THE EUROPEAN UNION: NEW TENDENCIES
03.07.2012
Gagik Harutyunyan
Executive Director of “Noravank” Foundation
The European Union, which includes 27 countries and has population of
over 500 million, is the biggest economy in the world (at current
prices the GDP of the EU is $16.4 trillion, which constitutes 28% of
the world GDP). At the same time this union has appeared in rather
difficult political and economic situation. In particular, the
national debts have grown and in consequence it is not excluded that
some countries (Greece, Spain and Italy) will default. E.g. the debt
of Italy constitutes 120% of its GDP and over the first quarter of
this year a rate of 0.8% economic recession was registered and as a
result the ratings of 26 Italian banks were downgraded. The situation
is almost similar in Spain and its is only a rate of 0.5% growth of
German economy that provided “zero” level stability of the EU GDP and
saved the European Union from recession. The current situation creates
fertile ground for different forecasts and statements which do not
rule out the scenarios of European currency or even EU collapse with
all the drastic consequences and aftermaths it may have. Sometimes
such statements remind preliminarily prepared information actions; the
assessments of some political figures and rating agencies pursue
mercantile aims and tend to direct processes proceeding on the stock
markets and at the political negotiations. But even this circumstance
proves that it is testing time for the “European project”.
Reasons of the crisis
The European crisis is not only a consequence of the depletion of
global liberal models’ resources, but it has also been caused by the
peculiarities of structural and administration system. They, despite
exerted efforts, do not allow forming common political and economic
rules which will be obligatory for all the members of the union. Such
a situation is a consequence of objective and sometimes even
subjective (conditioned by personal or political and economic
interests) circumstances.
The absence of the “European identity” is first of all considered as a
main drawback of the European system. The European nations, of course,
have many civilizational commonalities, but there are also
considerable cultural and political differences. In this aspect
especially the factor of Great Britain should be taken into
consideration; it takes special and not always very constructive
stance in the EU processes and positions itself as a part of
North-Atlantic (Anglo-American) and not continental European project.
Moreover, (especially if take as a ground W. Churchill’s memories1),
the architecture of the post-war Europe was planned so that there was
no possibility to form a center of power (and this referred not only
to Germany), thus proving Anglo-Saxon military, political and economic
prevalence.
An additional factor in the issue of the European identity is
“multiculturalism” phenomenon and deriving from it seemingly
inevitable tendency of changing ethnic composition of Europe
(correspondingly change of the cultural orientations)2. The steps
taken in this direction (immigration law enforcement, revision of
Schengen agreement, etc.), taking into consideration growing
immigration flows to Europe in consequence of geopolitical and
neo-colonization collisions in the Greater Middle East and Africa, do
not yield tangible result.
At the same time, there is an impression, judging by the publications
of the European media, that the opposition to the immigrants (which is
expressed not only in the works of intellectuals3, but also takes a
form of radical actions, such as Breivik precedent) somehow promotes
formation of the European solidarity. But in this sphere there are
some contradictions either.
Anti-immigration approaches are more characteristic of conservative
parties in the EU. Meanwhile these parties, as a rule, come forward
from a perspective of consolidation of the sovereignty of their
countries. The most fervent supporters of the idea of Euro-integration
are the European socialists which are in their turn comparatively
tolerant to the “multiculturalism”4.
In the aforementioned context, it would be appropriate to remember the
idea of German Chancellor Angela Merkel that Europe did not have “too
much Islam” but “too little Christianity”. Generally social scientists
condition these realities and disputable tendencies, which came
forward in modern European civilization processes, by extremely
primitive modern European system of values. As it is known acquiring
universal welfare is announced a top priority for Europe (this notion
also provides a room for different commentaries), meanwhile such
social model contains many risks and considered to be vulnerable.
According to some analysts such a conceptual approach is based on the
example of the Soviet Union which also tended to prove social rights
of its citizens5. But the “European welfare” (which exceeds on its
material level and in some principle issues such as right to labor,
free education, medicine, yields to the Soviet perceptions) is based
upon the rules of “consumer society” (against which the countries of
the “socialist camp” were struggling), with all the deriving
tendencies of devaluation of the spiritual sphere.
In case with the EU, the “welfare doctrine” has also a financial
aspect presented by budgetary expenditures (sometimes unreasonably
high), which in their turn bring to the growth of the national debts.
It is remarkable that before the “big crisis” in 2008-2009 majority in
14 of 27 governments in the EU belonged to the socialist who attached
great importance to the notion of “welfare”. But the recession came to
prove that the budget generosity may have drastic consequences and
today there are only 5 socialist governments in Europe. But all the
social protest actions which took hold of Europe come to prove that
non-socialist and pure market approaches also are pregnant with risks
and there are even more such risks than in case with the a high level
of state care as they can bring to the chaotic events as it happened
in Greece. In this aspect the victory of socialist Hollande at the
presidential elections in France can be considered regular and
adequate to the current European realities.
Francois Hollande: New Tendencies
All the EU members of course have equal rights, but it is not a secret
that some of these members are a little “more equal than the others”.
Here we speak about European superpowers – Germany, which is already
sometimes called 4th Reich and France. Before the presidential
elections in France the leaders of the countries, despite some
discrepancies, jointly tried to elaborate and tended to implement
programme on overcoming crisis in Europe (mainly to German receipts),
which was based on the strategy of budget restrictions and cutting
down expenses in a social sphere.
The situation changed after Francois Hollande’s coming to power, who
places stake rather on stirring up and raising economy than on policy
of cutting down budget expenses (though this is also included in
Hollande’s plans – newly appointed prime-minister has already stated
about 30% reduction of wages of the members of the cabinet). It should
be stated that the programme of the president which consists of 60
points, contains rather drastic changes. In particular, it is supposed
to reduce the taxes for small business owners, and in case with banks
considerable rise of taxes; the taxes of those who have more than 150
thousand Euros income will constitute 45% and of those whose income
exceeds 1 million Euros – 75%. Hollande conditions the rise of the
economy by the development of science-absorbing industries and his
program provisions underline the development of the science and even
contain points concerning revival of the “science aristocracy”. An
intention of Hollande to establish new European rating agency, which
would be an alternative to Standart&Poors, Moody and Fitch rejtings
companies, is very interesting.
But Hollande’s innovations are not only restricted to the sphere of
economy. He intends to reconsider the approaches of his forerunner in
the foreign policy. As it is known by the decision of N. Sarkozy in
2009 France reintegrated to the military structures of NATO6, and in
2010 France and Great Britain signed a military cooperation pact,
particularly in the sphere of nuclear weapons development. Media
called this pact an unprecedented one, which in fact marked the
establishment of joint French-British troops (according to that
document the parties agreed to create joint 6.5 expedition task
force). Hollande conform other logic – he has already kept his promise
to withdraw French troops from Afghanistan (they will leave the
country by the end of this year). Special attention should be paid to
the proposal of Hollande to create joint French-German military staff
which can be regarded as a certain pattern in the context of further
possible transformation of NATO and it should coincide with the
foreign policy coarse of Germany; as it is known A. Merkel keeps a low
profile concerning the claims of NATO in the well known processes in
Libya and Syria.
Thus, one should not exclude that the French foreign policy in regard
to the North-Atlantic model may change (or it would rather get back to
de Gaulle approaches), which may promote establishment of
full-featured continental European system.
1õ.þÅÒÞÉÌÌØ, ÷ÔÏÒÁÑ ÍÉÒÏ×ÁÑ ×ÏÊÎÁ (ËÎÉÇÁ ÔÒÅÔØÑ), ÷ÏÅÎÎÏÅ
ÉÚÄÁÔÅÌØÓÔ×Ï, í., 1991.
2See, for example, ÷ÉÛÎÅ×ÓËÉÊ á., ëÏÎÅà ÓÅ×ÅÒÏÃÅÎÔÒÉÚÍÁ. òÏÓÓÉÑ ×
ÇÌÏÁÌØÎÏÊ ÐÏÌÉÔÉËÅ, Ô.7, #5, Ó. 180. 2009.
3ôÉÌÏ óÁÒÁÃÉÎ, çÅÒÍÁÎÉÑ: ÓÁÍÏÌÉË×ÉÄÉÃÉÑ, éÚÄ-×Ï òéä, í., 2012.
4It should be mentioned that not all the socialists share this
approach and, in particular, the aforementioned Thilo Sarrazin was a
member of social-democratic party of Germany.
5
6France, being one of 12 NATO establishers, withdrew from NATO’s
integrated military and leadership structures under de Gaulle (in
1966).
“Globus” analytical journal, # 7, 2012
—
Another materials of author
*TURKISH NUCLEAR THREAT[26.04.2012]
*NEW MIDDLE EAST: REALITY AND PROSPECTS [15.03.2012]
*NEW STATEHOOD AND NEW CHALLENGES[20.09.2011]
*REFLECTING THE EVENTS OF THE AFRICAN CONTINENT IN THE MIRROR OF THE
GREAT GAME[18.05.2011]
*RUSSIAN-ARMENIAN COOPERATION AND TURKISH FACTOR[16.05.2011]
http://noravank.am/eng/articles/detail.php?ELEMENT_ID=6582
http://www.rodon.org/other/mivp.htm