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Preface
This book is intended as an introduction
to the European Union, a unique conglomeration of nation-states that is
playing an increasing role in world affairs. Although "Europe" is often
defined as a continent, it is really only the western third of the vast
land mass that geographers call Eurasia. A relatively small part of the
world, it has had an enormous impact on human history. For centuries its
kings and peoples fought each other over territory, trade, and religion;
in the modern era, several of its nation-states acquired lands abroad,
which made their conflicts global. Europe was both flashpoint and
battleground in the world wars of the 20th century, which had, by the end
of World War II, taken a savage toll on the region’s population and
destroyed much of its infrastructure, as well as many of its social and
political institutions; the last of the European colonial empires had also
begun to crumble.
After the war, Europe was effectually
divided into rival spheres of influence by the victorious, quasi-European
superpowers, with the Soviet Union, which had suffered more during the
war, exercising much tighter and far more oppressive control over Eastern
Europe than the United States did over the West. It was in Western Europe
that the notion of a consensual, pan-European effort to resolve
differences and avert future wars first emerged; it also seemed to many
Europeans that only as a bloc could they maintain their traditional
importance in world affairs.
From small beginnings, as a modest
confederation for managing coal and steel, the European Union has grown to
encompass 25 nations, approximately 455 million people, and more than 2
million square miles of territory, extending from the Mediterranean to the
Arctic Circle and from the Atlantic coast to the borders of Ukraine and
Belarus. Its collective economy is currently one of the world’s largest,
although none of its constituent nations can match the economy of the
United States. Earlier attempts at European unification—the empires of the
Caesars, Charlemagne, the Hapsburgs, Napoleon, and Hitler— were
accomplished through conquest and dynastic ambition; by contrast the EU
has been constructed slowly and haltingly through a series of dry,
unglamorous treaties focused, as a rule, on specific practical issues,
such as fishing quotas or steel tariffs, and punctiliously respectful of
the sovereignty of its members. At every step, skeptics have predicted its
demise, but bit by bureaucratic bit, the EU has become a power to reckon
with in trade and finance, and may in time develop into a full-fledged
political entity.
A draft constitution that would
restructure the existing network of treaties and agreements and more
sharply define the EU’s various institutions has been approved by
representatives of all the member states; however, since it might involve
some encroachments on national sovereignty, at least 11 of the signatory
governments intend to submit the constitution to a popular vote as well.
It is not clear what will happen over the next few years if any of these
referenda fails (aside from considerable embarrassment to national
politicians), but the EU is accustomed to slow, persistent negotiations
and manifold options, including the occasional "opt-out" clause that
allows a nation to decide how far it wishes to follow the Union’s
policies.
In whatever direction the EU continues
to evolve, it has already accomplished more than most people ever
expected. It has created a sizable free-trade area and provided the
machinery for resolving disputes among sovereign nations, thus keeping the
peace, and it has begun to put forward a distinctively European
identity—all this in a part of the world where more than 20 languages are
spoken and where ethnic fears and national rivalries have a long and
sanguinary history. The EU has also played an important—and
underappreciated—role in Western Europe’s economic and political recovery
from World War II, raising standards of living and promoting democratic
governments across the board; it now hopes to do the same in Eastern
Europe.
The Union’s ambitious program of
enlargement and consolidation might suggest dreams of becoming a
collective superpower, but if such dreams exist, they are still very
remote. So far, enlargement has worked to reduce cohesion, and national
sovereignty has emerged as an almost nonnegotiable issue. (The proposed
new constitution was rejected in 2003 and then revised to restore veto
power to the member states in such vital areas as defense and taxation. It
is too early to tell whether the rifts and stresses evident within the
European Union itself are simply growing pains that will pass as the
organization adjusts to its new size and achieves greater coherence, or
signs that it is nearing its natural limits and can now only fragment or
decline. Although the EU once adopted an anthem (Beethoven’s "Ode to
Joy"), it has never chosen a totem animal on the lines of the Russian bear
or the American eagle—if it did, the animal might well be a colorless,
shape-shifting amoeba, or else one of those ancient mythological creatures
put together from half a dozen different species.
The most significant failures of the EU
have been its apparent paralysis in the face of mass killings in the
former Yugoslavia during the 1990s (the United States and NATO finally
took action, and the EU is now developing armed forces of its own) and its
pervasive inability to win the trust and affection of its own populace. To
many Europeans it remains a distant, slightly mad bureaucracy, probably
corrupt or secretly controlled by unfriendly powers. This unflattering
view has been encouraged by national leaders who find it convenient to
blame "Brussels" for every unpopular measure and take credit for anything
that works, but the EU has often exacerbated the problem with numbing
jargon and lofty "we know best" attitudes. In fact, the Union has done
much for Europe’s diverse peoples, and the advantages of membership are
such that, while states are free to leave, only one (Greenland) ever has,
although several have declined to participate in one or another of the
Union’s activities. The loose structure of the Union and its "work in
progress" character make all sorts of adjustments possible, and, of
course, open the way to interminable negotiations.
This book is divided into six sections.
Part I describes the growth and structure of the Union and some of the
problems thrown into high relief by its proposed new constitution, which
will be the subject of popular referenda for several years to come. Part
II examines the EU’s historic expansion in May 2004, when it took in 10
new members at once (eight from the former Soviet Union) and then
confirmed plans for future enlargements, including a controversial
proposal to accept a Muslim republic. The articles in Part III deal with
the EU’s activities in trade and finance, where it has had a strong
presence almost from the start, while those in Part IV concern the
implications of open borders and the free movement of populations for
Europe’s economy and its treasured social services, as well as the
identity crises that migrants can provoke in states that have
traditionally defined themselves by ethnicity. Part V deals with European
security issues, and particularly with Europe’s interest in developing a
military force of its own, beyond the older NATO alliance with the United
States. Defense is only one of the areas in which European and American
interests may ultimately diverge. Another is covered in Part VI, which
explores the EU’s approach to environmental questions—the Union is the
principal supporter of the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, which the
United States rejects. Because their economies are linked by international
trade, however, American manufacturers may have to take European policies
into account whether they agree with them or not. As the EU continues to
grow, it may come into conflict with other world powers, more than it has
heretofore. In the Appendix which follows the book’s six sections, a
timeline of significant events in the formation and evolution of the
European Union is provided.
Perhaps because the subject is somewhat
amorphous, relatively little space has been given to the European Union in
the American press, so that assembling this Reference Shelf has been more
challenging than usual. I would like to thank the authors and
publishers—many of them foreign—of the articles reprinted here for
extending their permissions, and my colleagues Lynn Messina, Sandra
Watson, Jennifer Peloso, and Rich Stein for unfailing help and
encouragement.
Norris Smith
February 2005
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