Just as it was necessary to think beyond national protectionism in the 1930s, perhaps it is time to start thinking about life beyond the European Union.
The EU is afraid of its peoples
It could be that this crisis demands it.
It is going to be a sombre gathering when Europe’s leaders gather in Brussels for an emergency summit over lunch on Sunday Mar 1.
The EU faces its first economic crash, a disaster that is shaping up to be a once in a century event. Is it up to the job?
There is the spectre of intra-EU tensions around the Justus Lipsius luncheon table as leaders from big countries – that President Nicolas Sarkozy – tear up the rules.
Hurtling towards them is the prospect that bailing out the banks has merely transferred the “toxic” contagion to nations.
The coming crisis is a crisis of states not financial institutions. It will be a crisis of politics.
The EU is pretty resilient. It might just be able to contain the chauvinist French (or anyone else).
At a pinch, it can probably survive bailing out an entire country or two, depending on just how many.
But can the EU survive a crisis of the state?
The EU has always been a union of states rather peoples.
Its relation to the democratic European ideal is perhaps similar in effect to the financial sector’s warped and damaging dominance over the real economy.
The EU as a place where politics is conducted behind closed doors is ill-equipped to take people with them or to confront difficult questions.
The EU is learning a painful lesson: that its cosy consensus world of officialdom, diplomacy and contempt for voters, is not up to the mark when dealing with a full blown crisis.
Events have shown that the EU is better at puffing up fears about climate change, bird flu and other terrifying environmental perils than it is at dealing with a concrete problem.
Four interesting points:
In previous recessions the state used the crisis to identify (wrongly or rightly) elements of the social order that need restructuring – whether, as in Britain in the 1970s and 1980s, it is shaking out nationalised industry or smashing the trade unions. This has not happened in latest crisis.
Not a single EU country, certainly not Gordon Brown’s Britain, has yet come forward to spell how Western European states are going to make severe reductions in current forms of state expenditure. This seems to be a unique historical phenomenon in the face of an economic slump.
Nobody has set out any government or EU vision for how the economy is going to be reorganised during and after the shake out of a recession. There seems to be no vision of an economic future, it seems to be bailouts, heads down and hope for the best.
Out-sourced, privatised but bureaucratic member states, and the EU they created, have not tried to mobilise sections of the population behind a crisis programme. In fact, the EU seems more afraid of its populace than anything else. Margaret Thatcher could restructure 80s Britain because she won a political battle and social conflict for the national interest. The message seems to be “don’t worry your little heads, stay out of it”.
It is abundantly clear that institutions created for the benefit of diplomats and mandarins are not up to the job of stabilising febrile market institutions or getting cash (where it should be) into productive investments not dodgy bets on dodgier loans.
The problems the EU is facing are writ larger on the domestic stage, just as the European statist classes have embraced the EU, national statecraft has become dominated by fetishistic and self-destructive practices to which, we are told, There Is No Alternative.
Both the EU and Britain, with minor differences of degree and emphasis, have for over two decades been dominated by the liberalisation agenda, including constant diet of “deregulation” (doublespeak that often means more outsourced regulators or quangos) and privatisation (irresponsible horrors like the PFI).
This TINA agenda – totally dominated by tick box culture and the dreadful jargon that ensues when bureaucrats enter into a two-way Faustian pact with business – has clearly been more about states, such as Britain, ducking responsibility and outsourcing authority away from democratic accountability.
The proof? The EU, and its member states, are not up to the job of dealing with the current crisis, which has become one of global capitalism.
#1 by Anne Palmer on February 19, 2009 - 10:16 am
Many people, not just ME, are wondering why, in these “Credit Crunch Days” we are voting and paying for National Governments that can no longer govern?
There is a choice. we pay either one or the other but not both.
There are two Governments. UK and Brussels. Four Parliaments here in the UK and Northern ireland and nine EU Regions that the British people do not want. Two Parliaments in the EU (Brussels and Strasbourg)
We cannot coninue living in cloud Cookoo Land thinking that we can afford all these added layers of Governance. There are even ourside influences WHO, UN, ECHR, and all the military sides which we contribute to, it can no longer be done.
#2 by Ron Friderik on February 19, 2009 - 10:33 am
I think that even though the EU is not a project of the people, it can play an important role in coordinating member-states’ efforts to contain the crisis and get out of the coming recession. Member-states on their own want to bail out their car industries and reduce government spending to close budget deficits. If everyone does this it will be a disaster.
The Commission must quickly get the member-states back in line, and take charge in solving the financial crisis.
This would of course be a lot easier if the EU Commission had some democratic legitimacy and the people’s support.
#3 by Patrick on February 19, 2009 - 12:23 pm
Unfortunately this article, as with much written by Mr Waterfield, is the same nonsense which has been repeated endlessly over the past 20 years by UK anti-EU commentators, whose wet dream it is that the EU self-destructs and Europe returns to WWII days of individual nation states. This is not going to happen, the crisis will re-emphasis the role of the EU and the protection it gives to Member States.
With regard to Anne Palmer’s comment – the “credit crunch days” are directly as a result of the UK having lived beyond its means for far too long and whose main industry is a ponzi scheme unravelling day by day. It has nothing to do with the EU, and indeed membership of the EU may be the only saving grace for the UK.
There is only one Parliament that governs – the Parliament in London which can decide at any moment to dissolve the other Parliaments and to withdraw from the EU. There is no “government in Brussels”, only elected representatives from the different states collaborating together. As for the nine “EU regions”, this is merely an administrative measure which enables EU funds to be distributed more evenly across the EU. It particularly benefits a country like the UK where the power and money has been traditionally centred in London, and gives the rest of the country a chance to participate and benefit.
#4 by Bruno Waterfield on February 19, 2009 - 1:02 pm
Patrick, my point is that the EU is a product of member states – and that is the problem.
When I write that “the EU, and its member states are not up to the job of dealing with the current crisis” I do not yearn for the past. Far from it.
There can be no return to the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, whatever. European integration is a good thing, I just question its political basis.
I am not a eurosceptic, this posting certainly does not positively counterpose the national states to the EU.
I wrote: “The problems the EU is facing are writ larger on the domestic stage, just as the European statist classes have embraced the EU, national statecraft has become dominated by fetishistic and self-destructive practices to which, we are told, There Is No Alternative.”
For me Whitehall, in the British case, and Brussels, in the EU’s case are very much the same creature.
Ron, yes it is fine to “coordinate”, whatever that really means, but getting out of this crisis requires politics and political renewal.
Is the EU up to it? That’s my question. I think a European answer at the political level could be a good one. I just don’t see it.
#5 by Nemokrati on February 19, 2009 - 5:46 pm
Patrick, I would like to comment on your saying that “There is only one Parliament that governs – the Parliament in London”.
Isn’t that a statement that will be complicated by the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty? In Sweden we are very worried what this will mean to our democracy. The question has hardly been debated at all and the people is definitely not well informed about its consequenses, or even its contents. Critical voices have been hushed and national television didn’t bring it up at all as it was decided on in our national parliament on November 20, 2008. And with EU’s militarization traditional values will be overruled and we as a people will have no say in it what so ever.
#6 by Nemokrati on February 19, 2009 - 6:10 pm
And, I might ad, naturally we have not been granted a referendum either, although there is support for one.
#7 by Rene C. Moya on February 19, 2009 - 8:17 pm
Bruno, your style is tendentious at best, and outright disingenuous at worst. What’s more, you’re being highly hypocritical in praising Margaret Thatcher but then turning around and bashing the neo-liberal agenda she successfully peddled to the British people.
You make some particularly risible points:
(1) ‘The coming crisis is a crisis of states not financial institutions. It will be a crisis of politics.’
This began as a crisis of finance that has become a crisis of state. In many European states, the UK above all, the political class was deluded into believing that government had no rôle in regulating financial institutions. This race towards de-regulation, instituted by centre-right governments (e.g. Margaret Thatcher and her ‘Big Bang’ deregulation of the City) and accepted by ‘reconstructed’ centre-left parties (e.g. New Labour in Britain). The state failed by not becoming involved enough; we will perpetuate failure if we do not accept a larger–NOT a smaller–rôle for the state.
(2) ‘The EU is learning a painful lesson: that its cosy consensus world of officialdom, diplomacy and contempt for voters, is not up to the mark when dealing with a full blown crisis.’
That’s rubbish. It is learning a lesson, all right, and that is that unless there is deeper integration with respect to financial regulation–through the creation of a fail-safe bail-out fund for EMU states–all European economies suffer. All supranational organisations to date are ‘cosy’ worlds of ‘officialdom’ and ‘diplomacy’, but at least within the EU there are ongoing attempts to increase the power of the European Parliament in the Lisbon Treaty. It was a European institution, the European Court of Justice, which first increased the power of the ‘democratic’ arm of the EU. Not national governments. And the Treaty of Lisbon continues this process.
If your thesis were even remotely correct, then the UN, the WTO/GATT, the OECD, the IMF and World Band, and every other organisation where ‘officialdom, diplomacy and contempt for voters’, i.e. every diplomatic organisation ever created, would collapse under the strain of the present crisis.
Can you defend that thesis?
(3) ‘Events have shown that the EU is better at puffing up fears about climate change, bird flu and other terrifying environmental perils than it is at dealing with a concrete problem.’
Events have shown? Want to point out specific examples? What about EU structural funds; deficient as they may be in some respects, those funds have done much to build institutions and infrastructure in formerly impoverished states.
(4) ‘In previous recessions the state used the crisis to identify (wrongly or rightly) elements of the social order that need restructuring – whether, as in Britain in the 1970s and 1980s, it is shaking out nationalised industry or smashing the trade unions. This has not happened in latest crisis…Not a single EU country…has yet come forward to spell how Western European states are going to make severe reductions in current forms of state expenditure. This seems to be a unique historical phenomenon in the face of an economic slump.’
This isn’t like previous recessions, as any economist with half a brain would tell you. You love to point out the ‘shaking out’ of the state in the 70s and 80s as an example of good done under previous circumstances, when:
(a) many of those ‘reforms’ in the 70s and 80s are at the heart of the present crisis (i.e. deregulation of financial institutions, the hollowing out of industry);
(b) this isn’t a ‘stagflationary’ crisis like that of the 70s–this is a potentially DEFLATIONARY crisis caused by an across-the-board depreciation of asset values as a result of bank failures and the drying up of credit, i.e. it more appropriately resembles the Great Depression, the Japanese lost decade, or any number of 19th century asset bubble crises;
(c) ‘severe reductions…in state expenditure’ would be the WORST possible thing to do under the present circumstances–ANYONE, even the Godfather of Monetarism himself, Milton Friedman, would tell you that REDUCING the state during a deflationary crisis is anathema to future growth, and would only throw European states into a deflationary trap that would take a decade to crawl out of. Decisive and temporary state aid is a GIVEN;
(d) you’re obviously not an economic historian (nor do you have an inkling of credibility in claiming otherwise), since you assert that it is ‘unique’ under similar circumstances for states to sit back and CUT public services in the face of a slowing economy and price deflation–that would be a recipe for depression, pure and simple;
(5) ‘Margaret Thatcher could restructure 80s Britain because she won a political battle and social conflict for the national interest. The message seems to be “don’t worry your little heads, stay out of it”.’
Margaret Thatcher, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah. And here you reveal your political card game for the hackery it is. Britain doesn’t need a Thatcher or a Reagan; it needs a Franklin Roosevelt. You’re against the tide here, my friend, intellectually and politically.
(6) ‘Both the EU and Britain, with minor differences of degree and emphasis, have for over two decades been dominated by the liberalisation agenda, including constant diet of “deregulation” (doublespeak that often means more outsourced regulators or quangos) and privatisation (irresponsible horrors like the PFI).’
This is the most ridiculous of passages, with all the previous not-so-subtle hints you’ve dropped about your love of Margaret Thatcher–that arch-liberal who first instigated deregulation and privatisation en masse in Britain, and whose policies were eventually adopted at the European level.
This is most disingenuous: you critique EU and British policy by obliquely referencing those darned ‘great’ reforms of the 70s/80s/Thatcher/Tory era.
If that isn’t patently ludicrous and contradictory, I don’t know what is.
#8 by Rene C. Moya on February 19, 2009 - 8:26 pm
Oops…on my point 4 (d), it should have read: ‘…since you assert that it is ‘unique’ under similar circumstances for states NOT to sit back and CUT public services in the face of a slowing economy and price deflation–WHICH would be a recipe for depression, pure and simple;’
Other slight problems about (‘shred’ instead of ‘inkling’), but I guess intellectually deficient arguments really rile me up.
#9 by Bruno Waterfield on February 20, 2009 - 9:49 am
Rene
Good points, but you may have missed my main point – which is to try and make the case for politics, democratic politics, as opposed to the uncontested exercise of administration.
1) My argument might be against the state, especially as constituted, it is not against politics – specifically democracy. Democracy trumps markets or state forms, every time for me. I think you are wrong to say that “deregulation” meant the state was less involved or exposed to the financial sector. “Liberalisation” and “privatisation” all have fiendishly complicated legal form and outsourced regulators. The real issue was accountability and the absence of debate over the dominance of non-value creating activity in the economy.
2) The EU is feeling strain and those strains are evident – look at Sarkozy’s comments the other week, for starters, rows between Germany and Britain, spread yields etc.
The European Parliament, an artificial creation, does not address the fundamental character of the EU as created by states, by and for the world of officialdom and diplomats. The lack of public in this institution is one of the artefacts of this reality.
3) Structural funds are a success but not of sufficient order to have much impact in this recession.
4) I agree much of previous “reforms” appear at the heart of the current crisis but my point is that during present period there appears to be no counter-crisis programme at all – if there was one we could criticise and talk about it.
Whatever the financial form a crisis takes, the problem is one of contracting production and unemployment. Any counter crisis measures that do not address this are pointless as far I am concerned.
State expenditure does need to be cut in the UK because it is not being spent on the right things. In Britain, there are large areas of spending that could be reduced or reallocated – “public services”, especially the burgeoning security and surveillance sector could be one. State expenditure should be targeted on providing the basis for future growth, not business as usual – such as PFI.
5) I cut my political teeth in the 80s against Thatcher, I did not praise her or her programme. My argument is that the British establishment fought a political war to restructure the economy, one that mobilised, both for and against. This is better than cabals fixing deals in secret. This is my fundamental point, the crisis needs politics. In fact this crisis is potentially a crisis of right/left “centrism”, the kind of consensus and behind-the-backs-of-the-people bureaucratic politics we enjoy across Europe. I see that as opportunity, like with the referendums, to have debate as Europeans about the politics and economy we want.
See more
http://www.manifestoclub.com/files/EU%20Essays.pdf
#10 by Bruno Waterfield on February 20, 2009 - 10:15 am
Oh. I think the trillions being spent on banks are an area of state expenditure that could be cut btw
#11 by pm on February 23, 2009 - 3:42 pm
1. Unfolding developments have already made the word “crisis” irrelevant.There are financial, economic, political and social aspects. All of them are only consequences not causes.
2. The root cause seems to involve fundamental values deeply rooted in our heads and way of life during the last 2,500 years like competition, domination, oppression, laissez-faire, protectionism, etc. Not only our social and individual relations but our vital relationship with Mother Goddess (Mother Nature) are at stake. Without such a broad understanding we can not improve the prospects of getting out of this human-made mess and can prolong the inevitable birth pains. A good example of such an approach can be found in “Waking the Global Heart” by A. Judith. However, a transformation of this magnitude is beyond the
capacity of separate national or international entities, even the “strongest”. This is why there is no sense to blame any of them.
#12 by Anne Palmer on February 24, 2009 - 10:11 am
To Patrick I would agree with him that under the present Government we have indeed lived beyond our means. I also agree to a certain extent we could have repealed the European Communities Act 1972/3 and returned to a sovereign independent Government, but I doubt very much that could happen after or if Lisbon is ratified by all 27 States.
If I was in charge of events and was an expert in forward planning, once Lisbon was activiated I would move so very quckly, nothing could be separated again. And that is what I rather expect the EU state of, to do. World maps would be changed to show the English Channel as but an \inland waterway\ of the European Union or have you not read the EU’s \Motorway in the sea\. The EU’s Navy has already set sail(which our present Government ‘welcomed!\ and is now on ‘duty’. Now there is open and wide talk of the EU Army.
I only voted for one of the Ministers that form the EU government. The nine EU Regions cost money we cannot afford any more and the people do not want them plus we did not vote for those either. EU Funds were distributed before we had EU Regions.
The best thing to do would be to withdraw the Treaty before all 27 ratify it, and put it to the people in a referendum.
#13 by Patrick on February 25, 2009 - 8:55 pm
Bruno – The EU is indeed a collection of states taking decisions together in areas of common interest, what else should it be? The strength of the organisation lies in its ability to reach a consensus and set common rules to create the world’s largest trading bloc. Such organisations are created by states and not individuals, take for example the USA or UN. If Britain thinks there is an alternative, it has to leave and go and find it.
Nemokrati – The Lisbon Treaty increases the role of national parliaments in the EU decision-making process by requiring draft EU legislation to be submitted to them and allowing them to object to it if they feel the matter would be better dealt with at national level (the principle of subsidiarity).
Anne Palmer – Lisbon provides a specific withdrawal provision which sets out a simple exit procedure. This would be the easy part for the UK, the difficulties coming in rehousing the 5m+ pensioners currently living in the EU and providing work for the 2m who work in the EU.
As for the navy/motorway nonsense sourced from the Telegraph, it amounts to two proposals – one for coordinated, EU-wide coastguard agency to prevent illegal trafficking, and the other for a scheme to improve communications and links between ports. The scheme has already saved the Rosyth/Zeebrugge ferry link. As for redrawing maps, that’s absurd as no territory has been or will ever be given away to the EU.
I’m not sure who is the EU minister you’re referring to. Baroness Ashton in the Commission or the government’s representatives in the Council of Ministers? In both cases, the elected government of the UK nominated the individuals in question, and both Houses of Parliament voted on the Lisbon Treaty. As for the EU funding, I very much doubt that the recipients in less well-off areas of the UK are unhappy to have their deserving projects funded. In any event, what is being paid out is far less than what has been spent on the Iraq war or the Olympics.
#14 by Marcel on March 10, 2009 - 12:36 pm
Patrick seems to be some EU (Reich) plant to spread disinformation. The EU project was set up by democracy-hater Jean Monnet to disempower the national governments and parliaments and centralize these powers in Brussels in the hands of a mutually appointed unelected class.
The EU is bad for everyone, except politicians and people like Patrick who are probably EU employees (thus pay no income tax)
#15 by Anne Palmer on March 12, 2009 - 11:18 pm
According to our Politicians, all we have to do to leave the EU is to repeal the European Communities Act 1972. The withdrawal clause would never work and I rather think you know that Patrick.
Perhaps we should wait and see what the EU Parliament election reveals because people like myself that would not normally vote in that election will be, because I understand President Barroso fears that the people may use it as the referendum they were denied on the Treaty of Lisbon. I would therefore like to see the EU Parliament full of Pro-National people or what some would call “eurosceptic”. It was President Barroso that put the idea into my head. As far as the UK is concerned I will be using Claise 61 of Magna Carta, our own true Constitution, which, if Lisbon comes in would over-ride it, and that Patrick, according to R v Thistlewood 1820 to destroy our Constitution, is an act of Treason. So, there should be many MP’s that are hoping Lisbon remains DEAD which is what it is at present.
D’you know, not one Eurosceptic Party has ever ratified an EU Treaty, Those are the people that have been true to their own Country.
#16 by Anne Palmer on March 16, 2009 - 12:42 pm
My Comments re the withdrawal Clause and expecting others to understand it, made me wonder if they actually do.
I very much doubt the withdrawal clause was ever meant to be used. It is like a comfort zone, it is like putting food in a freezer. We are not going to use our own sovereignty for a long time perhaps, but it is “there” even though it is out of sight, it is there. We have frozen our Sovereignty, it is still there, we haven’t annulled it, nor repealed it, and while it is still there, we must still be a nation State. Right?
In the mean time, knowing our sovereignty is still there, frozen, we can go ahead with the EU’s Regions, EU Police, Army, Navy, all our food GM food, welcome Codex Alimentarius, mandatory vaccines, actually welcome anything the EU wants to do.
Sadly however, we all know what happens to food that has been frozen in the fridge for too long. It is just the same when some one else has been using our sovereignty when we ‘loaned’ it to them or ‘shared’ it, even friends think something on loan for 30-40 years is theirs forever, to use. Actually the EU is busy ‘planning’ for the next 50 years that seems like forever to me. Will our MP’s still expect us to vote for them? Be paid for governing us? Will we just be Regions of the EU? No Crown as head of State? No British Constitution because our own MP’s and Government have destroyed it bit by bit? How does the “Comfort Zone” feel now eh? Oh, I forgot, we can always repeal the European Communities Act 1972 can’t we? Or is that too just another Comfort Zone? Is that just “THERE”?
I suggest that our Government withdraws the very constitutional Treaty of Lisbon before all 27 Nation States ratify it, and put it to the people in a referendum as they should have done in the first place. Rather that than what may or will come after.
#17 by Buy to let mortgages on April 26, 2009 - 12:10 am
This crisis will actually highlight the existing problems. It is coming more apparent that some member states are more concerned about their own back yard and don’t worry too much about their neighbour needs. Many problems can be easily sorted, while others will not disappear for a long time. Sometimes I feel that while EU could be a good thing, it will not succeed in a long run unless this membership will be taken seriously by its members.
#18 by Anne Palmer on April 28, 2009 - 8:21 pm
We the people, elect and pay for our own British MP’s to govern this, their own Country. Their solemn and true Oath of Allegiance is to the British Crown and through the Crown to all the people in this Country, before all else. Britain has always been outward looking, because for us the Commonwealth has played a very major part of our lives long before the EEC/EC/EU came into being.
To Patrick, I have read a great deal of the EU’s Motorway in the sea and in fact I contributed to the EU’s Consultation document. Here for you, as you seem to think my information was sourced from the Telegraph, some paragraphs from that personal Contribution.
UNCLOS has done and is doing a wonderful job basically as a ‘constitution of the seas’, I have come across this expression time and time again for it is in fact generally accepted and respected as such. It is an overarching organisation that can and should
be respected by all. It should be independent from any Country, nation or state or
Union of Countries. UNCLOS should be respected by the EU as well as the USA and others.
These passages are taken from the Introduction of the EU’s Consultation Paper.
“Europe’s geography, therefore, has always been one of the primary reasons for Europe’s special relationship with the oceans for from the earliest times, the oceans have played a leading role in the development of European culture, identity and
history”. What our friends in the European Union appear not to have noticed at all, is that the same could be said about the United Kingdom. I seem to recall, in the dim and distant past that Britannia ruled the waves, or something like that. To rule
them we built our own Ships in our own shipyards. Through EU Competition Policy we lost most of them.
The way forward for the EU: “Principles of good governance suggest the need for a European maritime policy that embraces all aspects of the oceans and seas”. I believe that this good governance should come from International Law.
Governance of the seas has been around long before the EU came along.
In any case, from page 44 Consultation Paper, taking accounts of Geographical Realities. “A European Maritime policy needs a general framework, as set out in this document, but its implementation will need to take account of the realities of Europe’s
geographical situation. For example, EU Member States’ overseas territories give a worldwide dimension to European Maritime Policy. European Neighbourhood Policy 124 comprises a regular dialogue with partner countries, including maritime
issues”. Britain has 14 overseas territories spread throughout the world. So, I think
we can take it as a ‘yes’ that many will be the EU’s Motorways in the seas and many will be the nautical miles it will cover if this dreadful legislation was to go through. End of quotes from my paper.
The EU will not last because it has not taken the people with them. The EU ignores the people, this government has ignored the people and will find out what happens at the next general election exactly how the people feel about being ignored, for it is the people that vote and contribute towards the high living each of them have become so used to.