The European Union at a crossroads
Fifty years on from the founding of its first Community, Europe is at a crossroads. The entry into circulation of the euro, on January 1st, signalled the end of the process of monetary unification. Meanwhile, February 28th saw the opening of the Convention on the future of Europe, which has been assigned the task of redesigning the institutions of the EU. These two events are linked. The first marks the end of a phase in the process of European unification, the second the beginning of a constituent phase, and thus the opening up of the prospect of a federal outcome to the process.
While the creation of the single currency is certainly a historic achievement, it means that the stimulus that was generated by the Maastricht Treaty and that led twelve states to renounce their power to mint coins has now run out. If it is true that a currency without a state is an absolutely unprecedented situation, then it is also clear that the current stage reached in the process of European unification must be regarded as a transitory one. The process has now advanced to a point at which it appears easier to continue in the direction of a federal outcome than to turn back, even though the disintegration of the Union remains a possibility.
The institutional crisis
The nation-states have lost their capacity to govern Europe and to direct the building of European unity. The clash of national interests has caused the decision-making machinery of the European institutions progressively to seize up. Furthermore, the Nice Treaty failed to produce the institutional reforms that are needed if the European Union is to face the great challenges of the new century, namely: the overcoming of the democratic deficit (the result of the fact that the national governments, within the Council, still have the monopoly of decision-making power on the most important issues); the creation of a unified legal area, so that today's economic Europe might be transformed into an area of liberty, justice and security; the government of economic and monetary union (on which the welfare of the citizens of Europe and the global role of the euro both depend); the strengthening of the cohesion of the Union's institutions in order to prevent enlargement from watering Europe down into a vast free-trade area; and the unification of foreign and security policy, essential if the European Union is to speak with a single voice at world level. Thus, the right of veto has, more and more frequently, prevented crucial decisions from being taken. The Nice summit, at the end of days of inconclusive negotiations, marked the failure of the intergovernmental method and revealed the incapacity of the governments to give Europe a constitution.
The mandate of the Convention
Last December, at the Laeken summit, the European governments acknowledged their own incapacity to deal, by themselves, with the crisis of the European Union's institutions. This has led to the affirmation of an innovative method, already tried out in the drawing up of the Charter of Rights (proclaimed in Nice on December 7th, 2000), and thus the shift of the debate over a European constitution out of the narrow sphere of diplomatic conferences - something that federalists have long pressed for. The debate has been entrusted, instead, to a compound body made up of representatives from the national parliaments, the European Parliament, the fifteen governments and the European Commission. It is true that this Convention has not been elected by the people, but at the same time it cannot be denied that it is, in its composition, widely representative. It was also decided that the debates and documents produced by the Convention should be made public and that a Forum, representing civil society, should work parallel with the Convention and present to the latter its suggestions.
It is important to underline, finally, that the Convention has been given a very broad mandate: that of drawing up a European constitution. This must undoubtedly be seen as a victory for federalists who, in 1996, launched the campaign for a European constitution in total isolation. That said, the Convention has been given the power only to propose, not to decide. The governments have reserved the right to have the final say, at the intergovernmental conference due to be held in 2004. It is unrealistic to hypothesise the exclusion of the governments from the constituent process. The document that will ultimately define the structure of the European federation will be a Treaty-Constitution whose signatories will be the national governments. The problem is, rather, one of how to break down the resistance of the governments that oppose the federalist design. There are two obstacles that must be overcome, one theoretical and the other political.
The theoretical obstacle
Let us look first at the theoretical obstacle. The European governments (or at least a good number of them) are no longer hostile, on principle, to a federal-type solution. The expression "federation of nation-states" is one that is being used increasingly by many prominent political leaders. But rather than indicating a solution, it expresses a problem that needs to be solved. It points out the need to reconcile something that, in national culture, is viewed as an insurmountable contradiction: a union of states that has independent power, but does not eliminate the independence of its members. While the governments are clear on what it is they do not want (a superstate that would erase the nation-states), they do not know what it is they do want. Those who grope in the fog of national thinking are unable to see the solution. The task of federalists is to point it out.
The problem is complicated by the fact that all the existing federations have undergone a process of centralisation, which makes them unsuitable as models for Europe. Furthermore, the existing federations are unions of cantons, provinces or regions; there are no federations of nation-states. We are thus faced with the unprecedented task of applying the culture and institutions of federalism to a world region - Europe - that is the area in which both national culture and national institutions were first born and continue to dominate. The crisis of the nation-states can be overcome by transferring some powers upwards (to Europe) and others downwards (to regional and local communities), in other words, by reorganising the state on a number of independent and co-ordinated levels of government.
The political obstacle
The political obstacle lies in the iron law of the preservation of power, power which Europe's national governments will not therefore spontaneously relinquish. They must be forced to do so by two factors: a crisis revealing the incapacity of the European institutions to come up with a solution for crucial problems (such as, for example, the problem of enlargement) and the exerting of strong pressure from below, sufficient to prompt a real qualitative leap forward, that is, the decision to found a European federation.
The veto of the eurosceptics represents an insidious threat to the success of the Convention. Although the former agreed, surprisingly, that a constitutional mandate should be conferred on the Convention, this does not mean that their resistance has been broken down. The Convention will include representatives of countries - Great Britain first and foremost - that oppose the idea of a federal constitution. Furthermore, there is another proposal - favoured by the British government - that is emerging as a real alternative to the federal constitution, and it is to set up an Anglo-French-German directoire that would be responsible for foreign and security policy, a sort of EU Security Council.
There is thus a need, in the work of the Convention, and subsequently in the ratification process, to overcome the obstacle constituted by the right of veto and by the taking of decisions by unanimity, both of which would prevent any progress towards a federal reform of the European Union. What is needed, in other words, is for a group of countries to unite behind the federalist design, countries that are ready to break with their partners in order to create a federation within the Union. The Convention can succeed only if, within it, a federalist vanguard emerges with the capacity to win consensus for a draft federal constitution whose adoption will be subject to a majority vote and which will be applied to all those countries in favour of it. Were things to evolve in this way, it would be difficult for the governments, having agreed to summon the Convention, to go against the results it produced.
The novel aspect of the Convention is its openness to the views of Europe's citizens. And if the citizens demand a European federation, it will not be easy to ignore their requests. The national governments do not have absolute sovereignty. Even absolute sovereigns, in certain circumstances, have been forced to acknowledge that sovereignty belongs to the people. It might be remembered that it was the king who, faced with the crisis of the ancien régime, convened the Estates General from which sprung the events that led to the French Revolution. The Third Estate, assuming the name National Assembly, swore not to break away before the completion of the drawing up of the Constitution, which was to establish the outlines of the new order.
Ultimately, success in the battle to complete the process of Europe's unification will depend on the capacity of the Union of European Federalists (UEF) to achieve the uniting of forces and the popular mobilisation that will be essential in order to create a climate of opinion likely to give the most advanced wing of the Convention and of the governments the courage to opt for a federal constitution.