The French and Dutch peoples' NO to the Draft Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe has opened an unprecedented crisis in the European constituent process. Indeed, whilst it was the national political elites who rejected the European Defence Community and the Spinelli project, the refusal this time has been by the citizens of two founding countries of the European Community, and in both cases the referendum turn-out has been so high as to exceed those of all recent elections. This happened, in addition, in clear contrast not only to their governments but also to the overwhelming majorities in their Parliaments. To complete the picture, we have to add that of the ten countries that have so far ratified the Constitution, only Spain put the question to the people and there the turn-out was quite low.
This being the scenario, one cannot but pose the question: have European citizens become hostile to the very idea of European integration? Do they cherish the illusion they can cope with the challenges of an ever more globalized world by going back to the more familiar structures of the nation state? Although a part of the no's certainly came from that ideological background, we do not think that this is the prevailing sentiment among the overall majority of European citizens. Our assumption is that the vote has not been against the European Union per se, but against the method used in recent years to pursue integration.
Lately, many crucial decisions have been taken by member states' governments without any real democratic debate. That was the case with the introduction of the single currency, with the decision to enlarge the Union from 15 to 25 members without having first consolidated EU integration, and even with the decision to convene the Convention that drafted the European Constitution. No doubt national elections acted in effect as an indirect check on those decisions, but European policies have seldom been the most important issues debated during such electoral campaigns. It is worth recalling that the Laeken Declaration itself, which instituted the Convention, resulted from an awareness of the citizens' growing distrust of the European construction process, as disclosed by the Danes voting No to the Maastricht Treaty and the Irish voting No to the Nice Treaty, as well as the steady drop in turn-out in the European elections. It was for that reason indeed that it was decided to pass from inter-governmental conferences to the Convention at which representatives of the national and European Parliaments, and of the Commission, would for the first time take part in the European constituent debate together with representatives of the member states' governments - although, to protect their right of veto those same governments limited the assembly's prerogatives to such an extent that the significance of that move was essentially negated. The Convention had, in effect, to proceed by almost unanimous vote while at the same time knowing that the draft would later be reviewed by the 25 governments in an inter-governmental conference at which each one could, if it wished, veto every individual proposal. Partly because of these constraints, partly because of the decade-long habit to delegate to the governments the management of European issues, neither the European nor the national political leaders, including those that today are inciting the peoples to vote no, really fought so that the text of the European Constitution be the outcome of a veritable public debate, in which national and European parties, and through them the citizens, were involved.
This, in our opinion, is the fundamental deep-seated meaning of the votes of the past days: the citizens wish to become protagonists in building the future of Europe. A survey by Ipsos1 on May 29th (the day of the vote), indicated that 39% of the French who voted No did so because, among other things, "this will allow for renegotiation of a better Constitution". And it is obvious that for renegotiation to result in a better Constitution the method by which it is drawn up must be changed.
On these pages we have already fully analyzed the limits of the Constitution project. The main elements include the continued presence of the right of veto in fiscal, budgetary, defence and constitutional revision matters. Despite these limits, the European federalists decided to defend the text, mainly because they thought that, given the political will of a group of States, it would have allowed further progress towards the building of the European federation. This would be possible through the provisions regarding structured cooperation in matters of defence, the citizens' legislative initiative, and the possibility for the European Parliament to call for a new Convention for revising the Constitution. Activists from many different countries have upheld this choice with passion and courage, participating with astonishing generosity also in the French referendum campaign.
This ability to see the text in an historical perspective, and to evaluate its long-term effects, could be expected from federalist militants, but certainly not from the European citizens in general. To those who followed the French referendum campaign, as we did, the difficulty of defending this text became immediately evident, for after all it did not answer European citizens' expectations such as how to give a new impetus to the European economic growth, preserving our social model. How to speak to the world with one voice, and become emancipated from the American dominance? If we want to regain the consensus of European citizens we must start again with these questions.
The Commission and the Luxembourg Presidency, supported by the French and Dutch governments themselves, have so far limited themselves to calling for the continuation of national ratifications. The European Parliament, divided in its interior, did not even manage to adopt a resolution on the matter. Such a request rests on the content of Declaration 30, included in the Constitution, which states that if, on October 29, 2006, four fifths of the member States have ratified the Treaty, the matter shall be referred to the European Council. In principle, it is a correct proposal, based on the intention not to leave the power to block the entry into force of the Constitution in the hands of one or a few States. However, for it to be politically more effective, it should have been put in black and white before the referendum day, there being the precedent of Art. 822 of the Draft Treaty establishing a European Union approved by the European Parliament in 1984. If the French and the Dutch had known, when voting, that other States would go forward without them, the outcome of the ballots would probably have been different.
To remedy that mistake now is quite difficult. In all probability, the no by France and the Netherlands will adversely influence the following referenda which will take place even in traditionally euro-skeptical countries. The UK, followed by other States, has decided already to freeze the ratification process. The British intention is clear: to declare clinically dead this project, and with it the idea, never really accepted, that Europe shall have a Constitution.
There is only one possibility to save the Constitution: the States that have already ratified and those that, even if they have not yet ratified, do not intend to ditch sine die the constituent project, must solemnly declare that the Constitution, as it is, could enter into force if it will be ratified by at least twenty States, before the next referenda on ratification take place. Only such a declaration can give back a significance to a popular vote on a text which, in any other case, would be dead even before seeing the light.
A confused and in some way dramatic phase is opening. Already loud voices are being raised by those who, in a partisan spirit, attack the entire European construction, preaching the need to go back to national currencies and to close their borders against the invasion of the chimerical Polish plumber.
Europe will emerge from this situation in two ways: either resigning itself to its decline and to the progressive dissolution of its political and monetary integration, which will make us impotent in the face of Asian competition, slaves of the American hegemony and once again exposed to the nightmare of nationalist hatred, or else by finding the courage to turn down the logic of compromise, and to start a new era of European democracy, launching a political project capable of regaining the consensus among its citizens. Whatever the outcome, one thing is certain: the people have stormed into the constituent process, and will never leave. No governmental alchemy will ever pass their judgment unhurt.
In case the last tentative to save the Constitution fails, the only way the European project can be re-launched is by convening a true Constituent Assembly whose representatives shall be elected by the people. If the European Constitution dies in the ballot-boxes, in the ballot-boxes will return it to life. The debate preceding its election will for the first time seriously confront the citizens on the future of Europe and on a European plane at last, unlike the debates in France and the Netherlands which were strongly conditioned by their national political contingencies. As with every genuine constituent assembly it will have the legitimacy and the mandate to adopt a draft Constitution by qualified majority. It would then be directly submitted to the European citizens through a consultative referendum to be held on the same day throughout the Union, and would eventually enter into force in those States that have ratified it, providing they represent a majority both of the citizens and of the States of the Union.
The European Parliament's federalist inter-group has been in the front line defending the text, organizing demonstrations both in the assembly hall and in the city of Paris. It is now the primary duty of the European Parliament to launch this new proposal. We know that very powerful voices will be raised against it, and that it will not be accepted by all of the EU member States. For this reason it is necessary that a group of States should declare themselves ready to support it and to go forward with it together with those who share the same aim.
Today the survival of European integration is at stake, and with it that of the federalist project in the rest of the world. It is a choice on which we cannot allow anyone to have the right of veto.
1 http://www.ipsos.fr/CanalIpsos/poll/8074.asp.
2 "This Treaty shall be open for ratification by all the Member States of the European Communities. Once this Treaty has been ratified by a majority of the Member States of the Communities whose population represents two-thirds of the total population of the Communities, the Governments of the Member States which have ratified shall meet at once to decide by common accord on the procedures by and the date on which this Treaty shall enter into force and on relations with the Member States which have not yet ratified".