The enlargement of the European Union to include former
Soviet bloc countries in May 2004 marks a major turning point in
the affairs of the Union that will require new policies, sensibilities
and a greater willingness on the part of its leaders to work together.
Indeed it is becoming clear that attitudes will have to
change if the European Union is to continue to successfully realize
its main aim - that of ensuring peace and maintaining democracy
on the European continent.
Things were simpler for the founding fathers in the post-war
years. The number of member states, starting with six and rising
to 12 by the end of the Cold War, was still manageable. The confrontation with the Soviet
Union behind its Iron Curtain provided a firm geographical framework for the
European project. "Europe was sharply defined, and so was its central problem - Germany.
The challenge was how to rearm and
integrate a defeated foe into the western
alliance so that Germany could play its
role in the standoff with the Soviet
Union. Indeed, for the late French President
Franois Mitterrand, even the birth
of the common currency and the disappearance
of the German mark, were a
continuation of the effort to lock the
Germans into the European Union. Helmut
Kohl, the then German Chancellor,
shared that view.
If taming Germany was the key to
maintaining peace in Europe, the establishment
of stable democracies depended
on facing down the continent's
fascist past. Germany and Italy had been
fascist states. France had flirted with authoritarianism
under its wartime Vichy
government. Spain and Portugal continued
under authoritarian rule long after
the war. Greece had its colonels. Of all
the EU member states, Britain was the
only combatant that had not been defeated
or occupied during the war.
Although the nationalist right still
threatens to emerge in some countries as
tensions grow within the European
Union, that legacy appears now to have
been largely surmounted. But while
democracy was assured at national level
the European project was never submitted
to a genuinely democratic test at the
transnational level. As Loukas Tsoukalis
notes in his 2003 book, "What Kind of
Europe? the European Union developed
under a "permissive consensus, in which
populations was happy to leave the business
of integration to their leaders.
Tsoukalis adds that respectable economic
growth rates meant that integration
could be seen as delivering
mounting prosperity.
"Some smaller states could be captured by Mafia-type organizations
with roots in Russia and elsewhere
The enlargement to the East bestows
on the European Union an entirely different
historical baggage that is nevertheless
still largely the result of the last
European war. Seven of the ten countries
taken into the European Union in May
2004 - Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic,
Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia and
Lithuania - were either incorporated into
the Soviet Union or were Soviet satellites.
All were organized,more or less, according
to the Soviet model.
Even though 15 years have passed
since the Berlin Wall came down, the
coming years will also be about erasing
the legacy of communist rule that lasted
almost half a century. Another priority
will be to find a way of living with Russia,
successor to totalitarian Soviet Union, which was neither defeated, as
Germany was, nor has become a member
of the European Union, as Germany
is.
No one is suggesting that the
democracies in the post-Soviet countries
are teetering on the edge of a return to
one-party dictatorship or that Russia is
about to resuscitate the old Soviet
Union. Indeed the establishment of
functioning democracies in the area
once controlled by Moscow is a major
achievement, especially if you remember
that some of these countries, such as
Poland under Jzef Pilsudski, Latvia
under Karlis Ulmanis or Lithuania
under Antanas Smetana, also had their
authoritarian experiences in the 1930s.
Since 1990, elections have taken place
and governments have been replaced
without dramatic side effects.
Nevertheless, the shadow of the past
continues to fall on these countries. The
weakness of their administrations and
their institutions means that democratic
structures are fragile. The taint of corruption
mars the images of political
elites and encourages widespread voter
apathy. In some countries radical movements
are challenging the established
parties. Some of the smaller states could
fall victim to state capture by Mafia-type
organizations with their roots in Russia
and elsewhere. Such developments could
bring some exotic politicians to Brussels.
Participation in elections in Poland,
for example, is falling and confidence in
institutions like the Parliament is close
to single figures in the opinion polls.
And while Moscow no longer has the
ability to directly affect the affairs of the
new EU member, Russia, as the German
analyst Christoph Bertram has remarked,
is in danger of becoming "not
so much a failed state as a failed democracy.
This means that the sensibility of the new member states to developments
in Russia is and will continue to be much
greater than in many West European
capitals.
Andrzej Olechowski, a former Polish
foreign minister, told a conference in
Warsaw in September 2004 that Russia
must not be "left beyond the sphere of
European values and norms. He argued
that the European Union, working together
with the United States, must find
ways of bringing Moscow into the Atlantic
community. At same time Olechowski
urged the European Union to
create the prospect of a "European future
for Ukraine and Belarus by publicly
declaring that these countries would
be welcome to join the Union when they
fulfill the conditions of membership.
The European Union's so-called Copenhagen
criteria demand that new members
must have functioning democratic
systems and market economies.
In a nutshell, the eastern enlargement
means that the 25-nation European
Union must remember that
democracy in the new member states
still fragile. The Union must also pay
constant attention to strengthening
democratic structures and blocking any
return to the great power policies of the
past in Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova,
which will lie between its new frontiers
and Russia after Bulgaria and Romania
become EU members.
The European Union can be a powerful
stabilizing force. One need only
look back to the early 1990s and think
what might have happened if the nations
of Central Europe had not been on their
best behavior in the hope of joining the
European Union - or if the Union had
not existed. Poland, for example, had potential
frontier disputes and unresolved
conflicts with almost all of its neighbors
as the ice which froze the Warsaw Pact in place melted away. None of the potential
conflicts came to the fore because the
European Union had convincingly
demonstrated a new "European way.
Now Poland has good relations with all
her neighbors.
"If the new member states
falter, arguments that
Ukraine and Belarus
should shun the West
will be vindicated
Setting standards of behavior and
extending promises of future membership
will not, however, be enough. The
societies to the East of the European
Union's new borders are closely watching
developments in Poland and elsewhere.
They see the European Union's
eastward enlargement as an experiment
that can provide pointers to their own
futures. If the economies of the new
member states grow, corruption is
beaten back and democratic institutions
are strengthened as a result of joining
the European Union, then the weight of
the "Westerners among the Union's
eastern neighbors will grow stronger. If
the new member states falter in their development
and are marginalized in the
European Union, then those in Ukraine
and Belarus who argue that their countries
should turn away from the West
will be vindicated.
Membership of the European Union
must thus be an economic success for
the new states that will help to stabilize
both the countries to the East and their
own democracies. How this is to be done
remains a matter for debate. It seems clear, however, that the economic framework
of the European Union must be
arranged in a way that allows the new
members to make full use of their competitive
advantage, which is lower costs
of production. EU aid funds are, of
course, important - not least in building
a pro-European lobby in the new member
states. But the newcomers must put
their main emphasis on tight domestic
fiscal policies and encouraging foreign
direct investment. This, however, is a
mix that requires courage from political
leaders in the region, who are finding it
difficult to tighten budget spending. Liberalization
of labor regulations is also
proving a major challenge for many new
member governments.
"Europeans are still
working to erase the
legacies of the two
totalitarian ideologies
that bedeviled them in
the 20th century
This also requires special sensitivity
from old member states such as France
and Germany, which are demanding that
corporate tax levels be harmonized
across the 25-nation Union. The new
member states already face increases in
their production costs as a result of
accepting EU rules and regulations. Demands
that they now also increase their
taxes amount to asking the new member
states to concur in a further erosion of
their competitive advantage, even
though their levels of economic development
are far behind those in the older
members. Such demands serve only to confirm
suspicions that the old EU states want to
marginalize the new members economically.
The new member states need to
continue with economic reforms to remove
the remaining vestiges of their old
pre-1989 systems. This is not easy, as
powerful forces want to keep the old social
safeguards in a rear guard action that
is slowing prospects for growth. Few
argue, however, for the adoption of the
Western European social model as everyone
recognizes that the new member
states simply could not afford it. But
Germany and France also need to liberalize
their economic systems to boost
economic growth, which will also create
more opportunities for exporters in the
new member states.
In short, the major EU economies
must implement economic reforms to
provide the high growth rates needed to
finance enlargement and win popular
support for it in both the new and older
member states. But these reforms are in
doubt because politicians fear the shortterm
political losses such changes might
engender.
All this translates into politics at a
time when EU voters and governments
are taking close looks at the financial
costs and benefits of the European project.
In the West, the net contributor
countries are becoming increasingly
restive about continuing to bear the burden
of financing the EU budget. Recipient
countries that have been major past
beneficiaries of EU aid, such as Spain
and Greece, have long been concerned
about the effects of bringing in new
members that are more deserving of financial
support. The new member
states, whose populations have been led
to believe that EU structural funds alone
will provide major increases in growth,
are nervous that these funds could be cut. They also wonder how there can be
"more Europe if the EU budget is to be
held to one per cent of the Union's combined
Gross Domestic Product, as the
largest contributors are demanding.
This nervousness comes as the commitment
of individual countries to further
European integration is to be tested
in a spate of elections and in referendums
on the proposed new European
constitutional treaty. A positive outcome
is by no means a foregone conclusion in
major countries such as Britain, Poland
or even France. In other words, the time
of the "permissive consensus is over - as
are the days of Jean Monnet, when
progress on integration could be made
in the European equivalent of American
"smoke-filled rooms. Instead, the cause
of European integration will have to be
defended before national electorates suspicious
of what they see as an elite project
for which they are being asked to pay
too much.
Integration was easier during the
cold war than in the phase of Eastern enlargement,
on which the Union has now
embarked. Then, there was a clearly defined
enemy. Now, in the words of the
British scholar Timothy Garton Ash,
"Europeans are struggling to find an
emotional glue to hold together this extraordinary
project of voluntarily associating
25 very diverse European countries in a single political community.
My view is that the basic aim of the
European Union, to ensure lasting peace
and democracy for the continent, has
not only not changed, but is still very
much a priority. In a sense we are still attempting
to put back together 19th century
Europe. If Turkey becomes an EU
member, Moscow will be the only major
capital that played a leading role in that
century which will not be in the European
Union.Most importantly of all, Europeans
are still working to erase the
legacies of the two totalitarian ideologies
that bedeviled the continent for so much
of the 20th century.
That task requires imagination,
courage and a modicum of generosity
from Europes present leaders. It also requires
a dialogue between the leaders of
the old and new EU member states to
build mutual trust and recognition of
the economic and political exigencies
that both sides face. If European leaders
continue to strike poses on the European
stage meant largely for domestic consumption
then the European Union is in
trouble. But if they chose to look at the
continent as a whole, and see enlargement
as a major step to ensuring lasting
stability, then the European Union, complex
as the problems are, can have a future
as successful as its past.
Krzysztof Bobinski covered Poland for the London Financial Times from the mid 1970s to 2000.
Between 1998 and 2003 he published Unia & Polska, a bimonthly devoted to EU issues. He is currently
the deputy president of the Unia and Polska Foundation, which studies the ramifications of
EU membership for Poland.
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