Whiter dream of US of Europe?
Khalid Saleem
One was contemplating the future of the Turkish quest for membership of
Europe when one became cognizant of the fissures in the façade of the
European Union itself. Despite the frenetic efforts to spruce up the
image of unity, the dream of a ‘United States of Europe’ appears to be
as distant as it ever was. The Turks have been overly keen to be
accepted as part of Europe for as long as one can remember. Their quest
gained added momentum after the fall of the Berlin Wall. But as of now a
pall of gloom looms over the Turkish aspirations in this direction. In
fact, a Turkish friend in a message the other day cast cynical doubts
over the possibility of the very survival of the European Union itself
beyond a decade or two.
Ever since the late French president Charles de Gaulle (“Le Grand
Charles”) slammed the door in the face of the British application to
join the European Common Market (ECM), Europe has never quite managed to
achieve that degree of understanding that would afford it at least a
façade of unity. The European Union, which not so very long ago was
looking forward to a comparatively bright future, now gives the
appearance of having stepped over a bed of thorns. France and Germany
had been at odds with Tony Blair’s Britain for as long as one can
remember. Tony Blair’s departure may or may not have an emollient
effect. Then, the negative votes in France and the Netherlands in the
referendums on the European Union constitution understandably came as
something of a bombshell. The leadership of the European Union has yet
to fully recover from that shock.
As is well known, former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, in his
school-boyish enthusiasm, had already led Britain far afield from the
European mainstream, thus creating a schism that will not at all be easy
to mend. Then came the epoch when France and Germany took such a
resolute defiant stand against the US-British military adventure in Iraq
that Europe, to all appearance, appeared sheared right down the middle.
The passage of time did have an emollient effect of sorts and things
have appeared less severe of late. But with the subsequent developments,
European unity, such as it was, has taken a fresh battering. A cursory
glance at recent history may not be out of place.
The addition of ten new members in May 2004 (thus uniting Western and
Central Europe into a single market of 450 million people) had given
rise to wide expectation that the half-century of division of the
continent in two in the wake of the Cold War would finally come to an
end. As Romano Prodi, the then president of the European Commission,
enthusiastically put it at the time, “Accession of ten new member states
will bring an end to the divisions in Europe. For the first time in
history, Europe will become one because unification is the free will of
its people”. By hindsight one finds that this was no more than an
idealistic vision. A wide spectrum of Europeans found it difficult to
subscribe to the ebullient viewpoint of Romano Prodi. The ideal of a
united Europe did look good on paper. What did not appear realistic was
the expectation that this paper image could be smoothly transcribed on
to the ground, so to speak. The hurdles strewn across the path of Europe
were daunting, to say the least. For one thing, the economic disparities
among the member states alone were sufficient to destroy any prospects
of economic integration. The fears of those who felt that the Union was
moving too fast and that the planning was too ambitious for comfort did
not prove to be entirely unfounded. In actual fact, the results of
French and Dutch referenda gave rise to strengthened fears that the
European Union could well be in danger of coming apart at the seams. The
dream of “One Europe” is still far from realization. A cursory glance at
some of the considerations that may have influenced the French and Dutch
voters may be in order. The expansion of Europe, it now appears by
hindsight, has turned out to be a double-edged sword. Citizens of the
senior members of the European Union have been quite jealously guarding
their economic prosperity and, quite understandably, have shown marked
reluctance to share it with the less endowed new members.
There is also the matter of growing tension that is inevitable between
the newly expanded European Union and the impoverished former Soviet
republics that it will be sharing such a long border with. Here are some
instances of economic disparities: Belarus – population ten million -
has an average per capita output of $1,200. Ukraine – population fifty
million – boasts of an annual economic output of around $800 per person.
Compare these with European Union’s per capita average of around
$22,000.
The decision of the EU to open a membership dialogue with Turkey once a
hot topic has been nudged off the media pages by subsequent events in
the region. Turkey had a reasonably good case and was working extremely
hard to gain a foothold. Now it appears that Turkey’s quest may not be
smooth sailing. For one thing, the religion factor is bound to weigh
heavily in any final decision and cannot be dismissed lightly. As it is,
the hardcore Christians – and that includes the Vatican since the change
of the guard there – look askance at the reports that Islam is the
fastest growing religion in Europe.
The proposed constitution of the European Union that was all but thrown
out by the voters of France and the Netherlands would hardly have added
much to the regulations that already govern the Union. Its importance,
though, lay in the fact that it could have placed the European Union on
a more formal footing, capable of holding its own against the United
States. The United States must evidently have looked at this development
with feelings bordering on satisfaction. A de facto United States of
Europe facing them across the ocean would hardly represent a development
devoutly to be desired. The recent members of the European Union as well
as new aspirants, Turkey among them, have ample reason to feel nervous.
A Europe moving towards its conservative past is a Europe that will
reopen old wounds. This is the one scenario that those who wish Europe
well would hate to be replayed. Friends would wish instead to see Europe
rise as not only an economic giant but also as a rational grouping that
could act as a stabilizing factor in a world turned on its head by
America’s precipitate War on Terror.
Europe, then, is once again at sixes and sevens. Once on the threshold
of an historic unity and - shall one add, on the verge of eminence -
Europe has once again lost its foothold. An in-depth analysis will no
doubt blame it on mundane factors. It would not be politic to consider
this as the end of the road. Europe will turn around and have another go
at it. And this time round perhaps lady luck will smile at it. Europe
has had a checkered history, what with the two World Wars and the
several million dead. Europeans are bound to wake up to the realization
that any repeat of this bloody history would be once too many!
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