The European Union Since 1945

Alasdair Blair

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• eBook ISBN: 9781317861881
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Storia europea

The European Union faces a crossroads in the twenty-first century. While there is evidence of declining enthusiasm for European integration, the EU plays an increasingly vital role in tackling problems that can no longer be dealt with at member state level. In recent years, the EU has developed a stronger foreign, security and defence policy, and has had to face up to the challenges of tackling organised crime, human trafficking and drug smuggling.

In this fully updated new edition, Alasdair Blair examines the economic, political, social and personal factors that have shaped the process of European integration from the end of the Second World War until the Lisbon Treaty in 2009. Written in a clear and jargon-free style, the book explores:

• The context of European integration and expansion
• The relations between the European Union and its member states
• The institutional evolution of the European Union
• Methods of decision-making
• Key policies of the European Union
• The future direction of the European Union

Comprehensive and accessible, this book is an essential guide to understanding the relevance of the European Union in the twenty-first century.

Part 1

BACKGROUND

1

The Context of European Integration

On the afternoon of 9 May 1950 in the elaborate clock room of the French foreign ministry in Paris, the French Foreign Minister, Robert Schuman, proposed the creation of an organisation that would take responsibility for Franco-German coal and steel production [Document 9, p. 119]. Barely five years after the end of the Second World War, the Declaration aimed to link the interests of European states by establishing a common organisation to oversee coal and steel production. The choice of coal and steel was deliberate because they represented the most important economic industries at the time and were the basis for military power. More than six decades later, observers may find it difficult to understand the true significance of the proposals that Schuman advanced: not only did they provide a structure to unite countries that had spent much of the previous century at war with each other, but they represented a departure from the tactics employed after the First World War when French attempts to suppress German power had failed.

Schuman, Robert (1886–1963): Prime Minister of France 1947–48; Foreign Minister 1948–55. On 9 May 1950 he advanced the Schuman Plan that resulted in the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Community. President of the European Movement 1955–61; head of the European Parliamentary Assembly 1958–60.

Schuman’s plans were attractive to France and Germany for different reasons. For France, they offered the prospect of leadership in Europe and a method of controlling (but not suppressing) Germany. For Germany, they offered the chance to cleanse the horrors of the Third Reich and to be treated as an equal partner with other European countries. Apart from the support of France and Germany, Schuman’s proposals were warmly received in the capitals of Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands and resulted in ‘the Six’ countries agreeing on 18 April 1951 to establish a European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) which eventually came into operation on 25 July 1952. Five years later, in March 1957, the same six countries signed the Treaties of Rome that created the European Economic Community (EEC) and European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) [Document 14, p. 123].

European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC): First example of supranational cooperation among European nations when it commenced operations in 1952.

European Economic Community (EEC): Created by the 1957 Treaties of Rome. Revised by negotiations such as the Single European Act and Treaty on European Union. When the latter entered into force on 1 January 1993, the EEC was renamed the European Community and formed part of the European Union (EU).

European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom): Commenced operating on 1 January 1958 to develop nuclear energy, conduct research, create a common market for nuclear fuels and supervise the nuclear industry.

In the years that have passed, numerous reforms and changes have enhanced the influence of the institutions that govern the European Union (EU) of today. There has also taken place an increase in membership, from the six states of the ECSC to 27 member states as of 2009, while Croatia, Turkey and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia are candidate countries for membership [Document 35, p. 142]. This process of enlargement has resulted in the EU’s population swelling by 2008 to some 497 million, a figure that will only increase in the future [Document 35, p. 142]. The likelihood of further enlargement brings with it a redefinition of the boundaries of the EU, with many studies raising the question of ‘So where, then, is Europe?’ (McCormick, 2008: 35). Up until the late 1980s the Cold War division of Europe made this a straightforward task. However, in a post-Cold War world, the experience of enlargement to former Eastern bloc countries has resulted in many other countries seeking membership, with Iceland in 2009 being the latest to express an interest. The end result is that EU membership could possibly increase to 36 member states (or even more).

At the same time, there has occurred a growth in the number of policies that are now tackled at the EU level, from matters relating to consumer affairs and the environment to international trade policy and the single currency. And although some of these developments have been the product of incremental change over the last six decades, a great many more have been undertaken in the period since 1986. There has therefore been a considerable quickening in the pace of European integration in recent times, as evidenced by the creation of the single currency and the fact that the EU’s membership has more than doubled in the period since 1990. More and more decisions that were once taken at the national level are now taken at a European level, involving the input of the supranational institutions of the European Commission and European Parliament as well as the member states in the form of the Council of Ministers. Member states are also faced with the impact of rulings by the European Court of Justice which emphasises the fact that European law has supremacy over national law.

In evaluating the history of European integration, academics have sought to chart the events that have occurred as well as to offer theoretical models to provide a fuller explanation of events and processes. Theories are of particular importance because they move us away from merely describing events to instead creating structures that provide the opportunity to make decisions about the relevancy of information. This is particularly important in a European context where students are faced with a tidal wave of material and as such theories enable a student to make judgements between relevant and irrelevant information (Blair and Curtis, 2009: 125).

In the early days of European integration, federalism was advocated by many to be a worthwhile model because the World Wars of the first half of the twentieth century emphasised that nation states could not be relied on to provide stability, peace and security for their populations. To overcome this situation, federalists such as Altiero Spinelli and Alcide de Gasperi argued that nation states should be embedded in a broader political system, that of a federal Europe. However, many European governments were opposed to the idea of transferring power to new federal institutions.

Federalism: In the EU context it is a theory of integration that places emphasis on the building of supranational institutions which in turn limit the influence of nation states.

Spinelli, Altiero (1907–86): A key figure in federalist organisations throughout the 1940s and 1950s who advocated a federal United States of Europe. He established the European Federalist Movement in Milan in 1943 and the European Union of Federalists in 1946. He was a member of the European Commission 1970–76 and later served as a member of the European Parliament 1979–86.

de Gasperi, Alcide (1881–1954): A founding father of Europe, he was Prime Minister of Italy from 1945 to 1954, during which time he pursued the modernisation of the Italian economy. He steered a pro-western foreign policy, being a committed supporter of greater European integration.

The federal vision was soon replaced by functionalism, which was developed in the 1930s by David Mitrany. Functionalist theory argued that integration should take place in specific sectors of the economy, such as coal or agriculture, with supranational organisations therefore being established to tackle particular economic or technical problems. But while functionalists believed that governments would be willing to surrender some sovereignty in specific policy areas to new functional bodies where there was no direct threat to the nation state, the view that it would be possible to separate functional cooperation from domestic political interests did not reflect reality. A consequence of this was the adaptation of functionalism into a revised theory of neo-functionalism which emphasised the fact that the integration process involved bargaining and compromise, and that cooperation among member states in less contentious areas of policy would result in pressure building up for cooperation in others. Although this so-called ‘spillover effect’ meant that neo-functionalism held sway in the early years of European integration, its shine began to fade by the mid-1960s as it could not account for the slowdown in integration that arose out of France not taking part in the Community’s affairs in 1965. This was a period known as the ‘empty chair crisis’ and was resolved by a compromise that gave member states a veto over policies that impinged on their national interests. In other words, the future of integration was very much dependent on the ability of member states to agree among themselves, with this view being advanced in an approach that became to be known as intergovernmentalism. This focus on the importance of member states was further refined in the liberal intergovernmentalism approach that has been particularly applied to the study of key periods in the history of European integration, most notably intergovernmental conference (IGC) negotiations which are particularly influenced by the interests of member states.

Functionalism: A theory of integration that advocates cooperation between nation states through the creation of organisations that encourage integration in economic, social and technical policies.

Mitrany, David (1888–1975): Romanian-born scholar who was the founding father of functionalism. He regarded nationalism as a major threat to world and European peace and argued that states should cooperate in such policy sectors as agriculture, science and transport.

Neo-functionalism: A theory of European integration that considers the path of integration to be an incremental one that involves the spillover of integration from one sector to another.

Intergovernmentalism: An approach to European integration which emphasises the centrality of member states and which seeks to limit the influence of supranational institutions.

Liberal intergovernmentalism: A theoretical account that places emphasis on the manner in which the EU has been transformed by a series of intergovernmental bargains. This theory states that integration will take place only when there exists enough domestic political support for further integration and when there is a convergence in the preferences of governments.

Intergovernmental conference (IGC): A negotiating forum comprising representatives of all member states with the aim of making changes to the EU’s activities.

Although such theories are of great use in helping to structure arguments by enabling us to explain in more detail patterns of activity rather than just describing events, it is nevertheless the case that as the European integration process has developed it has become increasingly difficult for any one particular theory to offer an accurate picture of the EU. The reality of this situation is that many scholars prefer to analyse the EU through the concept of ‘multi-level governance’, which conveys a picture of policies being agreed to at the supranational level above the state, at the national level, as well as at the subnational level. Additionally, in recent years scholars have also made use of the concept of Europeanisation, which refers to the way in which European integration affects domestic political structures by necessitating organisations to adopt structures and policies that enable them to respond to and be able to influence decisions that are taken at the European level. This is a situation that has been characterised by Tanja Börzel and Thomas Risse as one of ‘uploading’ the preferences of national actors to the supranational EU and the ‘downloading’ of the EU’s supranational policies to the national level (Börzel and Risse, 2003: 62).

Multi-level governance: The range of different actors that have an input to EU politics at the European, national and sub-national (regional/local) level.

Subnational: Decisions that are taken below the level of central government, such as local and regional government.

Europeanisation: The impact that the EU has had on member states, whereby the pressure of common policies and structures forces a degree of uniformity.

But while such approaches offer value to academic analysis, they often have little impact on the wider public or for that matter policy makers. Thus, rather than picturing European integration as a process of Europeanisation, some individuals may conclude that the cumulative effect of these changes has been an unacceptable transfer of power away from national governments and a reduction in national sovereignty that can only be rectified by a member state withdrawing from the EU. Yet, as has been argued elsewhere, the concept of a state being completely sovereign over its affairs is out of date. In the area of economic affairs, virtually all of the world’s economies are dependent on international trade and are affected by the vagaries of financial markets, demand, investment opportunities and so on that can take place on the other side of the world. The most obvious recent example of this was the way in which the international financial crisis that took hold in 2008 emerged in the sub-prime housing market of the US and yet necessitated European governments to take individual and collective response. In other fields, such as legal affairs, nation states are also influenced by decisions that are taken outside of their borders. This includes the decisions taken by the United Nations Security Council on international security.

Sovereignty: Nation states have the right to take responsibility for the decisions within their own borders. Eurosceptics argue that European integration has undermined national sovereignty.

Concerns about loss of sovereignty tend to be linked to claims that the cost of EU membership for some member states outweigh the benefits. In crude terms, they pay in more money than they get out. It is an argument that has been used to considerable effect by the UK Independence Party in European Parliamentary elections. In the most recent elections of 2009 they obtained 13 out of a total of 72 UK MEPs, which was an increase on the 2004 elections when they obtained 11 out of a total of 78 UK MEPs (a reduction in the number of total MEPs was the result of a redistribution of MEPs across the EU to take account of enlargement) [Document 36, p. 144]. The simplicity of this argument responds to fears among the electorate that interference from ‘Brussels’ has led to unnecessary legislation that would not otherwise be implemented if the country was outside the EU. Such an argument fails to consider that there are often good reasons to have common regulation, while it would also be naïve of eurosceptics to think that national governments are not capable of excessive regulations. For example, much of the interference that affects everyday life is the source of decisions taken at a national level, a factor that is particularly evident in the area of health and safety legislation.

Regulations: A form of EU legislation (others are decisions and directives) that are directly applicable and fully binding on those that the regulation is applicable to. This includes the administrations of member states.

Some critics of European integration appreciate that certain benefits accrue from membership. This principally constitutes the ability to trade and move freely within Europe, while initiatives that seek to deepen European integration into other policy areas are steadfastly resisted. In contrast to these viewpoints, other individuals consider that the EU does not possess enough power, influence and resources for it to be able to effectively deal with the challenges that it faces. The argument here is that the series of negotiations that have shaped the EU have been determined by the need to achieve compromise and as such the EU’s influence and abilities have often been deliberately limited to appease member state concern.

As ever, there is an element of truth in each of these categorisations. On the one hand, EU rules can appear to be overly burdensome, and yet at the same time the EU is often ill equipped to deal with its challenges. Beneath these differing views is the greater reality that the EU’s structure and scope of policy competences have been the product of the decisions taken by member state governments. Indeed, when we examine the ‘so-called’ history-making decisions that came out of IGC negotiations, it is evident that member state governments agreed to all the outcomes of the Single European Act, Treaty on European Union, Treaty of Amsterdam and Treaty of Nice (Peterson, 1995). Similarly, the expansion in the European Commission’s responsibility into matters relating to the internal market, and the agreement to make greater use of the qualified majority voting (QMV) procedure within the Council of Ministers, were also judged to be appropriate developments by member state governments.

Internal market: The EU internal market where member states have deepened cooperation beyond the initial customs union to create ‘an area without frontiers in which the free movement of goods, persons, services and capital is ensured’.

Qualified majority voting (QMV): A process of decision-taking where it is possible for decisions to be passed if there is sufficient backing for the initiative, with votes being divided among member states in proportion to their relative size.

It is not only that member state governments have agreed to the key strategic decisions that have affected the history of European integration, it is also that they have often been over-enthusiastic when it comes to implementing EU rules and regulations in their own country. The frustration that business communities and individuals have at what they perceive to be unnecessary EU legislation is often because the member state government has over-implemented EU legislation by exceeding the minimum requirements. This is commonly referred to as ‘gold-plating’, whereby national governments extend the scope of European legislation by going beyond the specific guidelines that have been set when they commence the process of the transposition of Eu...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Series Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Publisher's acknowledgements
• Author's acknowledgements
• Preface to the second edition
• Abbreviations
• Glossary
• Part One Background
• Part Two Analysis
• Part Three Assessment
• Part Four Documents
• Further Reading
• References
• Index