The European Union

Politics and Policies

Jonathan Olsen

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9780429803871
• Edition: 7
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Thoroughly revised, the seventh edition of this accessible and highly respected text provides a rigorous yet digestible introduction to the European Union. Additionally, it authoritatively explains developments that continue to bring challenges to this powerful institution in times of great political change.

Key features:

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• Clearly covers the history, governing institutions, and policies of the EU;

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• Fully updated with new tables, figures, and photographs;

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• In-text features such as Chapter Overviews, Questions to Consider, and Further Reading encourage deeper research and debate;

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• Sustained discussion of transformative and historical change in the upheaval of Brexit and its ramifications, and the future relationship of the UK with the EU;

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• Through reflection on destabilizing issues such as immigration and the years of refugee crisis in Europe, the continued crisis in the eurozone, tensions with Poland and Hungary, Euroskepticism, Russia, and the rise of populism;

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• Increased coverage throughout of women or minorities within the EU.

Jonathan Olsen presents the EU as one of the world's economic and political superpowers, which has brought far-reaching changes to the lives of Europeans and has helped its member states to take a newly assertive role on the global stage.

Essential reading for students of European and EU politics, this book offers an up-to-the-minute look at both the opportunities and existential threats facing the EU.

PART I

History

CHAPTER 1

What Is the European Union?

CHAPTER OVERVIEW

• Because the EU is a political arrangement that defies easy categorization, it has stirred a much more vigorous theoretical debate about how to understand it than there has been for conventional states, such as the US.

• How we approach the EU still depends in large part on how we think about the role of the state. Consequently, there are at least five ways to conceptualize the EU – as an international organization, a regional integration association, a political system in its own right, a unique entity, or something that exhibits and combines all four of these.

• Theories analyzing the EU can be divided into two broad categories: those explaining how the EU evolved and those explaining what it has become. While the first category – which includes the theories of neofunctionalism and intergovernmentalism – was long dominated by scholars of international relations, the second category has increasingly become the province of scholars of comparative politics. The latter see the EU as a political system with its own institutions, processes, procedures, and policies. In recent years the term multi-level governance has emerged as one way to understand the EU as a political system.

Numerous books have been published on national systems of politics and government, but rarely do they begin with a chapter defining their subject. No survey of the US, for example, would begin by asking “What is the United States?” We know that it is a country with an established and self-contained political system, with institutions bound together by laws and political processes, and for which there is a multitude of explanatory theories and an extensive political science vocabulary. But the EU is an animal of a different stripe: it is a unique political arrangement that defies easy definition or categorization and defies orthodox ideas about politics and government. It is clearly much more than a conventional international organization, but it is less than a European superstate. We do not even have a noun that comfortably describes the EU: for some it is an “actor,” but for others it is simply sui generis, or unique.

This uniqueness has spawned a vigorous debate over theory, which plays a much greater role in the process of trying to understand the EU than it does in understanding other political systems. Initially, the debate was dominated by explanations generated by the sub-discipline of international relations (IR). The EU was approached as an international organization, driven by decisions made among the governments of the member states; European institutions were seen as less important than national institutions, although the supranational element of the European Economic Community – those aspects of its work and personality that rose above national interests – were not ignored. Since the 1990s there has been a reaction against the dominance of IR, and new studies of the EU have been influenced just as much by theories and analyses arising out of the subfields of comparative politics and public policy. In other words, rather than being portrayed as an international organization (albeit one with unique features and powers), the EU is now increasingly seen as a political system in its own right. A sharper spotlight is shining on the executive, legislative, and judicial features of its institutions, the channels through which EU citizens engage with the EU (such as elections, referendums, and the work of interest groups), and its public policy processes.

The field of EU studies remains fluid, however; no agreement exists among either scholars or political leaders about how best to classify and understand the EU, nor on the balance of power between EU institutions and member state governments. Although there is no shortage of competing theories of European integration, there is no single, generally accepted theoretical framework. Undaunted, this chapter introduces the EU by outlining a selection of the major concepts and theories of integration, divided into two broad categories: theories of how the EU evolved and theories of what it has become. It begins with a survey of the role of the state, then reviews attempts to understand how and why the EU emerged and developed. Finally, it examines different analyses of the structure of the EU, focusing in particular on its federal and confederal qualities.

THE ROLE OF THE STATE

The EU scholar Ben Rosamond once suggested four possible approaches to the study of the EU.¹ First, we could try to understand it as an international organization, tying it to the substantial literature on such organizations. Second, we could study it as an example of regionalism in the global economic system, and compare it to other regional blocs such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) or the Latin American free trade grouping named Mercosur. Third, we could approach it as an example of the dynamics of policy making in an attempt to better understand the crafting of interstate policy and how it is influenced by actors interested in the use of power. Finally, we could try to understand it purely on its own terms, as a unique organization that emerged out of a unique set of circumstances. But Rosamond’s list overlooked a critical fifth option: trying to understand the EU as a political system in its own right, and comparing its structure and operating principles with those of conventional national political systems.² This approach to the EU figures prominently in the multilevel governance approach discussed below.

Of course, how we approach the EU depends in large part on how we think about the role of the state, which has for centuries dominated studies of politics and government. A state is usually defined as a legal and physical entity that (1) operates within a fixed and populated territory, (2) has authority over that territory, (3) is legally and politically independent, and (4) is recognized by its people and by other states. Most people – particularly when they cross international borders – identify themselves as citizens of a state and distinguish themselves from the citizens of other states by all the trappings of citizenship: legal residence, passports, allegiance to their national flag, protection by their home government, and a sense of belonging.

Just how long states have been important to an understanding of the ways in which societies are governed is debatable, but the 1648 Peace of Westphalia – which brought an end to two European wars and resulted in many territorial adjustments – is usually taken as a convenient starting point. Many states existed long before 1648, but Westphalia gave a new permanence to the idea of borders and sovereignty. As a result, the term Westphalian is often used as shorthand by political scientists to describe the international state system that has existed since then.³

In spite of its philosophical domination, the state has many critics. States are accused of dividing humans rather than uniting them and of encouraging people to place sectional interests above the broader interests of humanity. Identification with states is often associated with nationalism – the belief that every state should be founded on a nation and that national identity should be promoted through political action. But because few states coincide with nations, and most European states in particular consist of multiple national groups, nationalism can lead to internal instability, to a belief in national superiority, to ethnocentrism, racism, and genocide, and – in the worst cases – to war within and between states. Nationalism lay at the heart of many of the disputes and wars that destabilized European politics for centuries, reaching their nadir with World War I and World War II.⁴ In the 1990s, nationalist violence tore the former Yugoslavia into several pieces, and even today several European states – the UK and Spain, for example – contain national minorities campaigning and agitating for greater self-government or even independence.

Americans have much less direct familiarity with the difficulties of nationalism than Europeans. The US for most of its history has been relatively stable and united, avoiding the kinds of nationalist pressures and jealousies that have long brought stress to European societies. It had a civil war, but the conflict centered primarily on the issue of slavery and was further fueled by economic pressures. Internal nationalist or ethnic divisions have rarely been an issue for Americans, who – as a result – often find it difficult to understand nationalism in Europe. But it has long formed the core of European political, economic, and social developments.

Criticisms of the state contributed to the growth of international cooperation in the twentieth century, particularly after 1945. Seeking to reduce tensions and promote cooperation, states signed international treaties, reduced barriers to trade, worked together on shared problems, and formed a network of international organizations (IOs). Usually defined as bodies that promote voluntary cooperation and coordination between or among their members but have neither autonomous powers nor the authority to impose their rulings on their members, IOs are mainly a product of the second half of the twentieth century. By one estimate, there were fewer than 220 IOs in 1909, about 1,000 in 1951, and about 4,000 in 1972. Then came the era of growth: by 1989 there were nearly 25,000 IOs in the world, and today there are more than 70,000.⁵ They include intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) – which consist of representatives of national governments and promote voluntary cooperation among those governments – and international nongovernmental organizations – consisting of individuals or the representatives of private associations rather than states. The most prominent example of an IGO is the United Nations.

The growth of IOs has led to the building of institutions in which states can attend to matters of mutual interest, the agreement of international treaties, the reduction and removal of trade barriers, and – in some cases – regional integration. This does not mean that states surrender their separate legal, political, economic, social, or national identities, but rather that they pool authority in selected areas and set up shared institutions with restricted powers. The ultimate expression of integration would be full political union, where states would create a new level of joint government and surrend...