Transcript Great Britain

Chapter 7:
The
European
Union
Thinking About The EU
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What’s in a Name?
– European Economic Community (EEC)
– The Common Market
– The European Community (EC)
– The European Union (EU)
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Who’s in, who’s out?
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The New Europe
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Three Pillars
– Trade and economic issues
– Justice and home affairs
– Common foreign and security policy
Thinking About The EU
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Key Questions
How and why did the EU emerge?
What is its political culture and how does it
shape the way people participate in its
political life?
What are the main decision-making bodies?
What are its critical public policy
initiatives?
How do the European people learn about
and react to those policies?
How will the EU and its institutions be
affected by broadening and deepening?
The Evolution of the EU
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Not such a new idea
ECSC
• The High Authority
• A Special Council of Ministers
• A Court of Justice
• A Common Assembly
The Treaty of Rome and the EEC
• The Commission
• The Council of Ministers
• European Parliament
• European Court of Justice
Creating the Common Market
Growth
Common Agricultural Policy
European Monetary System
Council of Permanent Representatives (COREPRER)
The Evolution of the EU
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The Single European Act
The Maastricht Treaty
The Treaty of Amsterdam
The Treaty of Nice
Popular Culture and
Participation in the EU
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Few people identify themselves first as
European.
Key EU organizations are still superficial
Democratic deficit
Lack of common language
The European State?
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The Commission
The Council
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General Affairs Council
European Council
COREPRER
Qualified voting majority
The European State?
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The European Court of Justice
– Decisions have frequently made major expansion of
the EU’s authority possible
– Actions have limited national sovereignty in favor of
the EU’s institutions
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The European Parliament
– The EU’s weakest institution
– Power has grown since direct election of members
– Codecision
– The right to approve all nominees to the
Commission and can remove the entire Commission
if a vote of censure passes by a two-thirds margin.
– The right to approve the budget
The European State?
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The Complexities of EU Decision Making
– Policy making more complex and
confusing because it has to reconcile
interests of its 25 member states with
those that transcend national boundaries
and the institutions are greatly
fragmented.
– Still being built
The European State?
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Next Steps?
– Further broadening and deepening seem unlikely in the
foreseeable future
• Criteria to join:
– Establishment of a functioning and stable
democratic regime
– Adoption of a market-oriented capitalist economy
– Acceptance of the acquis communautaire, the
80,000 pages of laws and regulations already on
the EU’s books
• To be a “United States of Europe,” need commitment
to a common foreign and security policy.
The European State?
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The EU and National Sovereignty
– Can it supplant the state and the primary
actor determining public policy and the
broader ways in which people are
governed?
Public Policy in the EU
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The Internal Market
– The removal of tariffs and other barriers to trade
• Tremendous impact on both European
governments and their citizens
– Monetary union
• The euro
• EMU gives the EU and its new central bank
powerful levers they can exert over national
governments
Public Policy in the EU
• Common Agricultural Policy
– Took steps to modernize inefficient farms to be
more competitive in the European market
– Established the EAFFF, giving farmers subsidies
and guaranteeing the purchase of surplus goods
at artificially high prices.
– Demonstrates how pressure put on member states
can lead to policies that tend to impede a free
market and also make the EU resistant to change.
– More recent reforms on the CAP have been
forced on the EU by the GATT and the WTO.
– CAP will not be able to survive the 2004
enlargement
Feedback
• There is very little feedback because of the way the EU
is structured and the way people participate (or don’t) in
it.
• People pay little attention to the politics and policies of
the EU.
• Turnout in European elections is much lower than in
national ones.
• Coverage in the press is spotty and concentrates on its
problems.
• Difficult for average people to have much of an impact
on decision making; distance and disinterest.