurrent arose that said: away with the separate countries; we are building a whole new Europe, a United Europe, a new demos, with a new soul. That’s our inspiring ideal. That idea was there from the beginning and it also became very clear during the discussion about the European Constitution in the years twenty zero (rejected by France and the Netherlands in referendums in 2005). Leading European politicians  wanted a Constitution, a national anthem, a flag.

These are things that belong to a sovereign country. But is that realistic? My stance is: no, it is not realistic. The reality of Europe is a great diversity of cultures, languages ​​and mentalities. French, German, Italian, Dutch, etc. Very different. The citizens of those countries feel primarily connected to their country. And that applies to the great masses. Not to that small elite in Brussels. They feel different. But for the time being, the reality of the citizens is that of their own country. Can that ever change? Maybe. In 100 years, in 200, in 300 years. But that is a natural process. It seems wise not to force it.

Isn't that nationalism, that terrible thing from the history? No, I don't think so. And that’s crucial. In my perspective, we must distinguish between a healthy form of patriotism, a sense of connection with one's own country, history, culture, language and unhealthy nationalism, idolization of a country. In my opinion, these are two fundamentally different things. And in my opinion it is unfair that federalists do not want to see that difference. I believe that a sense of connection with one's own country, identifying with it, is important for the cohesion of society. It yields involvement, security, solidarity, belonging somewhere, a bit of identity.

are feelings that are possible towards one's own country, but not in that way towards Europe, at least not now and not in the foreseeable future. And that is not bad: fellow Europeans can be very good friends. But that is something different from the kinship in the demos. And we should not play those two things off against each other. In summary: I think that the separate countries will remain the "demos" for the people for a very long time to come. And because that is the case, that is where sovereignty must lie, because that is where democracy functions. And that democracy must not be undermined. That is bad. Back to the core question: what kind of Europe, what kind of EU do we want? Personally I wish an EU of sovereign countries working together as friends. I do not wish a supranational Europe. I think that the entire dream of a federal Europe should be buried. Away with the formula “ever closer union”.

 Has the question of what kind of Europe we want explicitly been discussed in the past 70 years? Unfortunately, hardly at all. There were strong federalist forces from the start. And they have always remained (the last 20 years with the Belgian Verhofstadt as figurehead). Those forces pushed through the “ever closer union”. And that mainly happened by appealing to “necessity”. It was economically and technologically necessary…. In this way, the core question was concealed and the question of whether it could also be done in another way, namely in a way in which the countries remained sovereign, was not addressed. The formation of the EU was primarily a technocratic process, a process from above. But in that process, irreversible steps were deliberately taken. Many citizens did not understand what really was happening.

In the meantime this has changed. There are discussions now. And the course of events just described has taken its toll. In the last 20 years, “Eurosceptic parties” have emerged. They now hold a considerable number of seats in the national parliaments and in the European Parliament. Even more importantly, the EU has lost the UK. The root of this is essentially the federalist drive of the EU. The departure of the UK is a loss. The federalist drive creates more and more resistance which is weakening the EU. The federalists are destroying the EU. And that is bad. I hope that there will come a time when the EU can be transformed in a different direction, retaining what is good, but eliminating the federalist idea. In the last paragraph, I describe which EU I personally would like to see.

Another European Union

In my opinion there should be four goals:

• Maintaining peace on the continent.

  I consider this to be the first goal. It should not be overshadowed by the economy. In Western Europe we have had that peace for 79 years now. That’s fantastic. It is desirable to extend that peace to the East. It is sad that the EU is not contributing to this at the moment, on the contrary the EU is fueling the war in Ukraine (see my previous article no. 5).

• Playing a meaningful and significant role in politics in the world.

  The core of that goal should in my opinion be promoting peace, reducing injustice, promoting democracy elsewhere in the world. This goal requires standing at equal level with the large political blocs elsewhere in the world. It also requires wise restraint. No spreading democracy with the “push on a button and a blow with the sword”, as the US does. That goal means a joint foreign policy and it could need a joint defense. Here I would like more Europe. But... that does require a joint position on a number of conflicts and problems (the relationship with Russia; Israel; radical Islam; autocracies; discrimination and oppression in other countries, etc.). At the moment, that joint position doesn’t exist. So we first need to invest in a joint position. As long as that is not there, the EU cannot act as a unit and should not want to do so. Then foreign policy remains up to the countries.

  
  

• Promoting prosperity for the population. 

  This can be done through both internal and external measures (customs union and internal market, respectively trade agreements and tariff policy). This goal requires standing at an equal level with the large economic blocs elsewhere in the world and the large multinational companies, including digital ones. This is particularly the current "economic engine block". I would like to change two things here: a higher limit for European tendering and a reduction in the free movement of workers. At moment these two elements have too many disadvantages. Furthermore, I would like to abolish the extensive subsidy instruments that the EU currently has. EU subsidies distort national budgetary decision making. The customs union and the free trade area are sufficient to promote prosperity. 

  
  

• Cooperation in cross-border matters. 

  But only where that is really the case

In my opinion, applying these ideas would mean that the tasks of the EU in a large number of areas could be greatly reduced or even disappear altogether. An important example is the environmental area. The EU is huge in this field. But the environmental policies are either global (CO2) or national. I guess that of the 40 agencies, many could be abolished and that of the 60,000 civil servants, many (half of them? two thirds?) could go home.

Legally, I would like to transform the EU into a confederal structure, i.e. a treaty organisation of sovereign countries. 

I would like to abolish the European Parliament and the European Commission. Instead of the Commission five of six Secretaries-General suffice. All power should be vested in the European Council, i.e. the Council of Heads of Government, who are accountable to their own Parliaments. As for decision-making: no majority decision-making; unanimity. You don't force friends, you convince them. 

And as for the two biggest steps from the years 1985-1995: 

• The Euro. 

  It would be nice if it could be preserved, but that is only possible if people finally stick to the rules. No development towards a "transfer union", i.e. subsidization of the South by the North. That does not promote mutual solidarity. In fact, it undermines it.

• Abolition of internal borders (Schengen). 

  That is also nice, but if Europe does not see itself fit to effectively monitor the external borders, countries will have no other choice than to reintroduce their own border controls

Finally...

For the time being, what I have described here is a utopia. The federalist forces are strong. Moreover, processes are slow. But there is some perspective. Federalists are liberals, socialists and greens. Supporters of national sovereignty are the conservatives and the patriots. In the last elections, the second group was strengthened, the first weakened. The Christian Democrats, forming the largest group, are in between. They are divided. Von der Leyen, the continuing Commission President, is a convinced federalist, but there are others, and more importantly: the Christian Democrats do not want to be structurally the prisoner of the federalist bloc, and national and on the European level, they are under electoral pressure from conservatives and patriots. The most important factor, however, are the heads of government. Especially if other leaders were to come to power in Germany and France, the situation could change. Time will tell.