History
We often see in crisis, which challenges the EU severely, they are rarely solved, but addressed by the EU being given, or acquiring new responsibilities. During the Covid crisis, it was eventually the EU that stepped in and acquired the vaccines. As such debate followed on who should get the vaccines first. One could clearly see that during this crisis, the EU put upon itself responsibilities no one had previously agreed to.
There is a great debate on euroscepticism. Not as old as the EU itself, but comes mainly from the 90s. Eg. Brexit where Britain would once and for all solve the problem of euroscepticism.
As such there is with this a big debate about sovereignty, even though people can’t really pin down what that actually means. This is particularly relevant in eastern Europe.
The EU also has the idea that it should guard sovereignty. This is an idea that is more visible in eastern europe, should the EU then have a right, under certain circumstances, that the rule of law is not kept in place any longer.
Eg. in Hungary and Slovakia, which seems like the EU wants to intervene in. A lot of scholars seem critical of whether the EU is actually allowed to do this. How can they push through the rule of law? It seems they cannot. The EU found one answer: saying that certain funds, which in a legal interpretation belong to these countries, will not be given them unless they change their control of the media, certain legal provisions.
Brexit was so novel that no one could really figure out how to do it. It was an extremely complex process.
There is the question of the western balkans joining the EU, some there are, and som aren’t.
There is the question of Ukraine. This is specifically in the case of providing help to Ukraine.
The same is the case with Moldova.
There is the question of Georgia, which is comparable to Ukraine, having been part of the USSR and also being attacked by Russia multiple times.
More or less on a daily basis, there are manifestations in Georgian cities, about rule of law, proximity to the EU etc.
Turkey is an even more complex case; it has been on the agenda for almost 40 years. There has always been a question about how Turkey should be treated by the EU. During migration in 2015, the EU worked closely with Turkey. But it seems that Turkey joining will not be possible given the current situation.
Now the EU is changing to become a rearming movement. ’readiness 2030’. It seems accepted however that the EU is becoming a central player in military industry.
There is a lot of Brussels-style shifting of money from budgets to budgets in the EU atm.
Can there be a European identity? Will people feel predominantly European in 30 years?
There are enormous changes in migration and security policies, and this needs to be discussed on a European public sphere where the best argument can win (Habermas). The only public spheres that currently exist are those that are for a specific country, and as such there is no public reacting to the policies of the EU.
Eurovision is the only ”European” public sphere in existance.
”Europe is cliche and superficial”
The EU suprisingly has a lot of support at the moment compared to before
The EU strangely, has a habit of profiting from crisis. When there is a general disillusion with national politics, the EU seems better in comparison.
EU history generally has a reputation of being very technical and boring. Patel shows a different dimension in this regard. He alerts to a number of facts that are opposite to normal views, such that European integration actually used to be very strong. It was not a given that the EU was gonna prevail and be the prime mode of integration.
He hints at something that’s specific for the European community:
in the 1970s, which is seen as a period of crisis wherein integration couldn’t move forward, where there was a feeling that the EU was doomed; instead it seems that there was a new economic focus, and reinvigorated supranational law coming from this time.
What do we mean when we talk about Europe?
One the one hand there is the very strong idea of European decline, seen already in the 20th century with people like Spengler. Berlin is occupied and Paris is dependent on American aid.
The Rise of the US and USSR make europe think that its decline continues.
Even after the cold war and the retreat of the big super powers, the decline continued with the asian countries as economic competitiors.
Every year, Europe is having less and less of a share in the world market, in particular UK, France and Germany.
European integration is however often talked of as a success story.
Just last week a green politican said that Europe is old, weak and rich.
It is the biggest market in the world with a strong economic potential from the postwar development. The European union has also quite successfully built democratic institutions with rule of law, which is remarkable in a global comparison.
European integration and economic cohesion, generally speaking, has been successful, and there has been 80 years of peace in regards to European history.
Emergence of a European consciousness: it is a normal thing to come from varied nations all along Europe when you are at a university here. This is a successstory if you think about war.
There are quite a lot of limits to these meta-narratives, as the EU is not Europe, but is generally what is thought of when talking of Europe.
Thinking broader:
”Hidden integration”
Technological dynamics, in regards to european broadcasting services
Experiencing Europe in day to day life: such as sports and UEFA Champions league.
However, these are not run by the EU, they are even older than the EU usually.
These feed into the EU but are not the same: as such hidden as they still change lives within the EU
House of European history is done by the European parliment.
When it was launched, many historians thought it was counter to the very idea of Europe.
The professor likes it, even though it fails to merge the many kind of perspectives that exist in the EU. It follows the line of the politics of memory, and defines Europe as something defined by its darker history.
The beginning of formal European integration:
Marshal plan, US payment for European buildup
Before this there were even older roots such as the Paneuropean union.
There are certain lessons of the war in terms of coordinating and also afterwards, in terms of unifying against the soviets.
Christian democratic politcians were not necessarily democratic, but were very elitist and shared a European culture.
There were different realisations between unioninsts and federalists; make a new federation of states.
European Court of Human rights in strasbourg.
Schuman declaration leading to the ECSC which offers answers to what happened in WWII, which strangely ended up being about integrating European economies in order to feed the German war economy, particularly steel and coal. Some countries have iron, some have coal, and everyone wants steel so there needs to be a kind of integration, as they are all suddenly depedent of each other, and this could be done forcibly in Nazi Germany. As such, one would have to build the German economy after WWII not to only serve Germany then but also the others.
Schuman came up with the idea to rebuild crucial German sectors, but then to merge them into a new structure in which Germany no longer could control these resources.
This became a supranational high authority; a precursor to the European commission. You should give away sovereignty for the benefit of all.
Jean Monnet had a very clear about how to make the economy: functionalism.
You organise everything in a supranational way, you integrate more and more sectors of the economy so that Europe in and of itself would be a big economy.
Churchill was positive of European unification, but with the idea that the British would only be ”with them”, the europeans.
Atlee: ”The Europeans are an irresponsible body appointed by no one and responsible to no one”
The coal and steel union leads to other roads of integration. But we should not retrospectively call Monnet and Schumann these genius figures that necessarily had planned out the EU. There was not actually any clear goal for this kind of integration at all, no one was actually thinking about a United states of Europe, but rather only to solve very concrete problems.
The coal and steel community wanted to integrate germany to make sure it wouldn’t become dangerous again, but also to rebuild these dependent post-war economies.
Then, there were only six countries, which were all quite homogenous. The politicians’ mindsets were also quite homogenous.
During this time, there was a lot of Low politics rather than high politics: no one is aspriring for far reaching goals, but only for limited sectors which is easier to realise, and this is done by almost technocratic institutions. ”We bring everyone who has knowledge on a certain sector, and they agree on what they need, rather than having different prime ministers discussing.”
This is the core of a lot of EU criticism today: it is arcane and technocratic.
The EU is built to overcome the nation state after WWII: Ernst Haas with neo-functionalism The Uniting of Europe.
There is a counter thesis to this by Alan Milward The European Rescue of the Nation State: it is actually the opposite as what Haas argues. A lot of people lost their sovereignty in the war. So the only way to have nation states that function, is to lean on the EU, not in order to shift sovereignty, but in order to ground nation states on some new unifying body → this is particularly against German economic potential.
The European Free trade association
Alternative model for free trade without giving away sovereignty. We shouldn’t go to further abolishment of nation states, but simply have no tariffs between these countries. Many countries left the EFTA and it ended up not turning up very successful. The EFTA could have become a big organisation but it was a bigger concern to have access to the EU markets.
As soon as you really wanna trade with someone, there needs to be arbitration, or else things are just gonna come, pure free trade like this is impossible as different things are needed at different places.
Luxemburgian golden towers of the Court of Justice. This is the machine motor that drives everything: where the actual unification happens is here. It has a tendency to integrate different standards, rules and laws. The European court of justice is probably the most important heart of European integration, and very much impossible.
In the 50s, there is the common agriucultural policy which is where a lot of European funds used to actually come through.
If you extend the reach of early integration into other fields, nation states usually come in and say that the EU is going too far. This is where the European council comes in. It is an organisation where nation states themselves are represented. It basically counters the European comission. Where are the European people?
This is the European common assembly/Parliment comes in.
You build these supranational structure, there is a kind of counter movement from governments, there is a quest for democratic countrol; and the European court of justice that makes sure things are standardised and scrutinised by judges → integration.
Thatcher supported European economic integration but was heavily against political integration. Burn the witch.
Maastricht happened in 92: new situation in which the continent changes rapidly, germany is back on the map (despite being crisis ridden). Thatcher was not in favour of German unification, and the French president wasn’t either.
Kohl realised this and wanted to further deeper European integraiton, as an answer to the German question. The idea is that if Europe was more closely and economically integrated, then economic well-being in one place is economic well-being in another. German Deutschemark was seen as a cultural cornerstone, so removing it with the euro was not popular, but furthered integration.
European community
Common Foreign and Security Policy
Police and judicial co-operation
”The choice for Britain is clear. Either we chooe to enter the community and join in building a strong Europe on the foundations which the Six have laid; or we choose to stand aside from this great enterprise and seek to maintain our interests from the narrow – and narrowing – base we have known in recent years. As a full member of the community we would have more opportunity and strength to influence events than we could possibly have on our own.” The Whiter Paper
Why was Brussels the HQ of the EU? No one knows. The coal and steel was initially in luxemburg, and many other EU institutions is there. There was all kinds of powerplay between belgian and luxemburgian governments regarding this clout. The Belgian-luxemburgian train is disgustingly slow and there is a conspiracy theory that this was done intentionally to make people in Belgium not care about luxemburg.
If you come to Washington, it is very clear and the same is the case in Moscow. In Brussels you exit at Schumann and there are just lots of random stuff around, and no one knows how anything functions.
The EU buildings are rented and are gonna run out soon lol. Brussels really does not have organisation. Just like the EU.
In Luxemburg we have a nazi unification design, much organisation.
Always a dual idea between securtity and profiting economically.
How far did OPEK push the EU to unify?
Haven’t come across a direct link, but the 73 oil crisis, OPEK reacting to Israel fucking shit up, fucked a lot of shit up. OPEK is a very limited organisation in that it is only concerned with energy and integrates very diverse countries. The EU is from the start having the idea that their countries cannot survive on their own any longer. They need to be able to compete with the US, other emerging powers, and definitely OPEK. The EU always kind of works as a defensive union, always being against something, and as such always integrating at this point.
The currency project is one of the more extreme examples of the effects one sees in daily life. Speaks to the idea of an ever closer union, lead by technocrats.
At the same time we see an intergovernmental dimension which is still strong. It is vetobased
There are also differenct circles and speeds of integration: some join the Schengen area, some get the euro etc etc.
Old and new divisions coming to the fore against the backdrop of the EU: ”Frugal four”, New hanseatic League, Visegrad Four
We need to look at the financial crisis, often called European crisis
Lehman Bankruptcy in Septemer 2008 → crisis of banks → intervention of states sending in crazy amounts of money into the market from debt. Extreme increase in public debt.
Public debt was no longer sustainable: Greece collapses. This is a big problem for the euro as such. There were harsher measures of reform, and support for Greece financially. With all kinds of reverberations, with fierce manifestations against Merkel in Greece.
Structural problems in the Eurozone become visible: north-south gap.
Austerity: primacy of the market over politics.
Economic cohesion or growing gap? A few years ago there seemed to be a growing gap, but with current events it seems to be increased cohesion.
Democratic deficit? Social deficit?
Sovereignty: Hamilton moment (refers to early US where hamilton, through budgets integrated the states of the US more strongly) and different visions on sovereignty: German position in the eurocrisis and eastern states, and the decline of the US as a global player. Brexit and its impact, where Britain seems to be moving closer to the EU, taking a leadership role in defensemeasures. What we see in the EU is only one part of the picture.
Competing power blocs, and forms of political organisation. A couple of years the EU would have probably sold itself as the moral power, but with recent developments this seems to no longer be possible. The Europeans would argue that there are European values which differ from the BRICS, which lacks such a moral high ground.