Sub-groups of member countries should be given the possibility of establishing various forms of closer cooperation decided on the basis of shared interests rooted in the aspirations and common projects at the regional level.
Much of the debate about the causes of the ongoing economic and political crisis in Europe has been derailed by the participants. On the one hand we find the European elites (which broadly consists of the EU Commission, the bureaucrats in Brussels, the European Court, the Central Bank, the Presidency of the EU-Council, the Parliament, and a number of Brussels-based newspaper correspondents, think-tanks and European colleges) which unanimously pursue the idea that greater economic integration and increased centralization of the political system are necessary to advance European cooperation and therefore are a "good thing for Europe ". Hence, this elite has only one answer to the current crisis: more centralization and further acceleration of the march towards a federal political structure of the EU; the United States of Europe is the ultimate goal. This representation can prove fatal for the future of Europe because it is not rooted in the perception and everyday life of European people.
One the other hand we find the EU sceptics who are so ‘tired’ of Brussels and ongoing centralisation that they have turned their back towards Europe. These rather nationally inspired movements think that European countries can do better and cooperate better without Brussels on an intergovernmental basis.
This divide has accelerated in particular in the wake of the economic crises. Developments since 2008 have highlighted the weakness of political and economic structures that increasingly take the form of excessive centralization, one-sidedness to the benefit of finance and reduced national market regulations. Developments which, since the ‘fall of the wall’, have built increasingly on neoliberal ideas of a self-regulating market system and on the postulated need to reduce the welfare states. Hereby, the solidarity between EU countries has been weakened – the message coming from Brussels and Berlin, and repeated by the EU elites, contains a clear warning that each country has to first of all to 'put its own house in order'.
Since the explosion of the crisis, the solidarity between the rich countries has failed to go beyond the need to save their own national banks and the unsustainable loans that they had contracted before the financial collapse. This distorted solidarity has been legitimized by the rhetoric of crisis – the well-known 'economic strategy alarmist' denounced by Federico Caffè – and the national criticism of those politicians who would not have complied with the rules; because if they did the crisis would not have exploded!
To this has been added the so-called ‘aid’ to support the harsh measures required of ‘savings’ (cuts) to the member countries that were already on their knees. The imposition of ‘reforms’ and ‘savings’ controlled by a Troika appointed by Brussels and accepted by Berlin, consisting of representatives of the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. To get the loans they urgently needed EU countries have had to accept draconian measures of a dimension which in itself has helped to exacerbate the crisis in these countries, to increase inequality between countries and create the most acute conflicts between the peoples of Europe.
In this context it is hardly surprising that adherence by ordinary people to the ‘European project’ is crumbling, that popular support is declining, and that the European institutions meet growing scepticism in many countries.
Against this background we ask the question: is it really a peaceful, affluent, collaborative, and especially supportive Europe that the EU elites promote by their centralism, and the lack of understanding of national and regional diversity? Perhaps this is the main explanation of why this increasing number of people and political parties turn their back on the EU. They simply do not trust anymore that Brussels looks their way.
This serious doubt as to the future of Europe would not have come about if solidarity had been privileged, popular participation encouraged, and the speed of integration reduced.
It is still important to remember that ....
the European project was originally launched with the objective of securing peace in the continent through enhanced cooperation, which was to be based on growing prosperity and solidarity, and help to build mutual trust between ‘traditional enemies’. This process was built on the expectation that European countries would benefit from closer economic integration. A development that was also to be socially balanced and solidly rooted in national Western democracies, as a counterweight to the economic and political systems of the Eastern bloc. This process of European cooperation, rooted in an inclusive and democratic social project, was derailed by the EU integrationists after the ‘fall of the wall’ in 1989. The changes to the European treaties that followed have aimed to deregulate capital and labour markets, to reduce the political sovereignty of individual countries and at the same time to strengthen the domination of the EU institutions.
The result of these amendments to the treaties has increased the economic and political pressure on the original cooperation between nation states. An increasing number of EU directives have been passed only by a qualified majority, where the interests of individual countries have been set aside. The borders were opened and competition escalated and not only in the market of goods; but also in those of capital and labour, with destabilizing consequences on the possibility of conducting social and distribution policies appropriate to the people of different countries.
The ‘European dream’ of a peaceful, affluent and socially balanced cooperation in the agreements that were reached in the original Treaty of Rome, 1958 has collapsed. The ‘European’ elites led by Brussels bureaucrats, by the interests of European (and US) capital and an upper-class intellectual deluded themselves that the greatest benefit to the European people would be to establish the 'United States of Europe ' (USE) quickly and efficiently through an accelerated economic cooperation and then federal policies. The ambition was to make Europe the most competitive continent by 2020. Competitive Europe has taken the place of Social Europe, which has been shelved in favour of a more centralized Europe, where market forces and global financial capital dominate. The desire of the peoples of Europe to continue on the path of social justice, both at national and European level, has been systematically wiped out with derogatory statements such as 'nationalism', 'populism', and 'lack of knowledge'. The welfare states were after the 'collapse of the wall' relegated to being relics of the past. The result of this weakening of national democracies and welfare states is, unfortunately, undeniable: record unemployment and growing poverty and inequality.
This text reconstructs the stages of this growing process of derailment of the European project, highlights the areas where the process of integration according to the aspiration of European people has gone too far and has to be rolled back to rebuild the legitimacy of national democracies. If this transformation European cooperation is successful, it could also stop Britain and one or more of the countries of the South from abandoning EU cooperation. But for this change to happen Brussels needs to recognize the diversity of Europe. The dictates of the elites of the EU to the member countries to agree on further centralization to make the common currency and the economies of the eurozone work has to be recognized as one of the problems. The people of member countries will object to further attacks on their sovereignty to decide themselves on social and fiscal policies. Popular support for the EU project has declined alarmingly in many European countries, with the consequence that they are moving away from each other economically, politically and mentally and new antagonisms are arising. This is nothing less than a disaster, to which the EU elites have actively contributed.
European cooperation should therefore, where necessary, step backwards in the areas where it has gone too far. On the other hand sub-groups of member countries should be given the possibility of establishing various forms of closer cooperation decided on the basis of shared interests rooted in the aspirations and common projects at the regional level.
This kind of regional cooperation among countries which are pretty similar or share common interests in specific areas is, in fact, already in place. One could, for instance, mention the Nordic Council established as far back as the 1950s with an integrated labour market and no passport control. The financial transaction tax can be introduced as a form of cooperation between certain Member States of Central Europe. Regional policies for refugees and immigration should be strengthened. The Schengen agreements have been introduced in all continental EU countries too hastily and should be made regional. Trans-boundary environmental problems need to be resolved at the regional level when it is more appropriate. The protection of minorities is also generally a regional problem. Cooperation in EU foreign policy should be strengthened, as evidenced by the current events in Ukraine and the Middle East. These proposals of stepping backwards and cooperating regionally whenever suitable could more easily gain wider understanding and acceptance. These suggestions would take the interests and aspirations of ordinary people more seriously by focusing to a larger extent on ‘peace, solidarity and prosperity’. The alternative put forward by the EU elites ‘to save the euro at any price’ will divide EU even further, which could be at the expense European cooperation in the future.
* Pamphlet published on May 2014 simultaneously in Italy and Denmark, B. Amoroso and J. Jespersen, Europa? Den udeblevne systemkritik, København, politisk revy.Rome Castelvecchi.