NEW SCHEDULE FOR EAST WEST EUROPE BLOG
EWE will continue to offer analysis of the evolving relationship between Atlantic Europe and Eastern Europe, as well as the aftermath of Ireland’s Lisbon vote. However, over the next few weeks, we will experiment with a new schedule: there will be uploads and posts every Friday evening (c. 11 p.m.). If major events occur in midweek, we will post whenever we need to. But regular posts will be confined to Friday evening. On the other hand, we will attempt to add more depth and content, and to experiment with new material.
EWE AIMS
This blog is a forum for discussion of the future of the European Union following its most recent eastward expansion. It has a dual purpose: to servec as a repository of information and discussion, and to perform an advocacy function.
A range of perspectives will be covered in the information sources.
On the advocacy side, the editorial stance in opinion pieces will be based on the following broad assumptions.
The European Union is, and should remain, a Europe-wide inter-state organization comprising liberal democracies with free market economies.
Power in the Union should derive from the member states. Collective action should be based on a convergence of opinion and interest among sovereign states. Such action should not be based on pre-commitments or coercion. Any EU institutions should be based on confederal rather than federalist foundations, and should adhere to the principle of subsidiarity.
The EU does not and should not aspire to have the attributes of statehood, either relative to its constituent members or to the international states system as a whole.
The Union must give practical recognition to the diversity of its members in the areas of economic policy preferences, relations with the non-EU world, and religious or cultural norms impinging on social policy.
To ensure that these principles have full effect in the 21C, their advocates must form transnational alliances across the geographical space of Europe. In particular, Atlanticist states in the West, the smaller European democracies and the new Europeans of Eastern Europe must cooperate against centralizing and dirgiste tendencies in the core region. This cooperation must extend beyond governments to embrace like-minded actors in the economic, academic and cultural realms, and across the breadth of civil society.
The aim of such a trans-European dialogue is to generate a positive agenda for an alternative model of the European Union to that offered by its political leadership in recent decades.
JOIN OUR DIALOGUE
The Comments Feature
Please feel free to post comments in response to individual entries.
To ensure a healthy debate, comments critical of the above editorial position or to posts will be carried, either in full or as completely as possible.
Comments may be abridged for brevity or clarity.
Gratuitously offensive or irrelevant comments will not be published. The term “irrelevant” refers to items that do not relate to the post in question and will not be decided on the basis of their policy orientation. However, when editing comments, preference will be given to those that are well-informed and whose authors use real names and markers of identity. [Anonymous or concealed posting is not strictly banned but has less authority].
Entries and feedback from East Central Europe and from the smaller states are especially welcome. Contributions from other parts of the world are also appreciated.
June 12, 2008 at 8:54 pm
You have quite a well thought out editorial positions.
I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment of what would make the European Union a worthwhile enterprise.
In fact, I have never allowed myself to support the EU because it seemed there was no preventing it becoming another Federal Government like the ones we are saddled with in North America. And because it seems to be already generating mega-bureaucratic programs like the CAP.
To see this clarity of insight shows me that what I’ve been reading about Ireland’s free-market revolution may in fact be a libertarian intellectual renaissance. Good! You are seeing the benefit already, and if you don’t get swallowed up into a Federal Europe, I think Ireland has immense prosperity ahead.
EWE RESPONDS
Mike,
Sorry to disappoint you on two issues: I would not be a libertarian in social policy (i.e., family issues etc) - though I am more so on economics. As for North America, I would not favor anti-federalism in the U.S. context. Conferation has an unfortunate and ugly history in the United States. (I would certainly not agree with characterizations of the U.S.or Canadian Govt as “terrorist”). European states and cultural communities are more diverse and have longer histories of either autonomy or autonomous identity. Europe is building its infrastructure from scratch, so stopping at the confederal stage makes more sense here. Moreover, while the U.S. is
supposed
to be a federation, Irish and British people have always been reassured that the EU is not and that only a fringe minority (of Belgians!!) want it to be so. The nature of treaties like Lisbon make us suspect that there are more than the few Begian zealots involved!
On the other hand, I would favor more of a states’ rights interpretation of the U.S. Constitution if I was an American voter, though basic civil liberties should be universal.