LEADERLESS EUROPE
This page intentionally left blank
Leaderless Europe Edited by JACK H AY WA RD
1
3
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © The several contributors 2008 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2008 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Leaderless Europe / edited by Jack Hayward. p. cm. ISBN–13: 978–0–19–953502–6 1. European Union. 2. European Union countries–Politics and government. 3. Leadership–European Union countries. I. Hayward, Jack Ernest Shalom. JN30.L384 2008 2008004128 341.242 2–dc22 Typeset by SPI Publisher Services Ltd, Pondicherry, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Biddles Ltd, King’s Lynn, Norfolk ISBN 978–0–19–9535026 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Preface Although the lack of effective leadership within the European Union has frequently been deplored, the central argument of this book is that from its antecedents in the 1950s, the successive incarnations of European integration were intended to be leaderless. If so, the process has succeeded only too well in demonstrating that much can be achieved without sustained leadership. Despite the fact that some of its heroic or surreptitious protagonists had federalism as their longer-term objective, the attachment to national sovereignty of both most of the elites and mass populations has meant that in their practice confederalism has been implicitly accepted for the foreseeable future. Increasing resort to intergovernmental consensus, despite institutional reforms such as the incremental extensions of qualified majority voting, has been reinforced by the enlargement of the number of the Union’s member states, with the consequent increasing reluctance to accept leadership. As we shall show, there have been sectoral variations which have changed over time, with semi-stationary pauses being punctuated by piecemeal integrationist surges. However, the polycentric, transitional character of the European Union sets a general framework that usually limits the scope of innovation to incremental adjustments rather than comprehensive change. Leadership and its absence in the European Union is examined by combining attention to the evolving but path-dependent institutional structures and procedures established in the 1950s, the changing personalities that played a prominent part in the way in which these complex institutions formally and informally worked in practice, and the shifting political and economic contexts—national and international—within which Union organizations and personalities adapted their behaviour to changing circumstances. While all three aspects, institutional, personality, and context, are present in all the contributions, the emphasis varies as appropriate to the particular leadership aspect discussed because of the differing ways in which the constraints they impose and the capabilities they possess interact. Successive enlargements, notably the addition of ten member states in 2004, have for example posed increasingly complex leadership predicaments that will take years to overcome even if institutional reforms are adopted. Who, on a particular occasion, will speak on behalf of the European Union? Is it the President of the European Council, the President of the European Commission, the President of the European Parliament, the President of the European Central Bank, the
vi
Preface
President of the Eurogroup, the High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy, to name only some of the possible spokesmen? Two or more presidents may speak simultaneously, and not with one voice on a specific issue, causing confusion. There are too many would-be leaders and not enough followers. In investigating the predicament of why the process of European integration and its management have failed to prompt the emergence of a clearly identifiable leadership over more than half a century’s development, three clusters of issues need to be clarified. First, as European integration has advanced, who provided the impetus? Particular insiders episodically exerted decisive innovative influence, despite the need to conciliate the jealous champions of national sovereignty. Institutional inhibition of European Commission initiatives was a distinctive feature of changes made, with national governments, especially Franco-German action, being decisive more often than Council of Ministers or European Council proposals. However, from the mid-1990s, there was less inclination to accept Franco-German guidance. Three policy areas have been selected to demonstrate how the complex issue of identifying leadership when it exists can be disentangled with due respect to diversity. Economic and monetary policy has been too central a concern since the Rome Treaty not to be chosen, with the initial role of the Commission being increasingly challenged by the finance ministers of the member states and the European Central Bank. Environmental policy has become an increasingly significant latecomer, which justified its choice rather than that of the Common Agricultural Policy. Despite the latter’s importance—bulking large especially in its share of the Union’s budget—it is scheduled to be of declining importance. While competition policy has been a high profile, well documented manifestation of the Commission’s discretionary power in dealing with private and public national champion firms, we have chosen instead to explore the strategic sector of technology policy as a specific instrument for advancing European competitiveness. The second part of this book establishes why the European Union is currently leaderless. The weakened Commission and the increasingly assertive European Council and Council of Ministers have contended for control of agenda-setting but it is in the sphere of foreign and security policy that the EU’s logic of leaderlessness has been most conspicuous. The reduced capacity of the Franco-German tandem to offer acceptable leadership is marked by a shift in the balance of influence from French to greater German predominance not merely in the financial sphere but more generally. British incapacity to join or replace them in providing overall leadership will be discussed, even though British governments have been content to see EU enlargement preclude ambitious extensions of integration, concentrating instead upon practical reforms consistent with divergent national interests. The EU’s enlargement indigestion
Preface
vii
from its major eastward expansion made this a much more controversial issue, with prolonged procrastination particularly in the case of Turkey. A ‘fortress Europe’ attitude was accentuated by increasing preoccupation with circumscribing a problematic European identity and resolving interactable problems of EU governance. In Part III we pose the speculative issue of where European political leadership might come from, concentrating upon the ascertainable realities rather than media-fuelled perceptions. The referendum rejection in 2005 by France and the Netherlands of the proposed constitutional treaty involved a severe setback to institutional reform to replace the rotating presidency and strengthen the EU’s capacity to pursue a collective foreign policy. Attempts have been renewed to overcome the formal constraints on leadership of a non-hierarchical system based upon persuasion not command, although they have assumed a more modest, non-constitutional guise. The lack of enthusiastic public support continues to be a debilitating problem for the process of increasing European integration. Because the EU is better at legislating than implementing, the European Court of Justice is likely to continue to play a significant if self-restrained leadership role in securing the enforcement of agreed policies by laggard national governments, rather than promoting new policies. The Commission is trying to compensate for its weaker role in the shared elite leadership by mobilizing public participation through the use of the internet, with only limited success. Another source of problematic leadership impetus is the European Parliament, but despite its increasing activism it operates as an ally or constraint on the Commission and Council of Ministers rather than as a force in its own right, because the political parties represented notoriously remain primarily national in their identities. Finally, the limited consensus between those purporting to exercise collective leadership casts doubt on their capacity to make it effective. Nevertheless, an increasingly interdependent European Union has been able to improvise incremental changes and cooperatively muddle along thanks to its confederal leadership arrangements as the chapters that follow will show. I would like, in conclusion, to thank the Centre of European Union Studies at the University of Hull for its support in the organization of a preparatory workshop, and Professor Noel O’Sullivan, Professor Edward Page, and Professor Steven Weatherill for their comments during the lively discussion of the papers presented. Thanks are also due for the helpful suggestions of an OUP reader. J.H.
This page intentionally left blank
Contents List of Contributors
xi
Introduction: Inhibited Consensual Leadership within an Interdependent Confederal Europe Jack Hayward
1
PART I. WHO LED EUROPE? 1. Strategic Innovation by Insider Influence: Monnet to Delors Jack Hayward
15
2. Delegation and Commission Leadership in Economic and Monetary Union David Howarth
28
3. Guiding the Digital Revolution: Is European Technology Policy Misguided? Xiudian Dai
47
4. Environmental Policy: EU Actors, Leader and Laggard States Rüdiger K. W. Wurzel
66
5. Did France and Germany Lead Europe? A Retrospect William E. Paterson
89
PART II. WHY IS EUROPE CURRENTLY LEADERLESS? 6. Political Leadership in the European Commission: The Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005 Michelle Cini
113
7. Security Policy and the Logic of Leaderlessness Anand Menon
131
8. Franco-German Relations: From Active to Reactive Cooperation Alistair Cole
147
x
Contents 9. A Bid Too Far? New Labour and UK Leadership of the European Union under Blair Hussein Kassim
10. Leaderless Enlargement? The Difficult Reform of the New Pan-European Political System José M. Magone
167
188
PART III. WHERE CAN POLITICAL LEADERSHIP COME FROM? 11. Legal Leadership in the European Union John Bell 12. Commission Leadership and the Internet: Dragging the Net through Choppy Waters Jamal Shahin
211
227
13. The European Parliament: Leadership and ‘Followership’ David Judge and David Earnshaw
245
14. Beyond the Rotating Presidency Adriaan Schout
269
15. Collective Leadership in Leaderless Europe: A Sceptical View Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos
288
Epilogue: The Elusive European Prospect Jack Hayward
305
Index
313
List of Contributors John Bell, Cambridge University Michelle Cini, Bristol University Alistair Cole, Cardiff University Xiudian Dai, Hull University Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos, Birkbeck College, London University David Earnshaw, Burson Marsteller, Brussels Jack Hayward, Hull University David Howarth, Edinburgh University David Judge, Strathclyde University Hussein Kassim, East Anglia University José M. Magone, Fachhochschule fuer Wirtschaft, Berlin Anand Menon, Birmingham University William Paterson, Birmingham University Adriaan Schout, Netherlands Institute of International Relations Jamal Shahin, Amsterdam University and Vesalius College (Brussels) Rüdiger K. W. Wurzel, Hull University
This page intentionally left blank
Introduction: Inhibited Consensual Leadership within an Interdependent Confederal Europe Jack Hayward
Why has the management of European integration over more than half a century’s development failed to generate a clearly identifiable leadership? The answer may simply be that ‘Europe has made a principle of powerlessness,’ (Revel 2003: 123). The stubborn defence of an increasingly residual national sovereignty coupled with the fear of a remote, centralized, and intrusive authoritarianism, cultivated by attacks upon ‘Brussels bureaucracy’ and a purported ‘European superstate’, have resulted in the European Union deliberately shunning the institution of an overriding leadership. Instead, piecemeal power-sharing by nation statesmen seeks surreptitiously to promote an integrationist strategy incrementally, by fits, starts, and stops. Out of an obscure multiplicity of interactions, the unforeseen outcomes are elite compromises of imprecise parentage. The complex process that has underpinned the perpetuation of powerlessness has to be investigated if the accuracy of the assertion of principle is to be vindicated and be seen to have been practised. How did initial imaginative innovation give way to lacklustre, routine indecision?
THE POLYCENTRIC CONTEXT It is not the informed scepticism of those who understand that the European Union is based upon a rejection of any formal hierarchy between its member states that has occupied the forefront of public discussion. It is the relentless promotion of fear of a remote, centralized, and intrusive authoritarianism that predominates, even though the colourful cases illustrating these peremptory assertions are usually mendacious or misleading. Far from being the superstate
2
Introduction
of Eurosceptic daymares, the European Union has evolved into a highly polycentric and pluralist consociational polity within a mega-confederal system of consensual decision-making by its constituent member-state elites. So as not openly to challenge the sancrosanct principle of national sovereignty, the successive incarnations of integrating Europe shunned visible leadership. It did so in favour of a dispersed elite network of more or less committed supranationalists, surreptitiously steering a visible collective political leadership of nation statesmen, who tactically legitimized the incremental attainment of an integrationist strategy. The successive incarnations of the European Union have been deliberately dedicated to a polycentric pluralism and consociational confederalism calculated to avoid the emergence of uninhibited leadership. The nominal leaders can disclaim responsibility for the heavily amended and compromised results of processes that alternate between longer periods of secretive, piecemeal negotiations and shorter periods of public communication of the accomplished facts, between the informal understandings arrived at and the formal ratification that imparts to them an official legitimacy. They can also deny responsibility for the failures and paralysis that frequently result from resignation to non-negotiable nation-state intransigence, particularly when unanimity is a precondition of reaching a decision. Has the European Union an inbuilt propensity to immobility that, notably through appeals to an intangible acquis communautaire, preserves inefficient and inequitable practices that are far removed form the ideals of its protagonists? The explanation of both its unattractive practices and incapacity to devise simple and effective solutions to them can be traced to the European Union’s origins. Because the increasingly intrusive activities of a faceless ‘Brussels’ often seemed to alienated national mass publics not merely remote and incomprehensible but disturbing, it has been possible for populist demagogues to mobilize opposition to decisions lacking the trappings of habitual democratic legitimacy. Elite conspirators in the enlightened European public interest are easy victims of a mass media-orchestrated denigration. Because compromise bargains are made covertly, to allow a confidential exchange of concessions that would not be acceptable in isolation, the necessary lack of transparency lends credence to suspicions of sell-out that can be unscrupulously exploited. The need to identify adversarial winners and losers hampers the attainment of the cumulative benefits of positive-sum agreements by reducing controversial issues to intransigence inducing zero-sum discord. Despite the determination to sidestep the sensitive issue, transnational leadership is especially important to impart authority to EU institutions. Lacking popular legitimacy, leaders convey an uneasy sensation of having both feet firmly fixed in mid-air. Without the traditional loyalties of nation
Introduction
3
states, to whom citizens primarily look to satisfy their wants and with which they identify themselves, the EU has to rely on treaty-based legal authority. So it seems to require the infusion of a prominent political personality, a Mr Europe, to attract public support for what are generally regarded as complex, unfamiliar foreign authorities, with future-orientated ambitions that lack the capacity to arouse enthusiasm from those with more urgent preoccupations. However, this is a fatally simplistic if tempting short-cut solution to transnational leadership in a peculiar political entity that cannot be satisfactorily conceived by analogy with a nation state or international organization. The acknowledged absence of a single European demos means that direct democratic leadership is precluded, so the EU has had to fall back on a combination of indirect democratic legitimacy through member-state leaders, non-democratic institutions such as the European Commission, the European Court of Justice, and the European Central Bank, and a European Parliament with limited powers, to which the intergovernmental European Council and Council of Ministers are not accountable. An inability to institutionalize a more legitimate and identifiable leadership, which has largely taken for granted the views of their citizens and contented itself with symbolic manifestations of European identity—a flag, an anthem, a passport—has meant that while the integration process has nominally moved from a Common Market to an Economic Community and then a Union, it has in practice seemed to be shifting in the opposite direction. It has been reversing from a would-be union of peoples, via an actual union of states, into a minimal union of markets. Enlargement has accentuated an attenuated sense of community, resulting in marketization by default. While pleasing some, this retrogression has spread an impression of political leaders unwilling or unable to provide the impetus necessary to meet the competitive challenges in an innovative rather than inertial fashion. In 1968 Ralf Dahrendorf (1968: 268; cf. 269, 275–7) referred to the ‘cartel of elites’ types of leadership as being anxious, defensive and rigid, ‘designed to reduce risk and maintain the status quo’. Is this the fate of a European Union that seems to fit the confederal consociational model? The European Economic Community extension of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) into a Common Market was initiated by leaders of the three small states of the Benelux Customs Union in 1955, following the precedent of the nineteenth-century German Zollverein. However, unlike the predecessor economic confederation, it was not preceded by political confederation and succeeded by political unification. Determined to reaffirm their sovereignty, the six signatories of the Rome Treaty combined retention of a fragile intergovernmental balance of power with structures that could be
4
Introduction
adapted to a process of voluntary integration if acceptable to the member states. To avoid hegemony, it was a ‘contract between equals to act henceforth as one’, initially for explicitly limited purposes (Forsyth 1981: ch. 16; cf. chs. 1, 7, and Conclusion). The Treaty accepted implicitly that, not forming a democratic political community, majority decision could not operate. Adopted ‘top down’ by leaders, not based on a ‘bottom-up’ emotional unityin-diversity, their federalist inclinations had to be restrained with the resulting potentially confusing institutionalized confederal compromise only permitting further integration if this became practicable. Against de Gaulle’s ambitious view that European political unity should have priority, Jean Monnet justified prudently beginning with the ECSC. ‘We believe in starting with limited achievements, establishing de facto solidarity, from which a federation would gradually emerge. I have never believed that one fine day Europe would be created by some great political mutation and I thought it wrong to consult the peoples of Europe about the structure of a Community of which they had no practical experience’ (Monnet 1976: 367; cf. 285–6). After the French (and Dutch) had over fifty years’ experience, they voted down a proposed European constitutional treaty in 2005 that combined a consolidation and mutation that proved too indigestible for the mass public, despite desperate elite attempts at persuasion. To secure unanimity, elite conflict resolution had to be secured by extrademocratic reciprocal accommodation, the mutual concessions process being protected from publicity until agreement was reached. Presented with a fait accompli, the parliamentary representatives and the people more generally might not accept the concessions negotiated, with a resulting disillusion and alienation from the European enterprise and its functionally surreptitious practices. This is particularly likely because ‘consociationalism highlights the politics of the relationship between the leaders and the led, and the way in which the interests may depart from those of the latter in the process’ (Taylor 1990: 176; cf. Chryssochoou 2000: 179–80, 184–94). Quite apart from sometimes exacerbating rather than harmonizing conflicts of national interest, with consociational elitism a sense of ‘community is more likely to emerge despite than because of the intentions of leaders’ (Taylor 1990: 182; cf. Taylor 1996: 79–97). So, while consociational practices impart a dynamic corrective to confederation’s static legalism, they have made it more difficult to transform ‘a system of democratic governments into a democratic system of government’ (Chryssochoou 2000: 14; cf. 4, 15–17). The result may be not merely intergovernmental dissensus but dissociation between the European demoi. The stillborn proposed constitutional treaty underlined the confederal character of the EU through its article 60 formally specifying the right of member states to secede.
Introduction
5
Direct democracy’s 2005 national backlash against consociational elitism reminds us of the need to recall, as Giovanni Sartori did in The Theory of Democracy Revisited,1 why leadership is especially indispensable in democracies that are allergic to overt inegalitarianism. He successively quotes James Bryce: ‘Perhaps no form of government needs great leaders so much as democracy does’; Salvador de Madariaga, ‘Despite appearances, liberal democracies are dependent on leadership even more so perhaps than other, more authoritarian forms of government; for . . . their natural tendency to weaken the springs of political authority must be counterbalanced by a higher level of . . . authority on the part of their leaders’; A. D. Lindsay, ‘If democracy is to survive it will have to employ and use every bit of skill and knowledge and leadership it can get hold of. This complicated interdependent world in which we are living cannot be run without knowledge and skill, foresight and leadership.’ These remarks dating respectively from 1888, 1936, and 1940 take on even greater significance in the contemporary context of the European consociational confederation. The European misrepresentative leaders who substituted their own preferences for those they purported to represent had placed their independent responsibilities for too long above their need to be responsive to those they could not persuade and in 2005 their pretensions were rudely exposed. Public confidence in the working of European Union institutions has fluctuated in part with perceptions of their economic performance, but there has been secular decline in the links between leaders and led. This was because ‘Heads of Government and national ministers committed themselves to grandiose objectives without explaining the awkward implications to their domestic publics.’ Confidential, complex decisions taken in a confederation of committees was coupled with ‘the conspiracy among officials and ministers to say one thing to each other and another to their national publics (which became) so close to second nature that the problem of public consent was taken for granted’ (Wallace 1996: 247). The select, self-conscious insider agents of change pursued integration by stealth, facing the many ill-informed outsiders with repeated faits accomplis. ‘What was sought was not enthusiastic public involvement in the steps by which the content of the common European interest was defined. All that was required was public support and acquiescence after the event’ (Hayward 1996: 283; cf. 252). European election and opinion surveys indicate that ‘voters are consistently, and considerably, more sceptical about integration policies than their representatives’, reflecting a ‘structural conservatism’ that is significant because ‘voters views have a greater impact on elite orientations than vice versa’ (Schmitt and Thomassen 2000: 322, 333; see also Schmitt and Thomassen 1999). Because the participative direct democratic ideal requires that in some
6
Introduction
sense there is ‘government by the people’ and liberal democratic representative reality has operated at a great distance from them, the legitimacy of leadership is exposed to dubiety. When, alerted by the populist media, public suspicions are aroused, the political and administrative Eurocratic elites are disposed to retreat into ‘leading from behind or leaderless drift’ (Hayward 1996: 256; see also Chapter 1, below). The cost of consensus may be inertia supplemented as expedient by improvisation.
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT Faced after the Second World War by a domineering (US) friend and a menacing (Soviet) enemy, six West European countries tentatively ventured, initially, into cautiously limited economic integration. To avoid confronting controversial questions of principle, the founders deliberately took refuge in imprecise/flexible stipulations of the boundaries, power, policies, and ultimate purposes of an enterprise that some hoped would eventually become a United States of Europe by stealth. Having embarked on a ‘headlong flight into an unknown future, in order to escape from a fearful present’—Andrew Shonfield’s translation of fuite en avant—the founders sought ‘a modern surrogate for a federation’ in which it was not ‘point of arrival at a final union which it is important, or even possible, to foresee, it is the joint decision to embark on the enterprise and then the experiences along the route that matter’ (Shonfield 1973: 18–19). So, no limit was placed on the ‘European’ states that could be included as members. No restriction was imposed upon the policies that might be dealt with collectively rather than separately. No specification was made of what elements of national sovereignty would be shared. Visionary elite aspirations were concealed by a circumspect pragmatism from peoples judged unready or unable to understand the imaginative necessity to transcend their parochial nationalisms, so recently exacerbated by a war that had harshly exposed their destructive proclivities. Before considering what has been accepted as the Community method of European integration, it is necessary to see how this ingenious approach does not fit with either of the contrasting methods of decision-making that I dubbed thirty years ago ‘humdrum and heroic’, although it shares some features with both of them. Following on Charles Lindblom’s concept of ‘muddling through’, the humdrum style does not have an explicit, overriding, long-term objective and action is incremental, departing only slightly from existing policies as circumstances require. Humdrum decisions ‘are arrived at by a continuous process of mutual adjustment between a plurality of
Introduction
7
autonomous policy-makers operating in the context of a highly fragmented multiple flow of influence’ (Hayward 1975: 4. See also Lindblom 1959: 80–6). The heroic decision-making style sets explicit long-term objectives to be pursued by maximum coordination of public policies and by an ambitious assertion of political will. It was sceptically observed of the heroic style that it is ‘a most difficult activity with limited probability of clear-cut success and high probability of starkly visible failures at best’.2 In practice, ‘under the guise of reducing uncertainty there is a plenty of scope for wishful thinking and public deception’ (Hayward 1975: 5). The history of European integration offers many examples of both decision-making styles in operation. Adept at disguising heroic purposes by incremental innovation, the acknowledged father of European integration, Jean Monnet, after a long career in using his entrepreneurial skills in promoting disinterested international causes, launched French planning with American aid during 1946–50 before heading the ECSC that set the initial pattern that has endured despite drastic modifications. His experience in promoting international cooperation between sovereign governments in foreign economic policy led him to combine the implicit pursuit of heroic long-term integrationist objectives by humdrum incrementalist means. Monnet’s method of engrenage has been described by George Ross as ‘an “action trap” in which agents once set on a specific course of action, find themselves obliged to take a set of further and much broader actions that point them in a direction in which they did not necessarily intend initially to go’ (Ross 1995: 254; cf. 137). As used by Monnet and those who emulated him, it was ‘a way of being federalist without making too many people frightened about it’ (ibid. 21),3 just as within France he had successfully promoted concerted medium-term planning by people who were often wanting either to impose or oppose it and generally did not comprehend what he was doing. Although he shared Monnet’s purposes, Shonfield percipiently warned against ‘the excessive reliance of the tacticians of the European Community on the blackmail principle of international politics: you manipulate your innocent partners into a position which is more compromising than they had imagined, in the hope that they will then find that they can’t afford to opt out’ (Shonfield 1973: 90). The resentment that the engrenage action trap caused over the years has resulted in a distrust of surreptitious integration by manipulation of some would-be leaders by others acting as conspirators in the European interest. What it has ensured is that some latecomer governments— notably Britain, Denmark, and Sweden—have occasionally decided that they can afford to opt out of specific activities, while even in the heartland of the original six—as demonstrated in the 2005 referendum results in France and the Netherlands—mass publics have shown their revulsion from what
8
Introduction
was perceived as ‘headlong flight into an unknown future’ symbolized by the proposed constitutional treaty for an ever-expanding Union. Only one president of the European Commission, Jacques Delors, was to implement fully the Monnet method, in his capacity for behind-the-scenes manipulation of both his colleagues and more importantly the heads of member governments. Having spent much of the 1960s in the Monnet-created French General Planning Commissariat, Delors was also, like his exemplar, an institutional outsider who became a consummate insider. Monnet not only knew where decisions were made; he intimately knew the few who made them. As the capacity to decide was usually dispersed, only someone who could be trusted by a network of influential friends could play the crucial role of unobtrusive coordinator and de facto leader from behind the scenes. Because both Monnet and Delors found party politics repellent, they preferred to persuade those who could secure subsequent democratic endorsement as representatives of their peoples when this was required and unavoidable. Their gift was to carry conviction with the few who counted, leaving them to persuade the public. Perhaps out of despair at the unwillingness of many European leaders to discharge this duty, Delors increasingly came out into the open, assuming an overtly political role that inhibited his ability to provide the politicians with the policies for which they wished to take the credit without the associated criticisms. Unwilling to the play the role of a conventional political leader, Delors was condemned to the frustration of watching the heads of member governments warily refusing to fall into the beneficent action trap he had set for them. Particularly since its enlargement to twenty-seven member states, from January 2007 the EU clearly has an excess of entrenched ‘veto players’ as described by George Tsebelis, i.e. ‘collective actors whose agreement is necessary for a change in the status quo’.4 He explains that the potential for policy change declines as the number of veto players, the dissimilarities in their policy standpoints, and their internal cohesion increase. This means that the dynamic Commission-led action trap has reversed into a veto-encumbered joint-decision trap and inability to adapt in more than incremental ways to changing circumstances. Because Commission and European Court of Justice interventionism has been curbed, substitutes for member-state leadership are stifled. The EU’s inability—spectacularly in the case of the constitutional treaty proposals in 2005—to secure popular ratification of the agreements reached in the Convention and by the member governments, is eloquent testimony to the difficulty of overcoming the paralysing propensities of a polarized institutional structure, diverging policy preferences, and dissensions within member states, especially but not only when decisions have to be unanimous. The operation of the qualified majority veto within the various configurations
Introduction
9
of the Council of Ministers maintain a significant constraint on collective action. The additional veto players introduced by the referendum in some member states proved fatal to ratification. Faced by the need to take unpopular decisions, the failure of democratic ‘leaders’ to show leadership qualities in an interdependent transnational context results in the transfer of their personal discredit to the collective enterprise of European integration. A public opinion that until recently seemed even more uninterested than uninformed, disoriented when not apathetic, cannot be mobilized for ambitious purposes by methods that have been only episodically successful in the past, even though the original impetus has been perpetuated, paradoxically, by inertia rather than positive support in the absence of either sufficient galvanizing fear or hope. The surreptitiously heroic, inspiring, visionary style has relapsed into humdrum, unimaginative routine and demobilizing quietism, concentrating on day-to-day crisis management. Transactional, inconclusive problem-identifying has come to predominate over transformative, pragmatic problem-solving, resulting all too often in defeatist indecision because of the absence of the capacity to overcome the cumbersome administration of things by the collective government of the Union through a combination of collusion, impulsion, and persuasion.5 The alternative is to surrender to inhibition and eke out a precarious handto-mouth existence in the hope that unforeseen events will precipitate changes on which the complex of ‘leaders’ is otherwise unable to agree. As the potential outcome becomes clearer, failure of nerve threatens to paralyse those faced with the opportunities that doubtless will arise even when they do not need to create them. With many hands on the wheel, steering through the transnational rapids is a perilous exercise. Experience has shown it is not impossible but needs sometimes to be rather more riskily heroic and rather less cautiously humdrum if stasis or, worse still, disintegration is not to be the European Union’s fate. In the EU context, the current preference for using the looser appellation ‘governance’ instead of the precise term ‘government’, reflects an implicit acceptance of the absence of effective institutionalized leadership. Deploring its practical consequences without creating its preconditions constitutes a wilful refusal to face distasteful facts. The result is resignation to becoming the object of forces the EU is incapable of controlling because it has not achieved self-mastery. At the least, member governments should not evade the leadership function of persuading their peoples before committing them to changes for which they are unready, however frustrating the resulting slower pace of urgent adaptations may be. Meanwhile, we should eschew both elite wishful thinking and public deception. The time for action traps is over. We must indefinitely get used to living uneasily with leaderlessness.
10
Introduction
As a corrective to a depressing defeatism caused by the inability to fulfil excessive expectations, the prevailing view that confederalism had become obsolete was challenged by Daniel Elazar because the USA’s rapid replacement of confederation by federation has not been the model followed in European integration, which had its own logic and momentum. ‘The European Community developed as a new style of confederation in a new way’ (Elazar 2001: 37). It had ‘deliberately rejected the large ends of federation and sought the more limited linkages of confederation . . . This has been achieved not as a way station on the road to a United States of Europe but to reach a more confederal end’ (ibid. 49). He asked whether and on what conditions confederal tension between limited integration and residual sovereignty could be sustained long term, but did not answer his own question. I do not believe anyone else can. However, he did conclude: ‘Today it may be said that the European Union is essentially complete as a confederation although its member states and peoples do not necessarily share a sense of the completeness’ (ibid. 38–9). While this may be unfortunate, it has long since wisely been pointed out by a historian that ‘political confederations are not religious communities . . . reciprocal advantage, not sentiment, must be their basis if they are intended to endure. None but a cynic would despise sentiment; none but a fool would build on it’ (Smith 1863: 35).
NOTES 1. Sartori (1987: i. 163–4), quoting James Bryce, The American Commonwealth (1888; 1959 edn. 432); Salvador de Madariaga (1936: 56), and Lindsay (1943: 261). On consociational democracy, see Sartori 1887: 238–40. The Netherlands, the home of national consociationalism as described by Lijphart (1968), was one of the two countries that decisively rejected the European constitutional treaty in 2005. 2. Y. Dror, ‘Comprehensive Planning: common fallacies verses preferred features’, in F. van Schlagen (1967: 98). ‘Routine authority is legitimate because of what it is, the heroic leader is legitimate because of what he does’ (Hoffmann 1974: 86). 3. The ‘action trap’ is more precisely focused and is a positive not a negative trap, so it is not to be confused with the related but distinct ‘interdependence trap’ (Taylor 1980: 375; cf. 374–6) and ‘joint-decision trap’ (Scharpf 1988: 242, 265, 271). The Taylor and Scharpf traps concern resistance to integration, whereas the Ross trap specifically designates an ongoing impetus towards increased integration. 4. Tsebelis (2002: 19; cf. ch. 11). See also George Tsebelis, ‘Veto Players and Law Production’, in Döring and Hallerberg (2004: 170, 198–200). Others have referred to ‘institutional veto points’. For example, see Haverland (2000: 85).
Introduction
11
5. The distinction between transactional and transforming leadership comes from McGregor Burns (1978).
REFERENCES C, D. N. (2000) Democracy in the European Union. London: I.B. Tauris. D, R. (1968) Society and Democracy in Germany. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. D, H., and H, M. (eds.) (2004) Patterns of Parliamentary Behaviour. Aldershot: Ashgate. E, D. (2001) ‘The United States and the European Union: Models for their Epochs’, in K. Nicolaidis and R. Howse (eds), The Federal Vision. Legitimacy and Levels of Governance in the United States and European Union, Oxford: Oxford University Press. E, M. (1981) Unions of States, The Theory and Practice of Confederation. Leicester: Leicester University Press. H, M. (2000) ‘National Adaptation to European Integration: The Importance of Institutional Veto Points’, Journal of Public Policy 20/1: 83–103. H, J. (1975) ‘Change and choice: the agenda of planning’, in J. Hayward and M. Watson (eds.), Planning, Politics and Public Policy. The British, French and Italian Experience. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (1996) ‘Has European Unification by Stealth a Future?’, in J. Hayward (ed.), Elitism, Populism and European Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. L, A. (1968) The Politics of Accommodation, Pluralism and Democracy in the Netherlands. Berkeley: University of California Press. L, C. E. (1959) ‘The Science of “Muddling Through” ’, Public Administration Review, 19 (spring). MG B, J. (1978) Leadership. New York: Harper & Row. M, J. (1976; Eng. edn. 1978) Memoirs. London: Collins. R, J.-E. (2003) Anti-Americanism. San Francisco: Encounter. R, G. (1995) Jacques Delors and European Integration. Cambridge: Polity. S, G. (1987) The Theory of Democracy Revisited. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House. S, F. W. (1988) ‘The Joint-Decision Trap. Lessons from German Federalism and European Integration’, Public Administration 46. S, F. (ed.) (1967) Essays in Honour of Professor J. P. Thijsse. S, H. and T, J. J. A. (1999) Political Representation and Legitimacy in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (2000) ‘Dynamic Representation. The Case of European Integration’, European Union Politics 1/3 (October). S, A. (1973) Europe. Journey to an Unknown Destination. London: Allen Lane. S, G (1863) Empire. Oxford: Henry & Parker.
12
Introduction
T, P. (1980) ‘Interdependence and Autonomy in the European Communities: The Case of the European Monetary System’, Journal of Common Market Studies 18. (1990) ‘Consociationalism and Federalism as Approaches to International Integration’, in A. J. R. Groom and P. Taylor (eds.), Frameworks for International Cooperation. London: Pinter. (1996) The European Union in the 1990s. Oxford: Oxford University Press. T, G. (2002) Veto Players: How Political Institutions Work. Princeton: Princeton University Press. W, W. (1996) ‘Has Government by Committee lost the public’s confidence’, in Hayward (ed.), Elitism, Populism and European Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Part I Who Led Europe?
This page intentionally left blank
1 Strategic Innovation by Insider Influence: Monnet to Delors Jack Hayward
There is no lack of EU leaders; what is lacking is EU leadership. The impact of individual personality and leader discretionary power have become increasingly curbed by contextual and institutional constraints. As the complexity of organization has increased, piecemeal changes being superimposed after laborious compromises, the EC Commission—initially programmed to be the pathfinder for ever-closer integretation—has struggled to coordinate its heterogeneous activities and retreated from its role as comprehensive maximal policy proposer to minimal consensus mediator and manager of specific projects. Why and how did the Commission, as the successor of Monnet’s ECSC High Authority, lose its pivotal position as the institutional embodiment of disinterested, supranational foresight as officials and ministers of member governments (through comitology, COREPER, Council of Ministers, and European Council) increasingly seized the initiative? Use of this reassertion of member-state command and control to make portentous declarations and interfere in detailed administration has resulted in a crucial discontinuity between the high politics proposals for change and the low politics implementation of change. The Commission, personified by an authoritative president or enterprising commissioner, could formulate practically applicable initiatives and deploy the skills necessary to persuade the member governments to agree to adopt them collectively and implement them individually. The states did so with varying degrees of enthusiasm and reluctance but once the impetus was imparted a process of change was launched that might take years to be fully realized but had a momentum capable of mobilizing in its support the very forces of inertia that might be expected to paralyse it. Hoping to postpone controversial issues of political principle indefinitely, the founders—the political leaders Adenauer, de Gasperi, Luns, Schuman, and Spaak, as well as their mastermind Monnet—deliberately left implicit the national implications of the pooling of member-state sovereignty. By 1965 de
16
Who Led Europe?
Gaulle had forced too far into the open the unspoken question of how far the EC could go and it became possible for perspicacious academic analysis to pinpoint the predicament that the ‘community method’ had sought to sidestep. Haas had already in 1958 theorized the supranational process of creeping integration by successive sectoral spillover, but in doing so had let the cat out of the bag (Haas 1958: 29). Monnet’s momentous 1950s achievements were the result of inconspicuous crafting of a collusion between the key national statesmen. Although the Commission would not have the full measure of independence from national governments enjoyed by his brainchild, the ECSC High Authority, it would secure their acquiescence to the gradual takeover of their formal decision-making powers. A Council of Ministers and representative assembly—initially omitted—were to be relied upon to mobilize public support for the progressive process of European integration. As David Coombes (1970: 26; cf. 20) pointed out, the pace and ‘the nature of the final union are left mainly to the member states themselves to determine’ and integration was abruptly hampered by de Gaulle’s insistence that the member governments could veto whatever changes they regarded as very important matters to them. Coombes (ibid. 234; cf. 236–8) pointed out the inbuilt tension between the Commission’s mediative function between member governments and the Monnet prescription that ‘it must behave as if it constituted the political leadership of the Community, acting as an initiating, goal-setting body’. Furthermore needing to secure advance intergovernmental cooperation, it could only lead from behind the scenes. Lacking democratic legitimacy, the Commission was not in a good position to secure public support for a overt and explicit leadership role. Its initiatives were therefore at the mercy of governments, whose priorities were national and short-term rather than communitarian and long-term. Unlike Haas, Coombes therefore sounded a cautionary note in assessing the more ambitious prospects of European integration and the capacity to overcome its circumlocutory procedures, especially as it extended its role and its boundaries. He pertinently posed the ‘far-reaching question which is whether in the long run “the Community Method” represents an effective means towards political union at all in view of the vital role of political leadership in protecting national sovereignty and interests’ (ibid. 38; cf. 33–7, 76). Without the overriding menace of an external threat, such as the Soviet Union, or insidious dependence upon a patronizing USA, could European integration escape the leaderless fate of degenerating into an unattractive, uncoordinated, spasmodically animate body listlessly drifting downstream? The mind-arresting complexity to which Giandomenico Majone has appropriately applied the ancient appellation of ‘mixed government’, as embodied
Strategic Innovation: Monnet to Delors
17
in the 1957 Rome Treaty and its successors, is due to the enduring desire to maintain a shifting institutional balance based upon mutual agreement rather than monolithic sovereignty, as well as the EU’s institutional immaturity. Member states wish to share sovereignty in some matters and retain it in others, resulting in an improvised overlapping of functions and powers which can achieve admirably flexible outcomes when consensus has been secured by an exchange of concessions or stalemate when agreement is not obtained. The Community Method’s rejection of both representative democracy and the clear separation of powers has, through a sequence of expedient solutions, led to a confusion of powers without the underpinning of democratic legitimacy (Majone 2005: 46–51).1 Having been accorded a monopoly of legislative initiative and policy agenda setting, the Commission has found its privileged position increasingly challenged by its co-executives, the Council of Ministers and European Council, by the ex-consultative and now co-legislative European Parliament, and by the European Court of Justice, all occasional allies and nevertheless contenders for power within the mixed system of government. The centre is everywhere and circumference nowhere, so leadership of a government based on a parliamentary majority cannot be attained by partisan competition. Majone (ibid. 48; cf. his ch. 3) concludes that ‘Being difficult to reform and impossible, at least for the time being, to abandon completely, the community method is increasingly circumvented’. A mixed polity may be a proto-state in the making but meanwhile it starkly reflects the unintegrated nature of European public opinion, mass media, political parties, and political executives, despite the transnational convergence of many jurists, civil servants, and lobbyists that have exemplified the patchy development of informal shared outlooks and practices. In identifying the lost sources of European leadership as exemplified by Monnet and particularly Delors, we shall be touching on the successful making of the 1986 Single European Act and the aftermath of the failure of the promising 1993 White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness, and Employment. ‘With its firm commitment to the completion of the internal market, substantial increase of community competences, extension of majority voting, and the first significant enhancement of the powers of the EP, the SEA represents the zenith of the Community method. After this high point, decline sets in; most important policy and institutional developments . . . take place, in whole or in part, outside the rigid framework of the classic community method.’ To assess Majone’s conclusion that (as Monnet feared) the institutional rearrangements between the Paris and Rome Treaties involved a major ‘change from a prefederal to a confederal tendency; with the EU as “the paradigm of a postmodern confederation”, we need to ascertain whether its various ambiguities,
18
Who Led Europe?
pitfalls, and outright failures . . . are largely due . . . to underhand efforts to steer in the direction of full political union’ against popular hostility (ibid. 51, 221, 220; see also Hayward 1996: 252–7).
THE LIMITS OF INSIDER STRATEGIC INNOVATION Member governments are the democratically legitimate sources of EU leadership. France has usually been credited with leading European integration in association with Germany but it also blocked it in 1954 (rejection of the European Defence Community and European Political Community), paralysed it in 1965 (the de Gaulle boycott), and torpedoed the proposed European constitutional treaty by referendum in 2005. So, it is not surprising that a spectacular example of French fratricidal hostility, between Monnet and de Gaulle, should have played so important a part in the reorientation of the European integration process. Briefly associated in June 1940 in the desperate attempt to prevent French surrender by establishing an Anglo-French Union, in Algiers in 1943 and again in 1945 when de Gaulle accepted Monnet’s institutional proposals for national economic planning, for most of the intervening period, and subsequently, they were at daggers drawn, de Gaulle contemptuously condemning Monnet’s acceptance (to serve his national regeneration purposes) of US domination and his reliance upon the equally deferential Fourth Republic politicians (to assist him in his European federalist ambitions). They were both visionaries but their visions were diametrically opposed: nationalism against internationalism, state realism verses supranationalist idealism. They were both pragmatists about means but in the service of intransigent ends. British accession, which de Gaulle twice refused in order to preserve French dominance, followed by that of others, reinforced both intergovernmentalism and the deregulatory liberal economic policy enshrined in the Rome Treaty. It took the ingenious Delors to use completion of the latter policy in the Single European Act as a lever for provisionally reversing the weakening of the Commission and strengthening the position of its president. In contrast to the more politically selfless Monnet, Delors was unable to resist the temptation to exert not merely stealthy but direct public leadership on a par with heads of member governments, despite lacking their democratic legitimacy. His own legitimacy derived from the national think-tank planning of Europe’s future by diagnosis, prognosis, and practical proposals for implementation, content to persuade the elites to whom he left the task of using their power of decision in the hope that they could carry public
Strategic Innovation: Monnet to Delors
19
opinion with them. Not content simply to exert indirect influence rather than power, aspects of which his religious moralism made repugnant to him, his mission to manage European interdependence and reliance upon cultivating socio-economic organizations, the ‘social partners’ of French parlance, misled him into sometimes acting as ‘the leader of a semi-imaginary European polity’ (Drake 2000: 11; cf. 26–9).2 At the pivot of European Community bureaucratic and political action, Delors did not know how far to go in disturbing the balance between national guidance and policy leadership. His persistent application of the Monnet method he had learnt in the Planning Commissariat did not suffice in the mixed-government European Community context. Lacking an undivided political authority on which he could call, Delors felt compelled, in his speech to the inaugural session of the September 1985 IGC, to warn that ‘in 30 or 40 years Europe will constitute a UPO—a sort of unidentified political object—unless we weld it into an entity enabling each of our countries to benefit from the European dimension and to prosper internally as well as hold its own externally’ (ibid. 24). Unable to rely on Europe’s political leaders to live up to this challenge, having exhausted the capacity of covert influence to persuade them to be bold, Delors went beyond the strict limits of the Community Method. As a result he ‘acquired a political and politicised persona’ because ‘when member states cannot or will not reach an intergovernmental consensus under their own steam’, the Commission was expected to provide ‘systemic leadership in a regime in which political authority had been deliberately fragmented’ (ibid. 52; cf. 37, 48, 107, 139; and Ross 1995: 232–4). Delors tried partially to retrieve the Commission’s former status, damaged by Hallstein’s defeat by de Gaulle. This reversal was already reflected in the shift from Monnet’s High Authority’s ‘emphasis on formulating the general interest of the Communities to the accommodation of national interests’ in an institutional system structured ‘precisely and deliberately to inhibit scope for personalised leadership’ (ibid. 61, 71; cf. 63–6). This was achieved in the period 1966–84 when a succession of Commission presidents were sidelined by member governments. The Commission was confined to seeking consensus, while in the Council of Ministers ‘the competition of national interests became more overt’ but it was too indecisive to resolve EC conflicts, subsiding into inertia (Bulmer and Wessels 1987: 19; cf. 17–25; and Cini 1996: 52–68). In 1969 President Pompidou floated the idea of institutionalized summit meetings but especially prior to British EC entry ‘For smaller states summitry was viewed as a potential framework for French domination’ (Bulmer and Wessels 1987: 37; cf. 30–6). With the limited exceptions of Roy Jenkins and industrial commissioner Étienne Davignon, it was left to the Giscard-Schmidt 1974 creation of the European Council episodically to impart an impetus to
20
Who Led Europe?
a European Community that a cowed and introvert Commission had allowed to drift. It provided an informal opportunity to shape the EC agenda that the Commission was unable to undertake; it negotiated package deals and acted as court of appeal. Apart from the 1978 launch of the European Monetary System, the European Council concentrated on muddling along and crisis management, all too frequently entering into ‘agreements whose implementation they cannot ensure’ (ibid. 100; cf. 110–11, 134–43). Into this space came the new Commission president in 1985, determined to secure member-government acquiescence by ‘tactical systematic wooing of the European Council as the prime site for meaningful intergovernmental compromises’ (Drake 2000: 83; cf. 97) as well as cultivating the European Parliament of which he had been a brief but influential member. Faced by an unconcerned public, Delors was disposed to follow member governments in letting sleeping peoples doze and hope that there would never be a rude awakening, democratic deficit notwithstanding. The failure of the Chaban-Delmas Government (1969–72) New Society programme, of which Delors was largely the architect, led him to seek to transpose to the European level a social model that had not taken on in France and was to be opposed for its economic liberalization component by the French, whereas this was overemphasized by the British. Delors knew that he could get the Thatcher Government’s agreement to his White Paper on completing the internal market only if he relied on practical market measures that Commissioner Cockfield prepared. However, his ‘European model of society . . . would involve economic liberalisation, but this liberalising process would be tempered by European-level regulation, redistribution and common policies’ (Cini 1996: 77; cf. 74). Marketization was necessary to create the wealth but insufficient to promote the social cohesion that was its indispensable counterpart if what the Fourth French Plan (in whose content he played a part) had called ‘a less partial idea of man’ was to be attained. Delors’ confidence that the solidaristic improvement of the lot of working people and poorer member societies would be a by-product of the economic growth fuelled by market reforms was to prove too optimistic despite his best efforts. The Single European Act was very much an intense in-house Commission product and more particularly of Delors’s cabinet, especially François Lamoureux. ‘1992’ was the public relations self-fulfilling prophecy by which all internal barriers were to be dismantled. It proved not to be a false prophecy; by 1992 ’95 percent of the working party’s 282 proposals were adopted of which 77 percent had come into effect’ (Drake 2000: 104). Delors also succeeded in 1987–8 in redistributary use of the EU budget to double structural
Strategic Innovation: Monnet to Delors
21
funds for countries such as Ireland and Spain (then regarded as less able to benefit from SEA increased competition) and in persuading Chancellor Kohl that Germany should foot the bill. This was part of what was known as the Delors package I and was forced through in part by threats of resignation, a whitemail technique he had used with less effect as French finance minister but which he again used successfully in 1990 when the European Parliament blocked a third of the SEA’s provisions (Grant 1994: 77–9; Delors 2004: 242– 6; Drake 2000: 104, 111 n.). The mid to late 1980s witnessed ‘Delors acting simultaneously as consensus-builder, policy initiator and policy player in his own right and on behalf of the institution he headed’ (Cini 1996: 81; cf. Ludlow 1991: 116–21). This anti-stagnation success was not to endure. By 1991, informed doubts were being expressed about the sustainability and durability of the dynamic leadership that Delors had imparted to the European Commission. His assertive, presidential style involved political exposure that threatened the impersonal, consensus style of nation governments’ decisionmaking, whose leaders did not like having their hands forced. His successor Jacques Santer did not merely mark a retreat from Delors to the weak standing of his fellow Luxemburger Gaston Thorn (Delors’s predecessor), but suffered the ignominy of being dismissed from his position in 1999 by the European Parliament, resulting in the resignation of the full College of Commissioners. In his memoirs, Delors retrospectively acknowledged that despite incorporating a version of his 1988 Social Charter into its Social Chapter, his failure more generally to influence the Maastricht Treaty of European Union, even more than the failure to secure acceptance of the full practical implications of increasing European and international interdependence, was the demise of the ‘soft enlightened despotism’ through the ‘engrenage dynamic’ based upon ‘short-circuiting resistance to integration’ without ensuring popular consent in advance (Delors 2004: 406; cf. 457).3 His post-1985 ‘social dialogue’ had been an inadequate substitute for elusive mass public participation, but he sought in his valedictory 1993 White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness, and Employment once again to seize the initiative by focusing on the public’s main preoccupation: the stubborn persistence of mass unemployment. Less precise a plan of action, more an attempt to launch a debate in the absence of member-government consensus, switching the 1985–6 emphasis on competitiveness to promoting cooperative solidarity, Delors was able once again to persuade the European Council to ask him to prepare this White Paper. However, the finance ministers refused to countenance the loan that was a major part of covering the cost of the ambitious infrastructure programme, with the result that the imaginative revival of the EU to avoid the prospect of collective economic decline and public disenchantment was frustrated.
22
Who Led Europe?
When the heads of the member governments refused to overrule their finance ministers, Delors ironically remarked that ‘perhaps the heroes were exhausted’ (ibid. 427; cf. 418–26, 471; Drake 2000: 120–6, 129–38; Endo 1999: ch. 10). What had been accepted in declaratory principle was not implemented in practice. His successor as Commission president, Jacques Santer, was deliberately selected because he personified Jacques Delors’s antithesis and ‘the end of the style of Commission leadership which he so successfully embodied’, that of the strategically manipulative European social engineer (Drake 1995: 157; cf. Drake 2000: 153 and Chapter 6, below).4
AFTER DELORS The Delors presidency was the last hurrah of the Monnet Community Method of inconspicuous, incremental integration which had become too conspicuous for democratic comfort because some of the increments had proliferating implications that were experienced as too abrupt. Even before Delors’s replacement by Santer the former’s triumphalist speech on 6 June 1988 to the European Parliament provocatively predicting that within ten years 80 per cent of economic legislation and possibly tax and social legislation would emanate from the EU, was no longer in season; still less his hope two weeks later that a strengthened Commission would prepare the way towards a European Government (Delors 1988). Increased European Council activism relegated the Commission to a secondary role, while the Council’s March 2000 Lisbon meeting rejected the Community closed coordination method of binding agreements, with its legal and regulatory emphasis, in favour of the ‘open method of coordination’, setting loose guidelines and performance indicators, periodic monitoring and evaluation, mimicking benchmarking private sector practice. Because open coordination relies on informal goodwill, it arouses scepticism that the European Council, having failed to agree on policy priorities, has resorted to rhetoric to masquerade non-commitment and hopes that soft, sectoral coordination between experts in loose networks rather than a tight policy community, will suffice. But the EC is too politicized, spasmodic, and inexpert to coordinate them, so a role remains for the Commission, despite the fact that it is too understaffed to be fully efficient. Even though the Commission is infiltrated by member-government influence, it is excessive to assert that henceforth the Commission’s ‘agenda-setting
Strategic Innovation: Monnet to Delors
23
and policy leadership functions are redundant, since the European Council sets strategic priorities, monitors progress and coordinates’ (Kassim and Menon 2004, 95; cf. 91; Dehousse 2004: ch. 9; European Communities, Wim Kok Report, Nov. 2004). If so, nevertheless, the Prodi Commission vainly pleaded in a White Paper on European Governance in favour of ‘a renewed Community method as the model for the future’ (Commission 428, COM 2001: 34; cf. 4, 8). However, the European Council has continued to spend ‘much of its time embroiled in resolving internal EC disputes’ and the Council of Ministers has been reactive and ineffective in policy coordination because ‘even the heads of government refrain from conflict resolution’ (Bulmer and Wessels 1987: 2, 95; see also Hayes-Renshaw and Wallace 1997; and Wallace 2002: 327–41).5 Intergovernmentalism’s record has shown it to be an unwieldy way of achieving collective action and not a substitute for the Commission in pursuing this purpose. Delors having relied on his cabinet and the increased number of nationally oriented commissioners having compounded the problems of coordination, the Commission has subsided into piecemeal project manager. The previous analysis and subsequent events seem to sustain Majone’s severe verdict quoted earlier, so what do we make of the remedy he propounds? He argues that the Commission’s agenda monopoly has always been overrated because ‘autonomous initiatives amount to only 10 percent of all the Commission’s legislative proposals’ and that ‘the risk today is not excessive centralisation of decision-making in the EC/EU, but rather excessive fragmentation . . . and poorly defined responsibilities’ (Majone 2002: 377; cf. 366, and Dehousse 1997: 41–53). Majone contends that the shift from maximum harmonization (as envisaged by article 100 of the Rome Treaty) to minimum interference with national regulatory autonomy by marketlike competition among the rules, leading to bottom-up mutual recognition and the delegation of powers, has resulted in a de facto decentralized governance in which the Commission’s role should be confined to that of a ‘central regulatory clearinghouse’ (Majone 2002: 389; cf. 377–80, and Majone 2003: ch. 17). It has suffered a loss of legitimacy by overextending its functions relative to the resources member governments are willing to accord and should concentrate on its core commitment of negative integration. This is the direction in which things have been moving. For example, the Ecofin finance ministers forced the Commission into non-enforcement of the sanctions of the stability and growth pact adopted by the 1997 Amsterdam European Council, asserting their control of permissive macroeconomic governance. The 2005 controversy over the draft Bolkestein directive, which played a controversial part in the French rejection of the EU constitutional
24
Who Led Europe?
treaty referendum, exemplified the unwillingness to pursue the logic of supranational harmonization, when presented as the unfinished liberal business of the Rome Treaty; what T. H. Green called ‘hindering hindrances to freedom’. Majone (2005, 173; cf. 165) favours reliance on ‘intensive transgovernmentalism’ which involved ‘a decentralised and yet coordinated approach to collective problem-solving . . . policy coordination through mutual adjustment’. This requires a reliance for its credibility on consensual incrementalism, with each step accepted within the network because the commitments made are not threatening, such as was achieved in the gestation of Economic and Monetary Union (Majone 2005: 176–9 and Chapter 2, below). Curiously, this recalls the ‘action trap’ approach of the Community Method, with which Majone contrasts it, although the end result is different: legal certainty in the case of the Community method and market-conforming uncertainty with transgovernmentalism. The constitutional corollary is a European confederation proceeding slowly by political agreement because in the absence of a European demos and what Joseph Weiler has called ‘the affective crisis of European citizenship’, that is as far and as fast liberal democracies can go, so ‘from the political . . . point of view the community is in fact a confederation’ (Weiler 1999: 83; cf. 268–71, and Majone 2005: 209–21). However, ‘[t]he real problem is that no model exists for the kind of sub-federal mega-confederal state towards which Europe is slowing moving’ (Friend 2001: 112). Delors’s formula for the European Union’s destination as a ‘federation of nation states’ conflated the contradiction without resolving it; he compounded the predicament by being incomprehensible to a reticent public inclined to regard shared sovereignty with scepticism. Furthermore, enlargement has weakened a sense of community that diversification in the name of subsidiarity has not allayed. As a result, the mass public is perplexed about what the emerging ‘European model of society’ will mean in practice. Rather than clarifying policy conflicts, by obscuring them ‘the Commission creates the impression that Europe is governed by a consensual political class and deepens the subjective distance between leaders and citizens’ (Magnette 2003: 157; cf. 152–6). As we fasten our seat belts tighter, the peoples of the EU look to their leaders to provide the leadership required by this journey into terra incognita in search of the unidentifiable political objective. The ultimate destination may be uncertain, but in turbulent international, national, and subnational environments, the EU Commission is struggling to attain an interim institutional stability without inertia and within a confederalism that is not too disquietingly postmodern for comfort.
Strategic Innovation: Monnet to Delors
25
NOTES 1. For an excellent summary of the counter-sovereignty tradition of ‘mixed government’ theorizing from Polybius on Sparta and Rome to the English Commonwealth and eighteenth-century British constitutionalism, see Wilfried Nipple, ‘Ancient and Modern Republicanism; “Mixed Constitution” and “Ephors” ’, ch. 1 of Fontana (1994). So there was a Roman Republican pride of ancestry of the Rome Treaty! Note that Polybius emphasized that mixed government explained political stability, not dynamism. For the late medieval and early modern debate about sovereignty versus compound polyarchy, see Julian H. Franklin, ‘Sovereignty and the Mixed Constitution: Bodin and his Critics’, in Burns and Goldie (1991: ch. 10) and Howell A. Lloyd, ‘Constitutionalism’, ibid. 273–9. The eighteenth-century British constitution could be regarded as the best (Blackstone) or worst (Bentham) of all constitutions, but the mixed government— ‘oligo-bureaucratic and indirectly democratic’—is favoured by MacCormick (1997: 347; cf. 345–6) as the designation of the EU. 2. On the Commission’s conception of participation limited to ‘mobilised minorities’, see Magnette (2003: 148; cf. 147–50). 3. It is worth remembering that when Commissioner Ralf Dahrendorf argued in two anonymous articles in Die Zeit (July 1971) that the European Community was too remote from ordinary people there were demands for his resignation; see also Ralf Dahrendorf, ‘Mediocre Elites Elected by Mediocre Peoples’, in Hayward (1996: 1). 4. See also Goodin (1980: 31–3) on how acquiring a reputation for successful manipulation (as Delors did pre-1990) reduces the capacity for future manipulation (Delors after 1990). 5. For a detailed investigation of attempted French Government co-ordination of its EU activities, see Hayward and Wright (2002: ch. 5). More generally see Drake (2005).
REFERENCES B, S., and W, W. (1987) The European Council: Decision-Making in European Politics. Basingstoke: Macmillan. B, J. H., and G, M. (1991) The Cambridge History of Political Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. C, M. (1996) The European Commission. Leadership, Organization and Culture in the European Union Administration. Manchester: Manchester University Press. C E C (25 July 2001), 428. White Paper on European Governance. C, D (1970) Politics and Bureaucracy in the European Community: A Portrait of the Commission of the EEC. London: Allen & Unwin.
26
Who Led Europe?
D, R (1997) ‘European Integration and the Nation-State’, in M. Rhodes et al. (eds.), Developments in West European Politics. Basingstoke: Macmillan. (2004) ‘La Méthode ouverte de coordination’, in P. Lascoumes and P. Le Galès (eds.), Journal of European Public Policy 11/2: ch. 9. D, J (1988) Interview in Le Monde, 20 July. (2004) Mémoires. Paris: Plon. D, H (1995) ‘Political Leadership and European Integration: The Case of Jacques Delors’, West European Politics, 18/I (January). (2000) Jacques Delors: Perspectives on a European Leader. London: Routledge. (ed.) (2005) French Relations with the European Union. London: Routledge. E, K. (1999) The Presidency of the European Commission under Jacques Delors. The Politics of Shared Leadership. Basingstoke: Macmillan. E C (2004) Facing the Challenge: The Lisbon Strategy for Growth and Employment. Report from the High Level Group by Wim Kok (November). F, B. (1994) The Invention of the Modern Republic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. F, J W. (2001) Unequal Partners. French–German Relations, 1989–2000. New York: Praeger. G, R. (1980) Manipulatory Politics. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press. G, C (1994) Delors. Inside the House that Jacques Built. London: Brealey. H, E B. (1958) The Uniting of Europe. London: Stevens & Sons. H-R, F., and W, H. (1997) The Council of Ministers. Basingstoke: Macmillan. H, J. (1996) ‘Has European Unification by Steal a Future?’, in J. Hayward (ed.), Elitism, Populism and European Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. and W, V. (2002) Governing from the Centre: Core Executive Coordination in France. Oxford: Oxford University Press, ch. 5. K, H., and M, A. (2004) ‘EU Memberstates and the Prodi Commission’, in D. Dimitrikapoulos, The Changing European Commission. Manchester: Manchester University Press. L, P. (1991) ‘The European Commission’, in R. E. Keohane and S. Hoffmann (eds.), The New European Community. Decisionmaking and Institutional Change. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press. M C, N. (1997) ‘Democracy, Subsidiarity and Citizenship in the “European Commonwealth” ’, Law and Philosophy 16. M, P. (2003) ‘European Governance and Civic Participation: Beyond Elitist Citizenship?’ Political Studies L1/1 (March). M, G. (2002) ‘The European Commission: The Limits of Centralization and the Perils of Parliamentarization’, Governance 15/3 (July). (2003) ‘The Politics of Regulation and European Regulatory Institutions’, in J. Hayward and A. Menon (eds.), Governing Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press, ch. 17.
Strategic Innovation: Monnet to Delors
27
(2005) Dilemmas of European Integration: the Ambiguities and Pitfalls of Integration by Stealth. Oxford: Oxford University Press. R, G. (1995) Jacques Delors and European Integration. Cambridge: Polity. W, J. H. H. (1999) The Constitution of Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. W, H. (2002) ‘The Council: an Institutional Chameleon?’, Governance 15/3 (July).
2 Delegation and Commission Leadership in Economic and Monetary Union David Howarth
INTRODUCTION Monetary integration can be seen as one area where the European Commission—and its president and its commissioner for economic and financial affairs—has performed an important, and potentially vital, leadership role. Some scholars have interpreted Commission leadership in this field, especially prior to the Maastricht Summit bargain on Economic and Monetary Union (EMU), in terms of ‘entrepreneurship’ (Malnes 1995; Moravcsik 1999; Young 1991, 1999).1 The ‘entrepreneurial’ role of two Commission presidents has been emphasized—see Ludlow (1982) on Jenkins and Van Assche (2005) and Drake (1995) on Jacques Delors. Commission leadership in monetary integration has also been seen in terms of the Commission selectively marshalling the political and economic significance of Europe’s emerging Single Market and inducing key actors to rearticulate their preferences in terms of monetary union (Fligstein and Mara-Dritta 1996; Jabko 1999). Even if the final agreement on the details of the European Monetary System (EMS) in 1979 and the EMU project in 1991 depended upon intergovernmental bargaining, it would be problematic to deny the importance of a Commission leadership role in the discussions and negotiations leading to the EMS and EMU bargains. Leadership through ‘entrepreneurship’ and preference manipulation remains possible since the agreement on the Maastricht Treaty (Treaty on European Union, TEU) in December 1991. However, the extent to which the Commission has played a leadership role in the field of EMU since Maastricht should be seen principally in terms of this institution’s delegated powers and responsibilities. The aim of this chapter is to explore Commission leadership in terms of the powers and responsibilities delegated to the Commission under the TEU and the Stability and Growth Pact (Stability Pact, Pact, SGP). Delegation theory is
Economic and Monetary Union
29
a useful tool to elucidate the scope and limits of the Commission’s leadership role in EMU. The Commission’s potential for leadership or ‘entrepreneurship’ is maintained yet constrained by the terms of delegation. These terms provided considerable scope for Commission leadership in Stage II of the EMU project (from 1994) notably in rendering credible the commitment of member states to the start of Stage III on 1 January 1999 and the subsequent launch of the Euro. Delegation theory can also demonstrate why the Commission has had difficulty asserting a leadership role since 1999 in the context of macroeconomic—notably fiscal—policy coordination in EMU and more specifically with regard to the application of SGP rules. The Commission’s role can be seen principally in terms of the management and watchdog functions delegated to it in the Maastricht Treaty and the SGP. However, the rule book according to which the Commission must operate in terms of these two functions has been widely criticized—both by member-state governments and the Commission itself.
APPLYING DELEGATION THEORY Delegation theory can be used to explain the Commission’s leadership role in EMU in the preparations from 1994 for the 1999 start of Stage III—the irrevocable fixing of exchange rates and the transfer of monetary policy-making powers to the European Central Bank—and the transition to the single currency, introduced from January 2002. (For applications of delegation theory to the Commission and European Union more broadly see e.g. Kassim and Menon 2002; Moravcsik 1998; Pollack 1997, 2002, and 2003.) (The European Monetary Institute (EMI), the predecessor of the European Central Bank, was likewise assigned an important role in the preparation process which will not be explored further except as it directly affected the role played by the Commission.) The Commission’s leadership and potential leadership role in the EMU project has resulted from delegation that has taken place for two principal reasons. The first was the need for centralized experts to manage a complex policy-making sector and to present expert proposals—technocratic ‘focal points’—around which governments could coordinate their activities. The collective action problem facing governments is one of coordinating the production of information. Delegation took place because ‘centralised authorities are best placed to exploit economies of scale and overcome coordination problems or national mistrust, thereby generating and disseminating sufficient information required for more efficient decision-making’ (Moravcsik 1998:
30
Who Led Europe?
71; see also Majone 1996: 41 ff.). Nugent (1995) argues that the Commission’s capacity for leadership rests on its ‘constitutional’ powers and its knowledge and expertise. However, whether this capacity is put into effect depends on the member states’ perceptions of the need for policy activity as well as the institutional context of decision-making. The second reason for delegating powers and responsibilities to the Commission, which has structured the potential Commission leadership role in EMU, was the desire of member-state governments to lock in policy coordination—here both soft and potentially hard, or binding, forms of macroeconomic policy coordination—and demonstrate the credibility of their commitment to the rules of the EMU project. By delegating to the Commission the right to interpret and implement (yet not enforce) EMU agreements national governments sought to restructure future domestic incentives, encouraging future cooperation by raising the cost of non-decision or noncompliance.2 Delegation to the Commission in the EMU policy area, and pooling of powers over fiscal policy more generally, can be further viewed in two additional ways. First, delegation was a solution to the problem of ‘incomplete contracting’, which arose because national governments shared broad goals in favour of EMU yet found it too difficult to make technical agreements on the implementation of these goals. Governments therefore required efficient means of precommitting to a series of smaller, uncertain decisions staggered at a series of times in the future, some of which were likely to be inconvenient but which taken as a whole benefited each of them (Moravcsik 1998). Member-state governments delegated a great deal of scope over difficult and pressing technical policy formulation (albeit not final decision-making) to the Commission. Second, delegation took place to increase the credibility of the EMU project in the perceptions of economic actors which were, in the postMaastricht period, highly sceptical that Stage III would begin by the 1 January 1999 target date.
COMMISSION ‘LEADERSHIP’ IN THE MOVE TO STAGE III Member-state governments delegated implementation powers to the Commission thus allowing an important leadership role for this supranational institution in the lead-up to the start of Stage III of EMU. As delegation theory would predict, member-state governments needed to establish the credibility of the EMU project—and the credibility of their commitment to EMU— in the perceptions of financial market operators and other private economic
Economic and Monetary Union
31
actors (firms, workers, investors, and consumers) (see Leblonde 2004). There are seven major ways in which the Commission (joined by the EMI in some areas) had a leadership role in Stage II of the EMU project, leading to the start of Stage III and then the introduction of the single currency from 1 January 2002: 1. consulting relevant economic actors on their views concerning necessary developments in the transition to the single currency; 2. designing proposals for the transition for Ecofin and the European Council with the express aim of encouraging the action of member-state governments; 3. mustering support from a broad political coalition; 4. preparing relevant economic actors for the transition; 5. preparing concerned national public administrations for the transition; 6. monitoring economic convergence and budgetary discipline in the member states; and 7. designing proposals on budgetary surveillance from Stage III (in the context of the negotiations on the Stability and Growth Pact from November 1995 to December 1996). The Commission lacked final say over the detailed content of the move to EMU’s Stage III, which was left to member-state governments. In the terms of delegation theory, the Commission’s lack of final decision-making power is due to the nature of delegation which was not linked to reducing problems of the credible commitment of the governments (in the perceptions of other governments) per se. Rather delegation resulted from the inability of national governments to negotiate and include a complete contract in the TEU. When delegation is not about solving the credible commitment problem, memberstate principals are likely to keep tighter control over supranational agents (see Talberg 2002). Here the delegation that took place, which allowed the Commission an important role in the implementation of EMU, was principally to reinforce the credibility of the EMU project in the perceptions of private economic actors. It was not, in most respects, to reinforce the credibility of the member-state governments’ commitment to the project in one another’s perception—which, in the terms of delegation theory, would have involved granting the Commission considerably more powers. In the transition to EMU, private economic actors needed principles, rules, regulations, and procedures to focus their behaviour in the proper direction. Where Commission powers and responsibilities concerned the credibility of the commitment of governments—as in the area of budgetary surveillance—it can be argued that
32
Who Led Europe?
the Commission had more direct influence over final decision-making in the Council of Ministers and the European Council, which nonetheless retained the formal final say given the politically sensitive nature of decisions in this area. This is explored below.
Consultation and Proposal Design: ‘Egging on’ the Council The first two forms of Commission leadership—consultation and proposal design—can be grouped together because each of these activities contributed directly to the other. TEC articles 114(3), 117(6&7), 121(1) provide the Commission proposal-making powers on the details of Stage III and the transition to the single currency. In the fulfilment of these formal powers, the Commission had important informal agenda-setting powers (see Pollack 1997) in its consultations with private economic actors on the details of Stage III. In drawing up a changeover scenario that the member-state governments could use as a focal point in their negotiations, the Commission acted as a policy entrepreneur, making use of its technical expertise and extended networks with private economic agents. The Commission also, on occasion, publicly badgered the member-state governments to respond more rapidly to the demands of certain powerful private economic agents for more clarity on the transition to the single currency. In 1994, the Commission had to contend with stagnation in the EMU project despite the official start of Stage II on 1 January of that year. The Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) crises of 1992–3 and the difficult economic situation in several EU member states had engendered widespread scepticism in both the public and private sectors that EMU would proceed on schedule. Nonetheless, in the spring of 1994, the Commission began its work on convergence and technical preparations (Commission 1994). Yves Thibault de Silguy, commissioner for economic and financial affairs in the Santer Commission from 1995 to 1999, asserted that the Commission had a vital role to play in providing momentum to the EMU project and leading and encouraging reflection and preparation on EMU (de Silguy 1995: 38). In May 1994, the Commission set up an Expert Group on the Changeover to the Single Currency with the aim of promoting ‘the necessary technical preparations in the relevant areas of the private sector’ (Maas Report I, January 1995, p. 5). This group held hearings with diverse EU economic interests3 in March and April 1995 during which it discovered that most organizations and individuals were ill prepared for the move to EMU and the introduction of the single currency, for which the project’s lack of credibility was widely cited as the principal reason. The Expert Group blamed the lack of credibility on
Economic and Monetary Union
33
member governments for failing to produce a clear and definite timetable and strategy for the transition to the single currency (Maas Report II, May 1995). The Expert Group thus proposed a scenario for the phased introduction of the single currency by 1 January 1999, called for the immediate public announcement of the agreed date for the start of Stage III; and—with the aim of informing and preparing the private sector for the start of EMU and the introduction the single currency—called for the immediate establishment of a dialogue between public authorities and the private sector. The Commission followed on the Expert Group’s work by producing in May 1995 a ‘Green Paper on the Practical Arrangements for the Introduction of the Single Currency’ (Commission 1995a) which set out a three-phase reference scenario and legal certainty for private economic actors to undertake necessary preparations. The drawing up of the Green Paper was part of the Commission’s continuing strategy to get EMU back on the EU agenda. The paper was a consultative document in order to involve a diversity of private economic actors in the process of reviving the project (Leblonde 2004). At the request of the June 1995 Cannes European Council, the Commission made a first draft of a reference scenario on the changeover to the single currency on the basis of various responses to its Green Paper from private economic interests, which reflected the Commission’s efforts to find a broadly acceptable compromise. The Commission—responding to demands by private economic interests, including the European Banking Association (Financial Times, 13 November 1995)—made further efforts to accelerate European Council decision-making by publicly calling for the announcement of the changeover scenario and the actual name of the single currency by mid-1996 at the latest. Acting more quickly than had been expected, the December 1995 Madrid European Council formally approved the name of ‘Euro’; approved a three-phase scenario that was a combination of proposals by the Commission and the EMI; and accepted the legal framework that the Commission had proposed in its Green Paper. The Madrid European Council also called upon Ecofin, working with the Commission and the EMI to report on the modalities of the relationship between EU member states inside and outside the Euro-zone (Commission 1995b). The Commission proposal on this new relationship was adopted largely intact by Ecofin. While uncertainties remained, pro-EMU groups were encouraged by these developments and praised Commission efforts (Association for Monetary Union in Europe 1996). Following Madrid, the Commission focused upon coordinating the legal, technical, and logistical activities necessary for a successful launch of EMU’s Stage III and upon preparing all concerned public and private actors. Following consultations with the EMI and private economic interest groups that sought legal certainty in the transition period, the Commission presented
34
Who Led Europe?
to the Council two proposals on the legal framework for the Euro during the changeover period. At the December 1996 Dublin European Council, Ecofin and the European Council endorsed these proposals (Commission 1997a).
Mustering Support for EMU from a Broad Political Coalition Jabko (1999) explores the Commission’s post-Maastricht leadership role in terms of its political strategy to build the support of a broad and stable political coalition in favour of the EMU project. He (ibid. 486) sees the Commission as targeting those ‘national politicians . . . national central bank and finance ministry officials, members of the business community, especially in the financial sector, and, more generally, all actors or social groups who conceived a political, bureaucratic, or economic interest in the provision of fiscally conservative policies [and monetary orthodoxy]’. In doing so, Jabko (ibid.) argues that the Commission deliberately ‘framed EMU in terms of consolidating the liberal economic policy orientation embodied in the EMS and the Single Market’. Selling EMU in such practical terms was necessary because (as Frieden (1991) asserts) few social groups saw the project as economically necessary. An application of delegation theory assigns the Commission a less ideologically inspired role in mustering support for EMU, which can be seen as an implicit element of the preparation role delegated to the Commission. If the Commission tended to target certain actors over others, this made strategic sense given the monetary orthodoxy and fiscal conservativism embedded in the terms of delegation (TEU), which inevitably made the project more or less appealing to some actors and social groups. Thus, if the political strategy of the Commission had an ideological flavour, this was due to the Maastricht Treaty’s EMU provisions—which were not explicitly liberal—not Commission manipulation per se. Jabko’s assertion of the Commission’s liberal economic orientation might at least be qualified: its support for partial liberalization if necessary for member states to respect the convergence criteria—by which entry into EMU’s Stage III was to be determined—is not the same as a liberal economic orientation. Building it around monetary orthodoxy is not equivalent to building a political coalition around a liberal economic project. There is nothing inherently liberal about EMU. If the Commission saw creating a broad and stable political coalition in favour of EMU as one of its central roles in Stage II, this was because the incomplete contract of the Maastricht Treaty and the conditional terms imposed upon member-state participation in Stage III made such a role almost inevitable.
Economic and Monetary Union
35
Preparing the Relevant Economic Actors for the Transition to the Single Currency: Communication Strategy The Commission’s role in communicating essential information to relevant public and private actors was crucial to ensuring its successful coordination of the legal and technical preparations for the transition to the Euro. The Commission’s strategy here involved the organization of a January 1996 Round Table with major relevant economic and social interest group representatives. The output of the Round Table was agreement on a series of principles and practical measures to guide the supply of information on EMU. The most important principle agreed was that the Commission should not assume responsibility for communicating information about the Euro to the wider public because it could not do so effectively given limited staff and financial resources. This responsibility lay principally with the member-state governments and the private sector to ensure that the information on the transition to the single currency be adapted to its recipients, in terms of nationality and user type. However, it was agreed that the Commission was to retain a crucial information supply and monitoring role (supported by Ecofin and the EMI) to ensure the overall consistency and delivery of the information on the transition. Moreover, it is clear that the Commission (and in particular de Silguy, the economic and financial affairs commissioner) had a particularly heavy workload in promoting the single currency. It is reported that de Silguy alone made 120 speeches on the Euro (European Voice, 29 January–4 February 1998: 32; cited in Nugent 1995: 52).
Preparing Concerned National Public Administrations for the Transition to the Single Currency The Commission frequently voiced its concern over the inadequate readiness of national public administrations to cope with the changeover. To deal with this problem, in January 1996, the Commission established the ‘Public Administration Network’, an informal gathering of national coordinators responsible for the transition of public administrations to the Euro. The goal of the network was to encourage the exchange of plans, practical experience, and solutions to common problems (Commission 1997b). Responding to Commission pressure, ten of the member states published a national changeover plan by the end of 1997 and by the spring of 1998 Euro-related legislation was being considered by the parliaments of all eleven of the first wave of Euro-zone member states (Commission 1998).
36
Who Led Europe?
Monitoring Economic Convergence and Budgetary Discipline in the Member States The management of the TEU’s budgetary surveillance procedure provided the Commission with an additional leadership role. As well as the broader delegation of monitoring responsibilities to the Commission since the Treaty of Rome (as ‘guardian of the treaties’), the TEU included specific provisions on the Commission’s monitoring role in EMU: namely, TEC articles:
r 99(2–4) on designing Broad Economic Policy Guidelines (BEPGs) for
r r
r
r r r r
member states, monitoring member-state progress in following their BEPGs and making recommendations to member states failing to respect their BEPGs; 100(1&2) on financial assistance to member states in exceptional circumstances; 104(2, 3, 5, 13&14) on monitoring the budgetary situation and the stock of public debt in the member states, reporting to the Council on the failure to respect specified deficit and debt reference values and recommending further action; 114(1–3) on requesting the Monetary Committee (the Economic and Financial Committee from the start of Stage III) for opinions on the monetary and financial situation in the member states and the Euro-zone more broadly; 115 on the Council and member states requesting the Commission to make a recommendation or a proposal on member states failing to respect their BEPGs and deficit and debt reference values; 116(2b) on reporting on the achievement of economic convergence in the member states prior to the start of Stage II; 119(1, 3) and 120(2) on investigating a member state suffering from a balance of payments crisis and recommending protective measures and potentially mutual assistance; and 121(1, 2) on reporting on the fulfilment of the convergence criteria to determine member state participation in Stage III.
Delegation on budgetary surveillance was to ensure the credibility of commitment of the member governments to meeting the criteria prior to entry into Stage III.4 Eurostat performed the necessary monitoring tasks that ensured the Commission an important say in determining whether member states had met the TEU debt and deficit criteria and the ‘gate-keeping’ role of excluding member states with excessive deficits (Savage 2005). The annual publication
Economic and Monetary Union
37
of the Commission’s convergence reports was an eagerly awaited event in Stage II as it was widely seen as the most objective and thorough indication of national preparedness for EMU entry. The Commission’s March 1998 reports identified which member states qualified for EMU membership. Given the greater credibility of these reports over national reports, it would have been very difficult for the European Council to have ignored them in determining EMU entry. Thus, while in most areas it is problematic to assert that the Commission’s monitoring capacity significantly enhances its leadership role, the immense political importance assigned to budgetary surveillance in Stage II— and above all meeting the 3 per cent deficit criterion, with the goal of EMU a political priority in most member states—reinforced the central role of the Commission in the EMU process. Domestic German politics demanded that the 3 per cent rule be rigidly enforced, while many senior national politicians openly criticized this rigidity especially given the economic difficulties in many EU member states in the post-Maastricht period. The awareness of the great temptation for member states to engage in creative accounting to meet the deficit criterion placed further political importance upon a neutral monitoring mechanism, isolated from national influence. The Commission repeatedly reminded member-state governments that it lacked the resources to perform this function as effectively as it should. (The subsequent revelations of the extent to which certain member states ‘cooked the books’ demonstrates the validity of Commission concerns.) Nonetheless, this did not fundamentally undermine the central role of the Commission in budgetary surveillance in Stage II. This was in large part because of Eurostat efforts to create harmonized and credible budgetary data—through the development of the European System of Integrated Economic Accounts (ESA)—and its attempts to control what it regarded as member-state budgetary manipulation (Savage 2005). It is also crucial to recognize the importance of Eurostat’s ‘painfully hard-won reputation for political independence, adherence to professional standards, and transparent decision-making’ (ibid. 4). Prior to the annual publication of the Commission’s report, Eurostat issued its own top secret report, ‘Statistics on Convergence Criteria: Assessment by Eurostat’ (see e.g. Eurostat 1998) which was considered to be the authoritative evaluation of member-state budgetary data. As delegation theory would predict, even though the development of Eurostat’s capacities might be considered politically problematic for governments seeking to bend the rules, the member-state governments ‘identifi[ed] with the integrity of the procedure, participate[d] in its development, and promote[d] the use of these rules in member state policy-making’ (Savage 2005: 5). The member states did so because these procedures and rules reinforced the credibility of their commitment to the EMU project.
38
Who Led Europe?
Designing Proposals on Budgetary Surveillance from Stage III The Commission played an important role facilitating the adoption of the precise provisions of the Stability and Growth Pact at the December 1996 Dublin European Council (see Heipertz and Verdun 2004). The German proposal for a ‘Stability Pact for Europe’ was presented to EU finance ministers at a November 1995 meeting of Ecofin (Waigel 1995a, b). The German government sought an intergovernmental agreement in the form of an international treaty along the lines of Schengen which would have resulted in the marginalization of Community institutions and procedures. The Germans also sought automatic fines to be imposed upon countries by a Stability Council which was unacceptable to many other countries (notably France). While debates on the design of the Pact raged over the next thirteen months, the Commission was asked to come up with a compromise solution. The Commission had the difficult task of designing an EDP that avoided automatic fines yet retained the veneer of real deterrence. Its proposal was released in two draft regulations. The first called for the reinforcement of budgetary surveillance in the Stability Pact as a rudimentary device for economic policy coordination (Council Regulation (EC) 1466/97). The second draft regulation ‘on speeding up and clarifying the implementation of the Excessive Deficit Procedure’ (EDP) avoided automatic fines and reduced sanctions to a discretionary measure of Ecofin (Council Regulation (EC) 1467/97). It would be problematic to claim a significant leadership role for the Commission in the negotiating process on the SGP. Indeed, the Commission’s initial preference was for less strict rules than those agreed at Dublin. However, the Commission was successful in achieving two of its main objectives: a solution within the Treaty framework—thus ensuring an ongoing central role for the Commission in budgetary surveillance and macroeconomic policy guidance—and the inclusion of the Commission’s surveillance recommendations in the Pact, which further reinforced the Commission’s central monitoring role (Heipertz and Verdun 2004).
DISABLED LEADERSHIP WITH A MUDDLED RULE-BOOK If the leadership credentials of the Commission were boosted by its role in Stage II—and the entry of eleven member states into Stage III and the launch of the single currency in 2002—the terms of delegation have also worked to undermine Commission leadership in EU macro-economic policy coordination since 1999. As outlined above, the Commission was delegated important
Economic and Monetary Union
39
budgetary surveillance powers and responsibilities. Added to these are specific provisions in the SGP which stipulate that ‘the Commission: 1. will exercise its right of initiative under the Treaty in a manner that facilitates the strict, timely and effective functioning of the Stability and Growth pact; 2. will present, without delay, the necessary reports, opinions and recommendations to enable the adoption of Council decisions under Article 99 and Article 104; this will facilitate the effective functioning of the early warning system and the rapid launch and strict application of the excessive deficit procedure; 3. commits itself to prepare a report under Article 104(3) whenever there is the risk of an excessive deficit or whenever the planned or actual government deficit exceeds the 3 per cent of GDP reference value, thereby triggering the procedure under Article 104(3); 4. commits itself, in the event that the Commission considers that a deficit exceeding 3 per cent of GDP is not excessive and this opinion differs from that of the Economic and Financial Committee, to present in writing to the Council the reasons for its position’ (European Council 1997). Thus the Commission monitors and privately and publicly criticizes the convergence/stability plans of member-state governments; helps draw up the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines to which member-state governments publicly commit themselves to following; criticizes governments for failing to meet their plans and respect the guidelines; recommends that Ecofin launch the Early Warning Procedure (EWP) in the event that a participating memberstate government risks exceeding the 3 per cent deficit threshold; and then recommends the Excessive Deficit Procedure (EDP) when a member-state government has exceeded the 3 per cent figure. In terms of delegation theory, the Commission was assigned these budgetary surveillance and macroeconomic policy guidance powers and responsibilities in Stage III in order to render the commitment of the governments to the TEU and SGP fiscal policy rules more credible, reducing the risk of free-riding with certain Euro-zone member states running higher deficits and higher inflation whilst profiting from the low Euro-zone interest rates made possible through the low inflationary policies of the other participating member states. In turn, this delegation was expected to contribute to the ongoing credibility of the EMU project and of the European Central Bank’s (ECB’s) monetary policy in the perception of economic actors. However, the member states were cautious with regard to the powers they delegated to the Commission, which was granted the power neither to develop the rules of
40
Who Led Europe?
macroeconomic policy coordination nor to launch the EWP and the EDP, let alone the power to apply the full rules of the EDP which, following a member state’s excessive deficit over a period of three years, can lead to the imposition of fines. Ecofin (the member-state governments collectively) retained these powers. The argument can be made that the Commission’s watchdog function operates in the case of EU law because the final arbiter is the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and its judgments are expected to be implemented. However, delegation in terms of the watchdog function in the case of SGP rules is problematic because the immediate judge is the Council and the fact that Ecofin ministers have to judge one another poses an obvious incentive problem. In retrospect, had the Commission been given the power to launch the EWP and the EDP, it is likely that this more complete delegation would have further undermined the Commission’s leadership role in EMU. It is difficult to imagine certain member governments—notably French and German—allowing the Commission to apply the EDP and in particular the fines that it can result in. The great potential for conflict would have transformed the Commission into even more of a scapegoat than it already has been in this policy area and would certainly have undermined the Commission’s leadership position in this area. As it is, in a period of sluggish economic growth in which some member-state governments would face major political difficulties in making sufficient cuts to national budgets, the Commission was bound to be placed in a situation whereby the performance of its watchdog function of calling for the implementation of European law would attract considerable antagonism from struggling governments. More so than in any other policy area, the temptation for governments to scapegoat the Commission is great. While scapegoating the Commission is problematic (in that the Commission has no final authority with regard to EU fiscal policy-making) several governments have nonetheless done so. To take but one example, on 18 September 2003, in their joint EU growth initiative, the French and German governments energetically attacked the Commission which, in its commitment to low deficits, was accused of being bent on de-industrializing Western Europe (Le Monde, 19 September 2003). Beyond the Commission’s monitoring function—which creates potential for member state antagonism and scapegoating—the principal difficulty facing the potential development of a leadership role for the Commission in EMU is the problematic nature of the terms of delegation in the SGP fiscal policy rules, which have been widely contested by both governments and academic economists. Notably, the asymmetrical nature of the deficit cutting requirement has attracted criticism as it encourages such action at the bottom of the economic cycle when governments should be increasing spending.
Economic and Monetary Union
41
Furthermore, the need to cut deficits when national inflation might already be well below the ECB’s inflation target (and thus deficit spending cannot be considered to be excessively inflationary) is perceived as problematic. Other considerations of a particular national fiscal situation (debt load) were also ignored by the Pact’s rules. The Commission was placed in a position of having to defend the SGP rules even though the Commission president Romano Prodi publicly accepted that these rules were ‘imperfect’ and ‘stupid’ (Le Monde, 17 October 2001) and excessive deficits in certain member states coincided with national inflation rates that were well below the ECB’s target. Furthermore, the Commission decided to make the politically risky move of taking the Council of Ministers to the ECJ following Ecofin’s November 2003 decision to suspend the application of the EDP with regard to France and Germany. While supported by some of the smaller member-state governments that insisted upon the application of Pact rules—who thus looked to the Commission as a potential leader in this policy area—the legal move succeeded in outraging the French and German governments. The ECJ’s judgment—which challenged Ecofin’s decision to suspend the EDP but in effect failed to force Ecofin to implement the EDP—was far from a clear vindication of the Commission’s position. The Commission has also continued to perform its policy initiation function, presenting itself as a centre of expert advice on EMU. Romano Prodi’s criticism of the SGP preceded the political difficulties created by the infringement of Pact rules by Germany and France. This very public encouragement of Euro-zone governments to consider reform was the first for a serving highprofile European statesman. Whilst defending the application of the existing Pact’s rules and performing its monitoring function, in November 2002 the Commission issued a communication to the European Parliament and the Council which called for a strengthening of budgetary coordination in the European Union (Commission 2002). Presented in advance of the March 2003 European Council discussion of proposals to reinforce economic policy coordination, the Commission’s communication was in effect the first full reform package of the SGP incorporating a more flexible interpretation of the Pact’s rules, while recommending that the sanctions against noncompliant member states be strengthened. In 2003, Ecofin (2003b) agreed several modifications to the Pact in line with the Commission’s package, although there was ongoing debate on the need for additional reform following the Council’s suspension of the EDP in November 2003. Ecofin, in line with the Commission, emphasized a more flexible interpretation of the SGP’s medium-term rule to take into account the size of public debt, the economic cycle, and the quality of public investment. The final reform package
42
Who Led Europe?
agreed in March 2005 incorporated these concerns but also allowed the Euro-zone member states much greater ‘flexibility’ in the application of Pact rules. In terms of Commission leadership, the flexibility introduced with regard to both the short- and medium-term deficit goals of the SGP—and in particular the margin of manoeuvre of member-state governments with regard to the determination of acceptable deficit levels—will probably eliminate much of the tension created between member-state governments and the Commission in the application of the original Pact’s rules. The Commission retains its power of recommendation, yet the increased margin of manoeuvre promised to decrease the pressure on the Commission to engage in public conflict with Ecofin and individual member-state governments. There could be a difference in interpretation of acceptable deficits for a particular country but the EDP trigger was qualified. These reforms, far from undermining the potential for Commission leadership, may increase it by decreasing the potential for member-government– Commission conflict. On the other hand, for those virtuous smaller member states—notably Austria and the Netherlands—which turned to the Commission to uphold the rules when Germany and France insisted upon breaking them, these reforms are probably seen as undermining Commission leadership. Crucially, in the context of its delegated powers, the Commission can exercise leadership in its generation of ideas and initiation of policies but also through its role as a budgetary statistical authority—the reinforcement of which was the final point in the Commission’s reform package, a goal which was accepted as important by the member states. The Greek example of grotesque misreporting of information on the state of government finances—and the outcome of the ECJ case that the Commission brought against Greece—has reinforced the perceived need for the Commission to develop a greater capacity in this area. In the context of delegation theory, the reinforcement of the Commission’s statistical authority is now essential for building the credibility of the member-state commitment to EMU rules (even if these rules have now been significantly watered down) and, in turn, contributes to credibility-building in the perceptions of private economic actors. The Commission’s reinforced capacity to monitor, name, and shame governments which ‘fix the books’ will certainly reinforce its leadership role. The potential for scapegoating the Commission remains. However, criticizing governments and calling for further budgetary consolidation in the context of a more symmetric Pact is very different to the Commission’s monitoring role under the Pact’s first incarnation which involved criticizing governments for not respecting problematic fiscal policy rules and applying established procedures. By depoliticizing the application of the Pact’s rules, the
Economic and Monetary Union
43
potential for Commission leadership in the realm of economic governance is reinforced.
CONCLUSION When member-state governments delegate the implementation of their ‘grand bargains’ to supranational institutions, the results may differ considerably from what would have been achieved had decision-making been kept at the intergovernmental level (see Sandholtz and Stone Sweet 1998). In the case of EMU, there is good reason to doubt that the progress to Stage III would have taken place at the start of 1999 if the member-state governments had been the only actors in charge of the transition. Ensuring the support of private economic actors for EMU—and more specifically the confidence of financial markets in the project—was a major concern which encouraged governments to delegate to the Commission a role in Stage II that could be qualified as leadership. The decision to grant the Commission important monitoring powers with regard to the TEU and SGP fiscal policy rules can likewise be interpreted through the lens of delegation theory in that member states saw—and certain governments insisted upon—a role for the Commission in rendering credible their commitment to these rules. Delegation theory can also demonstrate why the Commission has had difficulty asserting a leadership role in the context of macroeconomic—notably fiscal—policy coordination in EMU and more specifically with regard to the application of SGP rules post-1999. The rules themselves have been widely challenged as problematic—by the Commission itself—and thus the Commission’s efforts to implement them have undermined the potential leadership role that it should have with regard to the development of economic governance in EMU. Certain leading member governments came to consider the original Pact as no longer vital for either retaining the credibility of the EMU project for private economic actors or as a clear indication of their credible commitment to the EMU project in the perceptions of other member governments. Yet delegation theory can also be applied to explain why there is considerable potential for the Commission to play an important leadership role in the operation of EMU in the future—notably through the development of the Commission’s own budgetary surveillance capacity, arguably crucial in the context of maintaining the long-term credibility of the EMU project and the credible commitment of governments to the project. The Commission’s potential for a leadership role in EMU is thus principally in the context of
44
Who Led Europe?
its efforts to discourage and challenge forms of free-riding on the part of member-state governments, for example, when governments allow national inflation rates to run well in excess of the ECB’s target rate. However, because these efforts are bound to ruffle the feathers of those brought to book, the Commission’s capacity for leadership will be reflected in its ability to perform its watchdog function sensitively and strategically.
NOTES 1. There are a number of definitions of entrepreneurial leadership (see Malnes 1995 and Underdahl 1991) which differ mainly on scope. Most applications of this concept incorporate certain core features including the innovative bargaining ideas that the leader introduces to negotiations and the ability of the leader to achieve successful outcomes in a changing environment. In his study of Delors’s entrepreneurial leadership role, Van Assche (2005: 281) applies Young’s (1991) definition of an entrepreneurial leader ‘as an individual who uses negotiating skills to frame issues in ways that foster integrative bargaining and put together deals that would otherwise elude participants. Such framing can be achieved through skilful agenda setting, popularization of issues, and the construction of inclusive packaging deals.’ 2. See TEC articles 99(2–4), 100, 104(2, 3, 5, 13&14), 105(6), 107(5&6), 111(1–4), 114(1–3), 115, 116(2b), 117(6, 7), 119(1, 3), 120(2), 121(1, 2), 122(1, 2), 123(4, 5). Even though the Commission had no final decision-making role in the move to EMU there was considerable delegation of guiding, advisory, and monitoring tasks which created sufficient scope for Commission leadership especially given the initial inertia of member-state governments on EMU. 3. For a full list see Maas Report II, May 1995: 13. 4. Jabko (1999) also explores the Commission’s monitoring role—and its increasingly vocal defence of the convergence criteria—in terms of its strategy of mustering a broad coalition of support for EMU and smoothing the transition to Stage III.
REFERENCES A M U E (1996) Annual Report 1995. Available at , accessed. C E C (1994) ‘Communication from the Commission: Practical Problems Involved in Introducing the Ecu as the European Union’s Single Currency’, Euro papers 1. Brussels: Directorate-General II— Economic and Financial Affairs.
Economic and Monetary Union
45
(1995a) ‘One Money for Europe: Green Paper on the Practical Arrangements for the Introduction of the Single Currency’. Luxembourg: OOPEC, 31 May. (1995b) ‘Exchange Rate Relations between Participating and Non-Participating Countries in Stage Three of EMU’. ECU 35: 12–14. (1997a) ‘Legal Framework for the Use of the Euro’. Euro Papers 4. Brussels: Directorate-General II—Economic and Financial Affairs. (1997b) ‘Communication from the Commission: Practical Aspects of the Introduction of the Euro’, Euro Papers 8. Brussels: Directorate-General II—Economic and Financial Affairs. (1998) Convergence Report 1998, 25 March. Brussels: Directorate-General II— Economic and Financial Affairs. (2002) ‘Communication to the European Parliament and Council: Strengthening the Coordination of Budgetary Policy’, Brussels, 27 November 2000, COM (2002) 668 final. C R (EC) 1466/97 on budgetary surveillance. (EC) 1467/97, on speeding up and clarifying the implementation of the excessive deficit procedure, Official Journal L 209 of 2 August 1997. D, H. (1995) ‘Political Leadership and European Integration: The Case of Jacques Delors’, West European Politics 18/1: 140–60. E C (1997) ‘Resolution of the European Council on the Stability and Growth Pact’, Amsterdam, 17 June, Official Journal C 236 of 2 August 1997. E (1998) ‘Statistics on Convergence Criteria: Assessment by Eurostat’, Luxembourg, 25 March. F, N., and M-D, J. (1996) ‘How to Make a Market: Reflections on the Attempt to Create a Single Market in the European Union’, American Journal of Sociology 102/1: 1–33. F, J. (1991) ‘Invested Interests: The Politics of National Economic Policies in a World of Global Finance’, International Organization 45/4: 425–51. H, M., and V, A. (2004) ‘The Dog that Would Never Bite? What We Can Learn from the Origins of the Stability and Growth Pact’, in Journal of European Public Policy 11/5: 765–80. J, N. (1999) ‘In the Name of the Market: How the European Commission Paved the Way for Monetary Union’, Journal of European Public Policy 3 (September), 475– 95. K, H., and M, A. (2002) ‘The Principal-Agent Approach and the Study of the European Union: A Provisional Assessment’, European Research Institute Working Paper Series, University of Birmingham, 14 July. L, P. (2004) ‘Completing the Maastricht Contract: Institutional Handicraft and the Transition to European Monetary Union’, in Journal of Common Market Studies 42/3: 553–72. L, P. (1982) The Making of the European Monetary System: A Case Study of the Politics of the European Community. London: Butterworth Scientific. M, G. (ed.) (1996) Regulating Europe. London: Routledge.
46
Who Led Europe?
M, R. (1995) ‘ “Leader” and “Entrepreneur” in International Negotiations: A Conceptual Analysis’, European Journal of International Relations 1/1: 87–112. M, A. (1998) The Choice for Europe: Social Purpose & State Power from Messina to Maastricht (Ithaca: Cornell University Press). (1999) ‘Theory and Method in the Study of International Negotiation: A Rejoinder to Oran Young’, International Organization 53/4: 811–14. N, N. (1995) The European Commission. Basingstoke: Macmillan/Palgrave. P, M. A. (1997) ‘Delegation, Agency, and Agenda Setting in the European Community’, International Organization 51/1: 99–134. (2002) ‘Learning from the Americanists (Again): Theory and Method in the Study of Delegation’, West European Politics 25/1: 200–19. (2003) The Engines of European Integration: Delegation, Agency, and Agenda Setting in the EU. Oxford: Oxford University Press. S, W., and S S, A. (eds.) (1998) European Integration and Supranational Governance. Oxford: Oxford University Press. S, J. D. (2005) Making the EMU: The Politics of Budgetary Surveillance and the Enforcement of Maastricht. Oxford: Oxford University Press. S, Y. (1995) ‘Préparation de la monnaie unique: qu’apportera le Livre vert?’, ECU 31: 37–43. T, J. (2002) ‘Delegation to Supranational Institutions: Why, How, and with What Consequences?’, West European Politics 25/1: 23–46. U, A. (1991) Leadership Theory. Oslo: University of Oslo. V A, T. (2005) ‘The Impact of Entrepreneurial Leadership on EU High Politics: A Case Study of Jacques Delors and the Creation of EMU’, in Leadership 1/3: 279–98. W, T. (1995a) Dritte Lesung zum Haushaltsgesetz 1996 (10 November 1995). Bonn: Bundestagsdrucksache 13/69. (1995b) Zweite Lesung zum Haushaltsgesetz 1996 (7 November 1995). Bonn: Bundestagsdrucksache 13/66. Y, O. R. (1991) ‘Political Leadership and Regime Formation: On the Development of Institutions in International Society’, International Organization. 45: 281– 308. (1999) ‘Comment on Andrew Moravcsik, “A New Statecraft? Supranational Entrepreneurs and International Cooperation” ’, International Organization 53/4: 805–9.
3 Guiding the Digital Revolution: Is European Technology Policy Misguided? Xiudian Dai
The search for European leadership vis-à-vis Europe’s main trading partners in the global competition for high technologies since the 1980s seemingly provides a powerful reason for policy-makers to justify the continued existence of a technology policy at the Community level. Whilst it is true that technology is one of the policy areas in which European Union (EU) institutions have responsibility, the issue regarding the ability of EU institutions and the effectiveness of EU technology policy in governing innovation is controversial. It is no secret that the politics of European technology policy has provoked considerable debate among scholars interested in testing theories of political integration and decision-making in the EU (Peterson and Sharp 1998). According to the EU Treaty, ‘[t]he Community shall have the objective of strengthening the scientific and technological bases of Community industry and encouraging it to become more competitive at international level, while promoting all the research activities deemed necessary . . . ’ (The European Union, no date, article 163). The Single European Act (SEA) in particular strengthened the competencies of the Commission in a number of policy areas such as research and development (R&D) and industrial policy (Coen 1997). As a specific manifestation of its increased responsibility enshrined in the EU Treaty, the European Commission has emerged as the most influential guardian of European technology policy, which is centred on the multiannual and large-scale Framework Programme since the 1980s. It is therefore not unreasonable if one expected that technology policy might be an area where Commission leadership is well established. But this is not necessarily the case. The purpose of this chapter is to investigate whether or not EU policymakers are capable of guiding the course of technical change in the digital age. Empirically, it is focused on a comparative study of two different but
48
Who Led Europe?
intrinsically linked cases related to the development of advanced television broadcasting technologies in Europe: the European High Definition Television (HDTV) project and the Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) project. The rationale for this comparison lies in the statement, ‘[t]he debates over HDTV and DTV [Digital Television] during the last two decades are important for what they tell us about the politics of standards as digitization proceeds’ (Hart 2004: 224). Aimed at raising Europe’s competitiveness in the global race for high technologies, the development of HDTV has been very much at the heart of European technology policy since the mid-1980s. Despite the good intentions behind it, the European HDTV story poses a number of important questions. First, whose responsibility was it to develop HDTV? Was it justifiable that the desire for a proprietary European standard for HDTV, which was synonymous to European competitiveness, has led to policy and political actors being closely involved in the business-led marketplace? Second, was there any clearly defined and firmly established leadership behind European HDTV policy? Apparently, there was no lack of leadership candidates. As far as the public authorities are concerned, the European Commission acted as the guardian of the overall EU technology policy, which would cover HDTV. The Council of Ministers was ultimately responsible for providing legislative backing and approving a budget for any Community support towards the European HDTV system. Meanwhile, some national governments, notably the French and the Dutch, were willing to play a proactive role in subsidizing their national champions in HDTV development through the Eureka framework. The coexistence of multiple candidates for political leadership, however, does not suggest a strong leadership behind the European HDTV project nor would any candidate accept responsibility when things were going seriously wrong. Third, given the doubts about political leadership, or the lack of it, at the EU level, could European firms still maintain their competitiveness in the global competition for the next generation of TV technologies? In the next section I shall discuss some of the key issues related to EU technology policy. This is followed by a case study of the European HDTV project and another on the DVB project presented in the third and fourth sections, which manifest entirely different approaches towards the governance of technical change and innovation in Europe—the policy-led approach and the market-driven approach. A number of policy implications are drawn from comparing the two cases in the fifth section. Finally, the chapter ends by considering how the leadership issue affects European technologies and competitiveness.
Guiding the Digital Revolution
49
EU TECHNOLOGY POLICY IN THE DIGITAL AGE Loosely defined, EU technology policy is intended ‘to strengthen the scientific and technological basis of Community industry and to encourage it to become more competitive at the international level’ (Peterson and Sharp 1998: 12). Successive cabinets of the European Commission have tried to raise European capacity in research and development. Although much has already been said about European technology policy, a few key points including, among others, the search for European ownership in high or strategic technologies through government–industry collusion, the underlying notion of competitiveness, and European coordination over research and development activities are worth considering further in the context of this chapter.
Government–Industry Collusion Although not an EU invention, government–industry collusion in setting/changing the agenda for research and technology development features prominently in the history of EU technology policy. From the late 1970s to the mid-1980s, the Davignon era,1 the European Commission set up a Round Table with members representing the large and influential European firms from the electronic industry. Using the Round Table as a communications forum, the European Commission signalled that the European electronic industry would have to improve its performance by jointly acting at a European rather than a national level. In return, the Community would develop new programmes (with public funds) to help the firms (Peterson and Sharp 1998: 6). As an outcome of the European Round Table, the first major research and development programme ESPRIT (European Strategic Programme for Research on Information Technologies) was established (ibid.). It is beyond doubt that the European Commission needed the industry players to carry out its new policy objectives and the European firms would be foolish if they did not tap into the potentially lucrative financial resources to be offered by the new Community programmes, such as the ESPRIT, JESSI (Joint European Silicon Structures Initiative), and RACE (Research in Advanced Communications for Europe). One question remains: Was the government–industry collusion manifested in EU technology policy intended to fight for a common European course, i.e. fending off American and Japanese competition in high technologies, or was it a necessary arrangement to serve the mutual interest of the policy and business communities? Some argue that ‘[i]nstitutions or governance structures which provide a firm with a higher level of influence
50
Who Led Europe?
either through the exclusion of rivals or through advantageous decisionmaking mechanisms are more likely to be selected as part of a firm’s strategy’ (Austin and Milner 2001: 412).
The Notion of European Competitiveness Government–industry collusion in technology policy has been justified by the need to raise the level of European competitiveness. The term ‘competitiveness’ was frequently used in many EU policy documents since the 1980s. For instance, the European Commission published the widely cited Delors White Paper in 1993 with the key word ‘competitiveness’ in its title.2 The problem is that there is no consensus over what is meant by the concept of national competitiveness. Some argue that national competitiveness refers to a nation’s ability to produce goods and services that meet the test of international competition while its citizens enjoy a standard of living that is both rising and sustainable (Tyson 1992). Others argue that we live in a world of ‘win-lose’ competition in which whether each big economy succeeds or fails is based on its own efforts, independently of how well the others do (Thurow 1993). Pushing this competitive scenario to its extreme is the notion that each nation is like a corporation competing in the global marketplace. In the OECD’s view the concept of competitiveness is applicable to both nations and corporations, meaning that competitiveness is the ability of companies, industries, regions, nations, and supranational regions to generate, while being exposed to international competition, relatively high income and employment levels (OECD1996). Disagreeing with all of these definitions, Paul Krugman (1994) warns that a nation is not a corporation, and competitiveness is a dangerous obsession. On the same side of the debate, Strange points out the concept of European competitiveness is ambiguous and confusing (Strange 1998). Echoing the controversy over the definition of national competitiveness, the European Commission has used the term to mean different things at different times, depending upon which policy area is in question. Sometimes the European Commission believes that the root of European unemployment is a lack of competitiveness with the US and Japan and, accordingly, the solution to the problem of declining European competitiveness is a programme of investment in infrastructure and high technology (European Commission 1993). At other times, the European Commission used the concept of competitiveness in an entirely different sense. For instance, in the 2004 European Competitiveness Report, the growing challenge of China’s low cost manufacturing is a main concern (European Commission 2004).
Guiding the Digital Revolution
51
The notion of ‘competitiveness’ remains vague in the EU’s legal texts as well. Within the Maastricht Treaty, for example, article 2 stipulates that the Community shall have as its task ‘to promote throughout the Community . . . a high degree of competitiveness’. The Maastricht Treaty grants the Community the authority to improve the competitiveness of Community industry by promoting research and technology development (RTD). Nevertheless, in practice, EU technology policy has become a useful tool to encourage and sponsor large-scale industrial collaboration among firms in the name of maintaining or enhancing the competitiveness of European industries.
European Coordination The purpose of the Community RTD programmes is in part to create an incentive for coordinated actions at the Community level. Research and development programmes at the member-state level are important but they are not necessarily ‘European’. The launch of the ESPRIT Programme, for example, was to create a European dimension of research and development in the context of global competition for strategic technologies, such as information and communications technologies (ICTs). It is believed that Community action can play a complementary role to that of the member states (European Commission 2005b). The European Commission argues that the Community research programmes and cross-border joint projects are ‘breaking down the barriers which, until now, have hindered cooperation between scientists in different countries’ and ‘by joining forces, European researchers can compete with the best in the world’ (European Commission 2004). The subsequent launch of a plethora of Community programmes in the same or similar technological field led to the establishment of the Framework Programme in the 1980s.3 The Framework Programme is intended to bring together various RTD programmes into a cohesive package of technology policy at the Community level to offset the drawbacks of the piecemeal efforts of individual streams of RTD activities. In June 2005, the European Commission published a proposal on establishing a new Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme (CIP). The new European Commission proposal contains a budget of over C4 billion covering the period 2007–13. Representing one of the policy changes under the Barroso Commission, the CIP is intended to bring together into a coherent framework specific Community programmes. The European Commission contends in its CIP proposal that continuing to implement the Community funding programmes independently would not have created synergies between them; rather, a ‘more ambitious option would have been to merge
52
Who Led Europe?
the specific programmes into one single cross-cutting integrated programme’ (European Commission 2005b: 4), which is the CIP. EU technology policy, in terms of coordination at the European level, has moved from the early Community RTD programmes addressing specific technological fields to the launch of the Framework Programmes and then to the most recent proposal of Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme. European Commission policy innovation is still developing unpredictably.
Technology Policy in Flux The fact that priorities and focus of EU technology policy are constantly changing is manifested in a number of ways: from promoting large European firms/champions to helping SMEs; from developing high (or strategic) technologies to promoting the application of ISTs (Information Society Technologies); from emphasizing European ownership in technologies to a more open approach with a view to attracting and accommodating foreign firms (with capital and/or technologies). The EU has never officially admitted any mistakes in its technology policy, other than quietly making changes to its priority and focus. Reminiscent of preceding European Commissions, the Barroso cabinet continues to call for ‘Pooling Resources for European Leadership’ in areas such as Information Society Technologies (IST): ‘Given their strategic importance and the fact that supplying them is a major industry in its own right, it is vital that Europe masters these technologies, rather than simply importing them’ (European Commission 2005a). The European Commission identifies IST as the largest priority in terms of funding under the EU’s Sixth Framework research programme. Out of the seven priority fields, the Information Society Technologies strand has been allocated C3.63 billion (or 20.7% of the Programme’s total budget at C17.5 billion), a sum higher than any other priority field. What appears interesting is the fact that the internet is seen by the European Commission as the most important element of Information Society Technologies (European Commission 2005a) for reasons discussed by Shahin in Chapter 12 of this volume.
ONE FLAGSHIP, TOO MANY ADMIRALS: POLICY ACTIVISM AND HDTV HDTV (High Definition Television), according to the CCIR (Consultative Committee for International Radio), is ‘a system designed to allow viewing
Guiding the Digital Revolution
53
at about three times picture height such that the transmission system is virtually or nearly transparent to the level of detail that would have been perceived in the original scene by a viewer with average visual acuity’ (cited in Hart 2004: 5). In the mid-1980s, Japan’s competitive leadership in the global consumer electronic industry reached a new high with its proposal that a revolutionary HDTV system, called MUSE (Multiple Sub-nyquist Sampling Encoding), was to be offered to the world as a new transmission standard. If the MUSE proposal, led by Sony and NHK (Nipon Hoso Kyokai), were adopted by the international standard body CCIR, that would spell an end to the current TV transmission standards NTSC (National Television Systems Committee) and PAL/SECAM (Phase Alternative by Line/Systèm Electronique Couleur avec Mémoire), developed in the United States and Europe respectively.4 What were the different roles played by the major public authorities, including the European Commission, the Council of Ministers, and the national governments (especially the French Government), in trying to manipulate the way that the European HDTV system, a flagship project of the European Union, was to be developed to deal with the competitive threat from Japan? With the disappearance of indigenous American manufacturers and the rapidly shrinking size of European consumer electronics industry, if the MUSE standard was adopted, a new generation of audio-visual equipment would have to be made to the new Japanese standard. HDTV, therefore, was inherently a ‘strategic’ technology on the political agenda in the Triad economies—Japan, Europe, and the United States.
The Role of the European Commission The European response to the Japanese challenge in the field of HDTV was kick-started by the European Commission. Japan was hoping that the CCIR would recommend its MUSE proposal as a new global standard but the European Commission alerted the European consumer electronics industry of the strategic implications of the Japanese technology if unchallenged (Cawson 1995). Sharing the concern of the European Commission, allied European governments fiercely objected to the Japanese HDTV proposal at the CCIR Plenary held in Dubrovnik in May 1986 (Dai 2000). In view of the disagreement, the CCIR decided to postpone its decision on a global HDTV standard by four years and asked the European countries to come up with an alternative system to MUSE. With tacit encouragement from the European Commission and strong backing from some EU member states,5 a consortium of European firms, led by Philips and Thomson, came up with a European HDTV proposal, which
54
Who Led Europe?
Table 3.1. HDTV systems in the Triad economies (early 1990s) Country/ Transmission Transmission Main region standard method technology Japan
Europe
USA
Main participants
Public subsidy
Result
MUSE
Satellite
Analogue
Japanese firms
Yes
Adopted and launched in Japan
HD-MAC
Satellite
Analogue
European firms
Yes
Adopted but failed in Europe
ATSC
Terrestrial
Digital
American, European, and Japanese firms
No
Adopted and launched in the USA
was submitted to the Eureka Secretariat and was subsequently accepted as the Eureka 95 Project (or EU95). EU95 was intended to develop a European HDTV system, named HD-MAC (High Definition-Multiplexed Analogue Component), to rival the Japanese MUSE. Now that the Japanese HDTV proposal was blocked by European countries, the American government decided to develop an American system. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) stipulated that the future American HDTV system would have to be a fully digital system suitable for terrestrial transmission. Unlike the European approach, the FCC invited both domestic and foreign companies to join efforts in developing HDTV technologies. The FCC encouraged competing groups of companies to create a single HDTV standard on the basis of their differing systems. This has led to the formation of the ‘Grand Alliance’ consisting of American, European, and Japanese firms. The joint effort of the Grand Alliance has resulted in the successful development of a fully digital HDTV system branded the ATSC (Advanced Television Systems Committee). Rapid development of digital HDTV technologies in the United States has made the process of global standardization for HDTV more complicated. By the early 1990s global competition for HDTV became dominated by three entirely different camps: the Japanese MUSE, the European HD-MAC, and the American ATSC; a typical manifestation of the high technology race within the Triad economies since the 1980s (see Table 3.1). In June1990, General Instrument (GI), an American semiconductors company, announced that HDTV programme signals could be digitally compressed and delivery via terrestrial broadcasting using a 6 MHz channel. This was opposite to both the EU95 and the Japanese approaches, which assumed
Guiding the Digital Revolution
55
that fully digital HDTV might not be achievable and the large volume of information required for displaying an HDTV picture would require satellite transmission (supported by cable redistribution) as a necessity. HD-MAC seemed doomed by the breakthrough in digital compression technologies in the US. Instead of acknowledging the failure of EU HDTV policy, the European Commission continued its effort to rescue HD-MAC. More specifically, the European Commission proposed an ‘Action Plan’ offering C850m of subsidy to further develop the HD-MAC system and help boost MAC programmemaking over a five-year period (1992–6) (European Commission 1992). At this point, the issue of HDTV became a matter of high politics in Europe— intergovernmental wrangling between EU member states took place regarding budget allocation.
The Council of Ministers and HDTV In the context of competition in the Triad economies, and endorsing the view of the European Commission, the Council of Ministers came to a consensus in the early days of HDTV technologies that ‘high-definition television (HDTV) is of strategic importance for the European consumer electronics industry and for the European television and film industries’ (Council of Ministers 1989). To ensure the success of the system developed by the European HDTV project, the Council of Ministers devoted considerable legislative resources to HDTV. During the period 1986–95, the Council adopted eight pieces of legislation on advanced TV broadcasting technologies alone (see Table 3.2) mainly to promote the European HD-MAC system. In a surprisingly speedy manner, only a few months after the 1986 CCIR conference, the Council adopted the ‘MAC Directive’ to make the MAC standards family the sole choice for satellite broadcasting and cable redistribution of TV programmes: For direct operational satellite television broadcasting, and subsequent redistribution by cable, member states shall take all measures by law or administrative action to ensure the use of only the following [MAC] systems. . . . member states shall select the system or systems of the MAC/packet family which is or are more appropriate to the present or future structure of their direct broadcasting by satellite or cable distribution networks and shall inform the Commission of their selection. (Council of Ministers 1986)
The plan of the EU95 project was to develop a European HD-MAC system on the basis of an already existing MAC technology. Quite simply, HDMAC was a HD (High Definition) version of the MAC standards family.
56
Who Led Europe?
Table 3.2. EU legislation on advanced TV broadcasting technologies (1986–1995) Type of legislation
Title of legislation
Date
Reference
Council Directive
on the adoption of common technical specifications of the MAC/packet family of standards for direct satellite television broadcasting
03/11/86
86/529/EEC
Council Decision
on high-definition television
27/04/89
89/337/EEC
Council Decision
on the common action to be taken by the member states with respect to the adoption of a single world-wide high-definition television production standard by the Plenary Assembly of the International Radio Consultative Committee (CCIR) in 1990
07/12/89
89/630/EEC
Council Directive
on the adoption of standards for satellite broadcasting of television signals
11/05/92
92/38/EEC
Council Decision
on an action plan for the introduction of advanced television services in Europe
22/07/93
93/424/EEC
Council Resolution
on the development of technology and standards in the field of advanced television services
22/07/93
93/C209/01
Council Resolution
on a framework for Community policy on digital video broadcasting
27/06/94
94/C181/02
Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council
on the use of standards for the transmission of television signals
24/10/95
95/47/EC
Therefore, any official protection and promotion extended to MAC would be advantageous to HD-MAC. It is also true that at the time when the MAC Directive was adopted HD-MAC as a technology was not even in existence; it was merely a proposal. This suggests that the Council decided to mandate a specific technology into an official standard by means of legislation rather than by market choice, with the expectation that a consortium of indigenous firms would come up with a solution to fill the gap with the help of public funding. Following on from the 1986 MAC Directive, a Council Directive in 1992 set a regulatory framework of standards for advanced television broadcasting based on the HD-MAC standard for European satellite and cable transmission for non-fully digital HDTV (Council of Ministers 1992). In a similar manner, another Directive, issued in October 1995, stipulated that all television
Guiding the Digital Revolution
57
services transmitted to viewers in the Community whether by cable, satellite or terrestrial means use the HD-MAC transmission system, if they are in high definition, and are not fully digital (Council of Ministers 1995). The eagerness of the Council of Ministers to foster a European technology by legislation in 1986 could in part be explained by the fact that the same year also saw the signing of the Single European Act, which gave the EU a new responsibility for scientific research. Advanced TV broadcasting technologies seemed to be an ideal area, in which the EU could start to exercise its newly acquired power.
High Definition High Politics: The Role of the Member States The issue of subsidizing HD-MAC brought a head-on clash between the British and the French Governments. Partly for ideological reasons, as well as the absence of any major British firms in the field of consumer electronics in general and HDTV in particular, the UK Government strongly objected to the Commission’s 1992 Action Plan and threatened to exercise its veto power. Meanwhile, the fact that Rupert Murdoch’s Sky Television was using the old PAL standard, rather than the officially sanctioned new MAC standard, was an additional reason why the Major Government was not interested in pouring public funds into the failing HD-MAC. In the end, a compromise deal was reached and the Action Plan was approved but with a substantially reduced budget of C228m. In addition to the reduction in subsidy, the revised Action Plan would support more generic aspects of advanced TV broadcasting, rather than narrowly focusing on HD-MAC. For instance, it would simply promote widescreen (meaning a picture ratio of 16 : 9, compared to 4 : 3 of the standard TV screen shape) TV programme-making to any new TV standard in the Community. The official rhetoric of the UK Government was that the original Action Plan was unjustifiable because it would subsidize an obsolete HD-MAC technology, bearing in mind that digital HDTV for terrestrial transmission had already become technologically viable in the US. The UK Government could certainly veto any EU budget for rescuing HDMAC but it might not be able to block the French and Dutch Governments from subsiding Thomson and Philips respectively via the Eureka framework. Within the Eureka framework, R&D projects undertaken by companies would receive funding from these companies’ home governments. This might be one of the principal reasons why European firms acted so quickly after the 1986 CCIR conference to submit their HDTV project proposal to the Eureka Secretariat. It is an open secret that reliable figures on precisely how much public
58
Who Led Europe?
funding was spent by national governments on Eureka projects have never been made available (Peterson and Sharp 1998). Nevertheless, it is estimated that the EU and Eureka member states have provided public funds in the order of C1 billion to the EU95 project (Dai 1996).
LEADING THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION: THE ROLE OF FIRMS IN THE RISE OF DVB In view of the rapid progress in digital TV technologies in the USA, Philips announced in early 1993 that it had suspended plans for mass-producing HDTV sets to the European HD-MAC standard due to lack of high definition programme-making in the European system. An alternative and perhaps more convincing explanation is that Philips was already of the view that future HDTV broadcasting in Europe would also be fully digital, which could not be achieved via HD-MAC. The Philips announcement heralded the end of the HD-MAC venture and it also repudiated a failed EU technology policy on HDTV. The debacle of HD-MAC did not significantly disadvantage Europe in the global competition for advanced TV systems, though. This is true in two senses. First, indigenous development in digital TV, although without EU support, actually took place at the industry level. Second, the leading European firms, in particular Philips, continued to take the lead in digital TV development, both within and outside Europe, despite the abandonment of the European flagship project. The success in digital TV technologies in the United States was coupled with the birth of the European Launching Group (ELG) for Digital Video Broadcasting at the end of 1991. The mission of the Group was to oversee the development of digital television in Europe as an industry effort. With the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in September 1993 by 120 members, the ELG renamed itself as DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting), as the world began to see the development of alternative digital TV standards outside the United States. To the DVB group, and contrary to the EU official position, ‘it was becoming clear that the once state-of-the-art MAC systems would have to give way to all-digital technology’ (DVB 2003a). To be sure, the European Commission from the start sent representatives to the meetings of the DVB group. However, the European Commission is not a signatory of the DVB group’s MoU. The European Commission has a seat on the Steering Board but its representative does not have voting rights, according to the DVB’s statutes, i.e. the MoU (DVB 1996).
Guiding the Digital Revolution
59
Table 3.3. Adoption of digital TV standards in the Triad economies (December 2005) USA ATSC (American) DSS (American) OpenCable (American) DVB-S (European) DVB-C (European)
Europe DVB-T (European) DVB-S (European) DVB-C (European)
Japan ISDB-T (Japanese) DVB-S (European) DVB-C (European)
DVB is now a consortium of 270 member organizations, consisting of broadcasters, manufacturers, network operators, software developers, and regulatory bodies from over 35 countries. Unlike the officially backed HDMAC system, which was narrowly focused on satellite transmission of high definition HDTV signals, the DVB project has developed a range of digital TV transmission standards facilitating terrestrial transmission (DVB-T), satellite broadcasting (DVB-S), cable redistribution (DVB-C), and multimedia communication (Multimedia Home Platform or MHP). This makes DVB a highly open and flexible systems family and DVB can now take on the competition from the US (with its ATSC digital TV standards) and Japan that has also recently developed its own digital terrestrial TV standard, i.e. the ISDB-T (Terrestrial Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting) system, alongside the MUSE standard for HDTV broadcasting. Compared to both ATSC and ISDB-T, DVB seems to be more successful. As shown in Table 3.3, the adoption of the DVB standards has become a reality in Europe, where the three main variants of digital TV standards DVB-T, DVB-S, and DVB-C are already in service. In the Triad of Europe, the US, and Japan, DVB has penetrated into the Japanese and American territories whilst there is no presence of Japanese or American digital TV standards in Europe. More specifically, the DVB-S and DVB-C standards are being used in Japan and the US alongside their indigenous digital TV standards. In terms of fending off competitors, DVB has already achieved what the officially instated HD-MAC failed to do. There may well be many factors contributing to the success of DVB. The most important one, however, seems to be that ‘DVB’s success is underpinned by a market-led approach driven by the CM [Commercial Module]. This ensures that technical work is completed to a set of functional requirements, cost targets and deadlines’ (DVB 2003b). Under the DVB Steering Board, there are four specialized ‘Modules’: the Commercial Module, the Technical Module, the IPR (Intellectual Property Right) Module, and the Promotions
60
Who Led Europe?
and Communications Module. Work of standards development at DVB starts with the Commercial Module that produces commercial requirements. The requirements set down by the Commercial Module are given to the Technical Module, where technical specifications are developed. The Commercial Module will then validate each set of technical specifications against the commercial requirements it had set before passing them to the Steering Board for final approval. Once approved, a specific standard will be promoted worldwide by the Promotion and Communications Module. The IPR Module is responsible for dealing with issues related to intellectual property rights. The DVB project is not driven by a sense of technological superiority. Rather, a set of commercial requirements is said to govern each and every DVB specification (ibid.). This is a major deviation from the European tradition of research and development, which overemphasized technologies whilst paying insufficient attention to market requirements.
AGENDA-SETTING FOR TECHNICAL CHANGE: WHO LEADS? The rise of DVB and the fall of HD-MAC have implications for considering the governance of technical change. In particular, the effectiveness of European technology policy, as manifested in the case of HD-MAC, was dwarfed by the power of the market. Despite utilizing almost every means that trade protectionists could think of, such as public subsidies, policy favours, and legislative backing, the European HD-MAC standard failed to live up to official expectation. In contrast, the industry-led effort in developing the DVB standards put Europe back into a leading position, so far as advanced TV technologies are concerned. The UK is one of the least enthusiastic member states in terms of supporting the interventionist EU policy towards developing the next generation TV systems. Despite its government’s lack of enthusiasm in promoting HDMAC, the UK has not become disadvantaged in the development of digital TV broadcasting. On the contrary, the UK was the first European country to introduce all three major platforms of digital TV services: digital satellite broadcasting (by Sky Digital in 1998 using the DVB-S standard); digital terrestrial broadcasting (initially by ONdigital in 1998 using the DVB-T standard now replaced by Freeview); and digital cable delivery (by TeleWest in 1999 using the DVB-C standard). In comparison, France, the most active member state in pursuing an interventionist policy toward HD-MAC, did not see digital terrestrial broadcasting until March 2005.6 It is rather ironic that television viewers in France today are beginning to experience digital TV
Guiding the Digital Revolution
61
from the non-official DVB project (DVB-T more specifically), rather than the officially favoured HD-MAC technology! The spectacular failure of HD-MAC and the unexpected success of DVB have certainly dealt EU policy-makers, including the European Commission, the Council of Ministers, and the French Government, a powerful blow. The EU finally accepted in 1995 that the outcome of technological standardization should be determined by market forces, rather than policy-makers (Council of Ministers 1995). EU technology policy towards HD-MAC was heavily biased towards protecting the interest of national or Eurochampions, such as Philips and Thomson, that were leading the EU95 project. The interests of consumers and TV broadcasters were at most given secondary consideration in EU policy towards HDTV up until 1993, when the European HD-MAC standard flopped. In comparison, the DVB approach allows for open and equal participation by any member company and organization in the process of agenda-setting for digital TV technologies. DigiTAG, an organization advocating the adoption of digital terrestrial TV, argues that, through the DVB project, ‘[t]he interests of the viewer, broadcast content suppliers, network operators and consumer equipment manufacturers are all best served in an open environment in which the implemented digital television systems are fully interoperable’ (DigiTAG, no date). Corporate strategy does not necessarily serve the interest of public policy. In addition to its leading role in the EU95 project to develop HD-MAC, Philips is a key player in both the DVB project in Europe and the ATSC in the USA. The fact that the current chairman of the DVB project’s Steering Board in Europe and the vice chairman of the board of directors of the ATSC (Advanced Television Systems Committee) in the United States are both Philips men is indicative of how well positioned and closely involved Philips is in the international market of digital TV technologies. It is one of the leading companies in the development of digital TV standards on both sides of the Atlantic. Whereas EU technology policy was conceived with a conscious understanding of Europe’s external borders in international trade, corporate strategies for European multinationals were globally oriented. After all, world-class corporations are less likely to be produced by inwardlooking technology policies. The opposite may well be true, too. EU and French technology policies have not prevented Thomson Multimedia from falling into an extremely embarrassing position in 1996, when the French Government was prevented from selling the former national champion for a symbolic franc to Daewoo of South Korea (Hayward 1997, 160).7 The case of HD-MAC suggests that the most tangible link between corporate strategies and technology policy was public funds (for instance, subsidies
62
Who Led Europe?
and R&D grants at national and EU level) and policy favours (such as the MAC Directive and the Commission’s HD-MAC Action Plan). Once the sources of public funding dried up the link became hardly meaningful.
CONCLUSION Although some European policy community actors, at both the national and supranational levels, were eager to be involved in setting the agenda for technical change, there are important lessons to be learned from the outcomes of European technology policy. In the case of HDTV development in Europe, the outcome of policy, legislative, and financial support extended to HD-MAC was undoubtedly disastrous—a technology that nobody wanted! The policy actors could not affix blame for the fiasco because no single institution was able to provide political leadership in the first place. Having identified HDTV as a strategic technology, which would be vital to maintaining Europe’s international competitiveness, the European Commission seemed to be keen on mobilizing the European consumer electronic industry to take on the Japanese challenge. By promoting HD-MAC, the European Commission hoped it would be able to demonstrate that it was the institution behind European technology policy. With the assumption that HDTV was a strategic technology that would have significant implications for European competitiveness, the Council of Ministers embarked upon a lengthy process of making detailed legislation in order to ensure the success of HD-MAC. Between the mid-1980s and mid1990s, the Council of Ministers passed an impressive range of directives, decisions, and resolutions concerning advanced TV technologies. By exercising its legislative power, the Council might seem to be the source of leadership in the promotion of HD-MAC, given the fact that it is undoubtedly the most powerful institution in EU decision-making in general. However, as soon as the issue of EU subsidy came up, high politics intervened. Intergovernmental bargaining led to substantial reduction in the amount of EU subsidy towards promoting HD-MAC. The Council of Ministers, far from being an effective leadership institution, was weakened by the tensions between different national interests and between different ideologies with regard to public subsidy towards indigenous technologies. The fact that none of the EU institutions could dictate the agenda of Eureka as a pan-European programme is another important dimension to the politics of HDTV. Established as a key project of Eureka, EU95 has served as a useful as well as non-controversial avenue for the pro-HD-MAC states, in particular
Guiding the Digital Revolution
63
France, to commit additional funding towards this technology. In the absence of strong resistance from countries such as the UK in the Council of Ministers, France was able to play a leading role in promoting the EU95 project, although this leadership was biased towards supporting a failing national champion, Thomson Multimedia. EU technology policy has failed to make Europe a leader at the global level in the case of HDTV. This policy failure was matched with an institutional failure: none of the eager players, including the European Commission, the Council of Ministers, and the French Government, was able to establish a sole and effective leadership over the issue of HD-MAC, which was unquestionably another European white elephant. In stark contrast, the DVB project has successfully delivered a set of digital TV standards without resorting to public subsidy or legislative backing. Rather, the DVB project started with identifying market needs and endeavoured to meet these needs. Thanks to the effort of the DVB project, Europe has led the field of digital broadcasting. DVB has achieved the objectives that the EU95 project failed to deliver: to make Europe a technological leader rather than a follower. Although EU technology policy was genuinely oriented towards improving European competitiveness, this objective seems to have been better achieved by European firms’ corporate strategy, which was preoccupied with achieving global competitiveness in the race for establishing new TV standards. In short, European technology policy has failed to set the appropriate agenda to guide Europe’s digital revolution because the policy itself was misguided. The presence of multiple policy actors in promoting HD-MAC has not led to the establishment of a European policy and political leadership. Together, the contrasting experiences of HD-MAC and DVB offer a salutary lesson to the present-day EU policy-makers in terms of what is meant by European competitiveness and who should be responsible for Europe’s position in the global competition for new technologies.
NOTES 1. Étienne Davignon was the European commissioner for industry during the period 1977 to 1985. Davignon played a key role in promoting interventionist policies in favour of the European industry during this period characterized by continued competition from the US in the field of computer-related technologies and cut-throat competition from Japan in consumer electronics. 2. The Delors White Paper refers to the European Commission (1993). Due to the personal involvement by the then Commission president, Jacques Delors, in the drafting of this White Paper, it has become known as the Delors White Paper.
64
Who Led Europe?
3. The First Framework Programme was launched to cover the four-year period 1984–7. Others followed, including the Sixth Framework Programme (2002–6). 4. The NTSC standard was developed by RCA in the United States in 1954 and PAL and SECAM by AEG-Telefunken in Germany and CSF (Compagnie Générale de Télégraphie sans Fils) in France respectively in the early 1960s. 5. Most notably France and the Netherlands, home countries for Thomson and Philips respectively. 6. The long-delayed French digital terrestrial TV broadcasting platform is called TV numerique terrestre (TNT) or digital terrestrial television. Although a latecomer in launching digital TV services among West European countries, the French Government now aims to speed up the process of analogue switch-off through legislation, to be achieved during the period 31 March 2008 to 30 November 2011. 7. Having returned to profitability, Thomson Multimedia has now found a more acceptable rescue—it has entered a joint venture arrangement with TCL of China, with the latter controlling two-thirds of stakes in the new company.
REFERENCES A, M. T., and M, H. V. (2001) ‘Strategies of European Standardization’, Journal of European Public Policy 8/3: Special Issue, 411–31. C, A. (1995) ‘High Definition Television in Europe’, The Political Quarterly 66/2: 157–73. C, D. (1997), ‘The Evolution of the Large Firm as a Political Actor in the European Union’, Journal of European Public Policy 4/1: 91–108. Council of Ministers (1986) Council Directive of 3 November 1986 on the adoption of common technical specifications of the MAC/packet family of standards for direct satellite television broadcasting, 86/529/EEC. (1989) Council Decision of 27 April 1989 on high-definition television, 89/337/EEC. (1992) Council Directive of 11 May 1992 on the adoption of standards for satellite broadcasting of television signals, 92/38/EEC. (1995) Council Directive of 23 November 1995 on the Use of Standards for the Transmission of Television Signals, 95/47/EC. D, X. (1996) Corporate Strategy, Public Policy and New Technologies: Philips and the European Consumer Electronics Industry. Oxford: Pergamon. (2000) The Digital Revolution and Governance. Aldershot: Ashgagte. DTAG (no date), ‘About DigiTAG: Objectives’, URL, , accessed 4 September 2005. DVB (1996), ‘MoU: DVB’s Memorandum of Understanding’, revised version, URL, , accessed 22 August 2005. (2003a), ‘History of the DVB Project: The First Ten Years’, URL, , accessed 3 September 2005.
Guiding the Digital Revolution
65
(2003b), ‘Commercial Module: DVB-CM’, URL, , accessed 7 September 2005. European Commission (1992) Proposal for a Council Decision on an Action Plan for the Introduction of Advanced Television Services in Europe, COM (92) 154 final, Brussels, 5 May. (1993) White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment: the Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21st Century, COM (93) 700 final. (2004) European Competitiveness Report: Competitiveness and Benchmarking, SEC (2004) 1397, 8 July, Brussels. (2005a) ‘Pooling Resources for European Leadership in IST’, 5 July, URL, , accessed 25 August 2005. (2005b) Proposal for a Decision of the European Parliament and of the Council Establishing a Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (2007–2013), Commission Staff Working Document, Annex, SEC (2005) 433, 4 June, Brussels. T E U (no date), Consolidated Version of the Treaty Establishing the European Community, URL, , accessed 12 June 2007. H, J. A. (2004) Technology, Television and Competition: The Politics of Digital TV. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. H, J. (1997) ‘Changing Partnerships: Firms and the French State’, Modern & Contemporary France 5/2: 155–65. K, P. R. (1994) ‘Competitiveness: A Dangerous Obsession’, Foreign Affairs 73/2: 28–44. OECD (1996) Industrial Competitiveness. Paris: OECD. P, J., and S, M. (1998) Technology Policy in the European Union. Basingstoke: Macmillan. S, S. (1998) ‘Who Are EU? Ambiguities in the Concept of Competitiveness; Confusion concerning Causes and Consequences’, Journal of Common Market Studies 36/1: 101–14. T, L. (1993) Head to Head: The Coming Economic Battle among Japan, Europe, and America. London: Nicholas Brealey. T, L. D’A. (1992) Who’s Bashing Whom? Trade Conflict in High-Technology Industries. Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics.
4 Environmental Policy: EU Actors, Leader and Laggard States Rüdiger K. W. Wurzel
Environmental policy was not mentioned in the 1957 Rome Treaty because such issues were not politically salient in the 1950s. Immediately after the Second World War, political reconciliation and economic recovery were the main political priorities in Western Europe. However, by the time the 1987 Single European Act (SEA) introduced an explicit legal base for a common environmental policy into the Rome Treaty, more than 100 legally binding EU environmental measures had been adopted (Wurzel 2002). It is therefore no exaggeration to argue that ‘[c]ompletely unanticipated in 1957, [EU] environmental policy had moved from silence to salience within thirty years’ (Weale 1999: 40). The majority of the EU’s early environmental policy measures consisted of regulations which harmonized nationally different product standards (e.g. car emission regulations) on the grounds that they were barriers to trade within the internal market (Bungarten 1978; Rehbinder and Stewart 1985). In the absence of explicit environmental policy provisions in the EC Treaty, it was the internal market provision (formerly article 100, now article 95) which served as the main legal basis for the adoption of common environmental policy measures prior to 1987. Early EU environmental policy could therefore be regarded as ‘a textbook illustration of the [Monnet] method at work’ (Weale 1999: 40). Jean Monnet had envisaged that functional spill-over, issue-linkage pressures, and engrenage would become major driving forces for the adoption of new common policies which in turn would foster deeper political integration (see Chapter 1, above). In accordance with the Monnet method, the Commission used its initiative monopoly to propose the harmonization of nationally different environmental standards in order both to ensure the functioning of the internal market and to expand the EU’s (and thus also its own) institutional powers. Member governments and the pro-integrationist European Court of
Environmental Policy
67
Justice (ECJ) went along with this ‘integration by stealth’ (Hayward 1996; see also Weale 1999). Starting in the 1970s, the ECJ backed a wide interpretation of existing EC Treaty provisions to legitimize the adoption of common environmental policy measures. As early as their summit meeting in Paris in October 1972, the Heads of States and Government agreed that the EU should have a common environmental policy (Bungarten 1978). However, retrospectively they legitimized formally the EU’s rapidly growing number of environmental laws (i.e. secondary law) only when they adopted the SEA (i.e. primary law). The Monnet method and its underlying functionalist logic are crucial for understanding the EU’s adoption of a common environmental policy. Nevertheless, this explains only part of a more complex story. As Albert Weale (1999: 40) has pointed out: Patterns of environmental policy are not explained by the pure logic of spillover. . . . Other pressures and trends associated more generally with the rise of international environmental politics as well as developments wholly within the realm of domestic politics have played their part. Yet, without the impetus of functional spillover, the domestic and European politics of environmental policy would have been different.
It was the United Nations’ (UN) first major environmental conference in Stockholm in June 1972 which forced the EU’s Heads of State and Government to discuss environmental issues at their Paris summit in October 1972. At the 1972 UN Stockholm conference, member governments advanced different views and made conflicting proposals about a common environmental policy while the EU Presidency, then held by Luxembourg, was unable to ensure a unified EU position. Some member governments (e.g. Germany and the Netherlands) demanded relatively ambitious environmental commitments while others dragged their feet (Bungarten 1978). From the late 1960s onwards, a relatively loose EU environmental policy network emerged which was made up of policy actors who, although for different reasons and while relying on asymmetrical power resources, all advocated the adoption of a common environmental policy. The European Parliament (EP) had already supported a common environmental policy since the late 1960s (Bungarten 1978: 161). However, due to being restricted to consultative powers prior to the 1987 SEA, the EP created initially mainly ripples instead of waves (Judge, Earnshaw, and Cohen 1994; Chapter 13, below). The Commission published its first communication on environmental policy in July 1971 (EC Bulletin 9/10) and the Council of Ministers staged its first meeting of the ministers responsible for environmental policy in 1972 after the Heads of State and Government had given the green light for a common environmental policy (Bungarten 1978).
68
Who Led Europe?
Importantly, it was not only member states and EU institutions which lobbied for a common environmental policy early on. Companies which were located in member states with relatively stringent domestic environmental standards were keen on achieving a European ‘level playing field’. They often lobbied their host states to push for EU-wide uniform environmental standards. Many environmental non-governmental organizations (NGOs), which had initially been sceptical about what they perceived as the EU’s neo-liberal market agenda, gradually began to support the adoption of stringent common environmental standards. Finally, the public in most member states also started to support the EU’s environmental policy involvement (Eurobarometer 1999). However, although there was no shortage of potential leaders pushing for the move into the new environmental policy field, EU environmental policy actors often pulled in different directions. While environmental NGOs and environmental leader states pressed hard for the ‘racheting upwards’ (Vogel 1997) of EU environmental standards to the level of the most stringent domestic standards, most businesses and environmental laggard states favoured lowest common denominator (LCD) solutions. As unanimity was required for the adoption of common policy measures prior to the 1987 SEA, some observers expected the creation of a ‘joint decision trap’ in which veto actors would insist either on LCD solutions or demand side-payments (e.g. additional EU regional funding) thus leading to suboptimal solutions (Scharpf 1988). However, although a small number of Commission proposals for common environmental standards (e.g. for pulp-producing industries) was blocked by veto actors, most EU environmental policy measures went well beyond LCD solutions (Héritier et al. 1996; Weale et al. 2000; Wurzel 2002).
JUSTIFICATIONS FOR EU ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY The four most important justifications for the EU’s environmental policy involvement can be summarized as follows (similarly Rehbinder and Stewart 1985; Weale 1999; Wurzel 2002). First, different national environmental standards can create barriers to trade which endanger the functioning of the internal market. Immediately, one has to differentiate between product standards (e.g. car emission limits) and process standards (e.g. standards which regulate production processes in factories). There is agreement that different national environmental product standards ought to be harmonized because products can otherwise not be traded freely across borders. Political disagreement about product standards occurred mainly about the level of stringency at which
Environmental Policy
69
harmonization should occur—that of environmental leader states or the environmental laggard states? Justifying the harmonization of process standards on the EU level was less straightforward. Different national process standards do not usually create barriers to trade as they target stationary objects (e.g. factories). However, companies based in environmental leader states often lobbied their governments to ensure that EU regulations impose a level playing field. Moreover, ‘high regulatory states’ (Héritier et al. 1996) with a relatively high level of (environmental) regulations that may not necessarily be very stringent but exhibit distinct national regulatory styles and philosophies—were keen to avoid adaptation costs and therefore tried to export (or ‘upload’) to the EU level their domestic environmental regulations together with their preferred national environmental regulatory styles and philosophies (Héritier et al. 1996; Jordan and Liefferink 2004; Weale et al. 2000; Wurzel 2002). Alberta Sbragia (1996) has identified a ‘push–pull’ dynamic that allows environmental leader states to push for stringent EU environmental standards and pull laggards up to their level of stringency. Similarly, David Vogel (1997) has argued that a ‘trading up’ takes place which allows the rich, environmentally minded Northern member states with large markets to ‘ratchet upwards’ the EU’s environmental product standards to their national level. Member states with high levels of public environmental awareness and ecological vulnerability strongly favoured the harmonization of both product and process standards. Germany’s dense population pattern, heavy reliance on industrial production for economic growth, and geographic location at the centre of Europe, made it particularly vulnerable to domestic and transnational pollution. However, uniform process standards were opposed as environmentally unnecessary and economically damaging by member states such as island Britain which enjoyed lower ecological vulnerability. As The Times put it on 11 December 1976: ‘[T]o impose uniform controls, irrespective of the capacity of different environments to absorb waste, would be like insisting that Italian and French winegrowers install heated glass houses of the kind that would be needed to grow grapes in Scotland.’ However, in the 1970s, at a time of low public environmental awareness and great economic difficulties, Britain not only tried to take advantage of its higher environmental ‘carrying capacity’ but also externalized the cost of pollution prevention measures by adopting a high chimney and long sea outfalls policy which widely dispersed domestic pollutants (e.g. sulphur dioxide and sewage) that subsequently caused environmental damage to other states (e.g. acidification in Sweden) and/or public goods (e.g. algae bloom in the North Sea). Considering that unanimity was required for the adoption of EU environmental policy measures until the 1987 SEA introduced qualified majority
70
Who Led Europe?
voting (QMV), Scharpf ’s (1988) joint decision trap should have applied to both product and process standards. However, as Scharpf (1996) himself recognized, the EU actually managed to adopt a wide range of relatively ambitious environmental product standards even before the SEA came into force, although few environmental process standards were adopted prior to 1987. Second, many environmental problems are transnational problems which cannot be tackled successfully by states acting in isolation. The EU therefore provided a more appropriate regulatory arena. Even in cases where the EU was not the most appropriate environmental regulatory arena (e.g. because major polluters were not member states), a coordinated policy stance usually provided member governments with greater bargaining power at the international level. Moreover, common EU targets in international environmental agreements granted member states greater flexibility during the implementation phase. A classic example is the EU’s greenhouse gases emission reduction target under the Kyoto Protocol. The EU has agreed to reduce collectively its greenhouse gas emissions by 8 per cent by the year 2010 (compared to 1990). However, while Britain and Germany both accepted national reductions of more than 8 per cent, other, member states have to achieve lower reduction targets while the less industrialized southern member states will be allowed to increase their emissions. Despite the advantages which a common ‘foreign EU environmental policy’ provides, member governments were initially reluctant to concede powers to the Commission in international environmental politics. However, the pro-integrationist ECJ ruled (most famously in its so-called AETR decision) that whenever the EU ‘has promulgated internal rules in a certain field, i.e. has taken measures binding on the member states, then the powers to act externally in that field are created’ (Haigh 1992: 239).1 At a time when the EU’s ‘domestic environmental policy’ entered a defensive and reorientation phase in the 1990s, the Commission pushed hard to expand the EU’s leadership role in international environmental politics. The Commission attempted to regain the momentum for a common ‘domestic environmental policy’ by trying to ensure that the EU is committed to relatively ambitious ‘foreign environmental policy’ targets. Third, many pollution problems are the result of legitimate activities such as industrial production (Weale 1992). In other words, legitimate market activities may result in ‘negative externalities’ (e.g. environmental pollution) which can be controlled through market-interventionist measures (e.g. regulations) or market-based instruments (e.g. eco-taxes). The conventional neo-liberal and socialist views were that there is a trade-off between economic growth and environmental protection. However, they were challenged by the ‘ecological modernization’ doctrine which gained in influence in Northern European
Environmental Policy
71
states within strong environmentally minded social democratic parties and/or Green parties and amongst the EP’s Environmental Committee and the Commission’s directorate general (DG) for Environment, during the late 1980s in particular. Ecological modernization proponents argued that stringent domestic environmental regulations would benefit the economy in the long term as companies would have to use scarce resources more efficiently while producing less polluting products which environmental laggard states would have to import when faced with serious environmental problems (Schröder 1989; Töpfer 1989; Weale 1992). Proponents of ecological modernization therefore endorsed what Michael Porter (1990) identified as the ‘competitive advantage of nations’ which create lead markets for innovative products and production technologies (Jänicke 2006). However, when, in the early 1990s, economic recession gripped Europe while environmental public awareness started to ebb, ecological modernization proponents found themselves on the defensive. Fourth, from the late 1960s onwards, it became clear that economic growth resulting in grave environmental pollution was not compatible with the raising of living standards which had been endorsed as one of the EU’s primary objectives in the 1957 Rome Treaty. In the early 1970s, the EU adopted a common environmental policy not only to protect the environment but also to raise the quality of life for its citizens. The quality of life aspects help to explain the early enthusiasm of some EU environmental policy actors (the Commission and EP in particular) for the protection of local ‘public goods’ (e.g. bathing waters) in addition to tackling transnational ‘public ills’ (e.g. transnational air pollution) (Weale 1999). EU environmental policy was also a means of providing the EU with a ‘human face’ in order to (re)gain public support for the wider European integration project which had stalled in the 1960s. Similarly, the EU’s more recent efforts, to take on a leader role in international climate change politics is at least partly driven by strong public support for tackling the threat of climate change.
PHASES IN EU ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY Broadly speaking, the following five phases of EU environmental policy can be identified (similarly Hildebrand 1992): (1) 1958–72: Infant phase; (2) 1972–87: Adolescent phase; (3) 1987–92: Mature phase; (4) 1992–2005: Sedate phase; (5) Since 2005: Selective activism. These phases broadly recall Anthony Downs’s (1972) issue attention cycle: the pre-problem stage; alarmed discovery and euphoric enthusiasm; realizing
72
Who Led Europe?
the cost of significant progress; gradual decline of intense public interest; and, post-problem stage. However, as Downs (1972: 109–11) himself recognized, many environmental problems are long-term problems (e.g. climate change) which are unlikely to be resolved with short-term measures. Downs therefore argued that environmental problems may be processed more quickly through the issue attention cycle than most other public policy problems.
Infant Phase: 1958–72 Prior to 1972, common environmental policy measures were mainly concerned with trade and had a strong internal market bias. They were adopted in an incidental manner (Bungarten 1978; Judge 1992: 188). In 1969, the EU tried to revive the internal market project by adopting a legally non-binding Information and Standstill Agreement (Standstill Agreement) which required member governments to inform the Commission about draft national legislation with a potential impact on the internal market while putting it on hold for up to one year in order to allow the Commission sufficient time to propose common legislation instead. The 1969 Standstill Agreement led to a trickle of EU regulations which contained some environmental protection requirements although their main aim was the prevention of trade barriers.
Adolescent Phase: 1972–87 The 1972 Paris European Council marked the beginning of the adolescent phase. At the Paris summit, which was also attended by Denmark, Ireland, and the UK although they joined the EU only in 1973, the Heads of State and Government issued this declaration: ‘[E]conomic expansion, which is not an end in itself, must . . . emerge in an improved quality as well as improved standard of life. In the European spirit special attention will be paid to nonmaterial values and wealth and to the protection of the environment so that progress shall serve mankind.’ (EC Bulletin 10 (1972): 15–16). This somewhat lofty statement was influenced by the rise of post-materialist values (Ingelhart 1971) and the revival of European integration. The Heads of State and Government instructed the Commission to draft the EU’s First Environmental Action Programme (EAP) which they adopted in 1973. The First EAP outlined the main policy principles and indicated the EU’s medium-term environmental priorities. Like all of the six EAPs adopted so far, it was legally non-binding although it provided the Commission with an additional source of legitimacy for common policy proposals.
Environmental Policy
73
In 1973, the 1969 Standstill Agreement was amended to include draft national environmental laws. The 1973 Standstill Agreement induced a ‘follow the pioneer’ effect (Guardian, 29 March 1972) which Eckard Rehbinder and Richard Stewart (1985: 17) have characterized thus: ‘Strongly environmentalist member states were more or less able to set the pace and direction for Community action by unilaterally proposing strong national environmental legislation, which forced the Community to react with measures of its own.’ However, it would be wrong to argue that EU institutional actors reacted passively to the pace and direction set by ‘green’ member states. Already from the late 1960s onwards, the EP prepared several environmental reports and the percentage of questions which the EP put to the Commission on environmental issues rose from 0.8 to 6.9 per cent between 1969–73 (Bungarten 1978: 129–30). However, prior to the 1987 SEA, the EP only had consultation powers, which severely limited its influence (Judge 1992; Chapter 13, below). At a meeting in Bonn in 1972, the ministers responsible for environmental policy—not all member states had yet set up an Environment Ministry— agreed that proposals for common environmental policy measures could be based on one of these: (1) the 1973 Standstill Agreement; (2) the EAPs; and, (3) existing Treaty provisions (including the internal market provision (article 94, formerly article 100), the implied powers doctrine (article 308, formerly article 235); and the public policy provision (article 30, formerly article 36)). The implied powers doctrine is typical for federal systems and was therefore frequently contested by the French and British Governments. However, the Commission nevertheless based a small number of early EU environmental policy measures (e.g. the wild birds directive) on article 308. The public policy provision, which allows nationally more stringent environmental standards in cases of public emergencies (e.g. an environmental catastrophe) has been interpreted very narrowly by the ECJ. The internal market provision (article 94) was therefore by far the most important legal base for EU environmental policy prior to the SEA.
Mature Phase: 1987–92 The coming into force of the SEA in 1987 marked the beginning of the mature phase. The SEA introduced environmental Treaty provisions, stipulated QMV for the revised internal market provision (which explicitly mentioned environmental policy) and introduced the cooperation procedure. The number of common environmental laws continued to rise during the mature phase. Up to then EU environmental policy measures consisted almost exclusively of traditional ‘command-and-control’ regulations which
74
Who Led Europe?
were adopted by EU policy-makers on the supranational level but had to be implemented on the member-state level by national and/or local actors. Two developments stand out in this context. First, although the EU was based on ‘liberal foundations’, it used ‘illiberal instruments’ (i.e. ‘commandand-control’ regulations) for environmental policy (Weale 1999; Weale et al. 2000: 458). Actors who demanded the use of ‘new’ environmental policy instruments (NEPIs), such as market-based instruments (i.e. eco-taxes and tradeable permits), voluntary agreements, and eco-labels) received a boost by the 1987 Fourth EAP which proposed the adoption of non-regulatory instruments (Jordan, Wurzel, and Zito 2003: 2005). However, ironically the British government, which had been one of the fiercest critics of the EU’s tendency to develop into a ‘regulatory state’ (Majone 1996: 55) was also the fiercest opponent of EU eco-taxes on sovereignty grounds. Second, after pressure from the EP, the Commission took more seriously the implementation of EU environmental policy from the 1980s onwards. The Commission discovered, with the help of environmental groups which acted as whistleblowers (Mazey and Richardson 1993), that a serious implementation gap existed. Under Environmental Commissioner Ripa di Meana (1989–92), the Commission’s DG Environment repeatedly risked public confrontations with member governments (Wurzel 2002: 66). However, Ripa di Meana’s naming and shaming strategy caused ill-feeling among member governments. Ripa di Meana was praised by environmental NGOs. However, the British prime minister, John Major, derided him as ‘Ripa the Ripper’ for allegedly singling out Britain for failing to implement EU environmental laws (ibid. 146). He was seen as a loose canon within Commission president Jacques Delors’s cabinet (Ross 1995: 197). Ripa di Meana’s strategy would have been untenable without the unprecedented upsurge in public environmental awareness in the early 1990s.
Sedate Phase: 1992–2005 The most important factors which pushed EU environmental policy onto the defensive and into a reorientation phase include the debate about the principle of subsidiarity, a (moderate) decline in public environmental awareness, the search for more cost-effective policy instruments and disagreement about the EU’s broader environmental regulatory philosophy. 1992 constituted a turning point in the history of EU environmental policy. The first half of 1992 was characterized by great optimism and hectic environmental activism. The preparations for the UN 1972 Earth Summit in Rio in June 1992 were in full swing and Environmental Commissioner Ripa di Meana was hopeful that his proposal for a common carbon dioxide/energy tax would
Environmental Policy
75
be adopted on time. On the surface, the EU looked able to present itself at the 1992 UN Rio Summit as a model for regional environmental cooperation. However, the carbon dioxide/energy tax was never adopted and the ‘No’ vote in the first Danish referendum on the Maastricht Treaty in June 1992 triggered a debate about the principle of subsidiarity which pushed EU environmental policy onto the defensive. In June 1993, a ‘hit list’ was drawn up by the French and British Governments which proposed the repatriation of more than 100 EU laws including 24 environmental laws (Wurzel 2002). Although none of the EU environmental laws listed was later scrapped, DG Environment shifted its preference for ambitious regulations derived from the best available technology (BAT) principle towards more flexible framework directives, costeffectiveness appraisals, and procedural measures. In the 1990s, Britain developed from a reactive ‘policy taker’ towards a more proactive ‘policy shaper’ (Jordan and Liefferink 2004) in EU environmental policy, although it became an environmental leader only for a limited number of specific issues (such as climate change and the integration of environmental requirements into other policy sectors). Britain lobbied hard for flexible environmental quality objectives, framework directives, procedural measures, and soft policy instruments. Germany, on the other hand, lost some of its environmental credentials while coming under pressure from the EU to reform its domestic environmental policy style which relied heavily on detailed emission limits derived from the BAT principle. The adoption rate of traditional EU regulations has slowed down since the 1990s. At the same time, the EU has failed to generate consensus on the adoption of NEPIs which, according to the 1995 Fifth and 2005 Sixth EAPs as well as the Commission’s 2001 White Paper on European Governance (CEC 2001a) were meant to supplement (or even supplant) traditional regulation. There are still no EU-wide eco-taxes and only about one dozen voluntary agreements while the EU’s eco-label scheme lacks corporate and public support. A strong leadership role on the part of the EU (and the Commission in particular) as regards the adoption of NEPIs can only be detected with respect to the EUwide emission trading scheme which became operational in 2005 and infused new momentum into EU environmental policy. Finally, the sedate phase saw the adoption of several, at times contradictory, ‘meta strategies’. The 2000 Lisbon strategy aims to make the EU ‘the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world’ by 2010. However, it initially failed to mention environmental policy which was inserted only retrospectively at the Gothenburg Summit in 2001 following an initiative from the Swedish EU Presidency. The EU’s 2001 sustainable development strategy gives equal weight to economic, environmental, and social concerns (CEC 2001b). However, in early 2005, Commission president
76
Who Led Europe?
Manuel Barroso made it clear that the Commission would pay more attention to economic policy than to environmental or social concerns by likening his role as Commission president to a father who has to pay more attention to a sick child than the healthy children. But only a few months later, Commission president Barroso partly changed his attitude about the need to relegate environmental for more pressing economic priorities by supporting a relatively ambitious EU climate-change policy.
Selective Activism: Since 2005 Climate change has emerged as a major political priority issue for the EU since around 2005. The EU had tried to adopt a leader role in international climate change politics already since the early 1990s. However, as was mentioned above, its leadership ambitions were hampered by the fact that it failed to adopt a supranational carbon dioxide/energy tax. The EU was nevertheless instrumental in rescuing the 1997 Kyoto climate change protocol following the withdrawal by the world’s largest emitter of climate change gases, the United States of America, under the Bush administration in 2001. The Kyoto protocol came into force in 2005, after the EU had managed to persuade Russia (and other states) to ratify the protocol. Ironically, the EU initially opposed proposals by the USA (under the Clinton administration) to include emissions trading as a flexible and costeffective means of reducing greenhouse gases under the 1997 Kyoto protocol. The EU therefore became a somewhat reluctant pioneer when it adopted the world’s first supranational carbon dioxide emissions trading scheme (although national greenhouse gas emissions trading schemes had already been in place in Britain, Denmark, and the Netherlands) which became operational in 2005. The Commission seized the opportunity offered by the Kyoto protocol, which allows for global emissions trading from 2008 onwards, to push through a pioneering EU emissions trading scheme with the help of like-minded member states (such as Britain, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Sweden). The EU (and in particular the Commission) has since promoted its emissions trading scheme as a model for others to follow. Under the EU emission trading scheme, companies are issued allowances for the amount of carbon dioxide they may produce each year. Companies which produce less carbon dioxide can sell or bank their allowances while companies which produced more carbon dioxide must buy allowances on the market or face a fine. However, due to overly generous carbon dioxide emission allocations by member states, the scheme initially brought about only very moderate reductions of carbon dioxide while resulting in big ‘windfall profits’ for large energy
Environmental Policy
77
producers which simply passed on to their customers the cost of allowances. However, the first phase from 2005–7, was widely regarded as a learning phase for the EU emission trading scheme. The second phase from 2008–12, must show whether the scheme can live up to the expectations of its creators. The adoption of an innovative but highly complex supranational emissions trading scheme is not without risks because failure would badly damage the environmental reputation of the EU and the Commission in particular. However, a successful EU emissions trading scheme is likely to function as a model (which other countries will want to follow) or become linked to other national and/or subnational (such as the Californian) emissions trading schemes. In March 2007, a European Council meeting under the German EU Presidency reaffirmed the EU’s leadership ambitions in international climate change policy when it adopted a unilateral 20 per cent reduction target for carbon dioxide emissions by 2020 (compared to 1990 levels) and a possibly 30 per cent reduction target (compared to 1990) if other developed countries undertake equivalent actions. The German 2007 EU presidency tried to revive the draft European constitution, which had been rejected in referendums in France and the Netherlands in 2005, by, amongst others, proposing the inclusion of a new provision about the need for EU action against climate change (interview, 2007). For some observers this proposal reflected not only Germany’s determination to make the EU better able to fight climate change but also constituted an attempt ‘to give the treaty a populist push by tapping into an issue that has captured the imagination of people across Europe—regardless of national borders or party affilitation—to seek to demonstrate the relevance of the EU’s controversial new set of rules and institutions (Financial Times, 20 March 2007). Climate change has emerged as by far the highest profile EU environmental issue during the selective activism phase. However, there are some other important EU environmental laws and initiatives that fall into this phase which also deserve attention. One of them is the EU’s new law on chemicals or REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals) which was adopted by the EP and Council of Ministers in December 2006 and came into force in June 2007. Another one constitutes the Commission’s controversial proposal in February 2007 for EU legislation on environmental crimes which threatens company directors with up to ten-year jail terms and firms with fines over one million Euros. EU Environmental Policy Entrepreneurs There is no shortage of EU policy actors who tried to act as environmental policy entrepreneurs.
78
Who Led Europe?
Environmental Leader States Environmental leader states have long been identified as driving forces behind EU environmental policy (Bungarten 1978; Rehbinder and Stewart 1985). There is widespread agreement that Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands made up a ‘green trio’ which was extended to a ‘green sextet’ when Austria, Finland, and Sweden joined the EU in 1995 (Liefferink and Andersen 1998). Within the EU, environmental leader states have to accommodate the demands put forward by environmental laggards which may use their national veto or form a blocking minority. Environmental leader and laggard states may both try to persuade swing states to join their respective camps. The environmental leader-laggard dimension goes a long way towards explaining the dynamics and stalemates within the Environmental Council. However, member states’ classification as environmental leader, laggard, and swing states may vary over time or even from issue to issue. Moreover, environmental leader states can adopt either a ‘forerunner’ role or a ‘pusher’ role (ibid.). A forerunner aims to maximize the freedom to develop its own national environmental policy while a pusher will try to export to the EU level its domestic standards and regulatory philosophy. In 1982, Germany became an environmental leader (Weale 1992). This was triggered by concerns about dying forests (Waldsterben) for which air pollution was seen as the main cause. Unusually for a pro-integrationist member state with a ‘leadership avoidance complex’ (Paterson 1996), in 1983 Germany threatened to ‘go it alone’ if the EU refused to accept its demands for the introduction of BAT-derived car emission standards (Holzinger 1994; Wurzel 2002). In the end, Germany abstained from adopting a forerunner role and instead pushed for BAT-derived EU car emission standards which, however, became mandatory only in 1993. During much of the 1980s, Germany was the EU’s most important environmental leader due to its relatively ambitious domestic environmental policy, large market, technical expertise, political influence in the Council, and as the EU’s paymaster. However, post-unification Germany lost some of its environmental credentials while coming under pressure from the EU to modify its environmental regulatory style (Héritier et al. 1996). Moreover, due to the cost of unification and sluggish economic growth between the early 1990s and first half of the first decade in the twentyfirst century, Germany lost its ability to act as the EU’s paymaster and has become more cost-conscious while finding itself repeatedly on the defensive on EU environmental policy measures (e.g. environmental impact assessment) which were perceived as incompatible with the domestic environmental regulatory style (Knill 2001; Wurzel 2003, 2004a). However, Germany, whose economic situation started to improve markedly in 2007, has continued to
Environmental Policy
79
provide environmental leadership on issues of national priority such as the fight against climate change, in particular during its EU Presidency (and G8 Presidency) in 2007. Denmark has consistently adopted a forerunner role which amounted to a defensive strategy aimed at minimizing the EU’s impact on its domestic environmental policy (Liefferink and Andersen 1998). Denmark’s uncompromising stance can be explained by the widespread Euroscepticism amongst its domestic public which shows also a high level of environmental awareness. There have been several EU environmental policy measures where Denmark has demanded more stringent standards while refusing to give up its veto under the unanimity rule or remaining in a minority of one (ibid.). However, Denmark’s green credentials have recently been called into question by its former long-standing environmental minister, Svend Auken (Social Democrats), who accused the centre-right coalition, which came into power in 2002, of ‘waging “virtual terrorism against Danish nature” ’ (ENDS Daily, 7 August 2003). The Netherlands has traditionally taken a more constructive environmental leader approach while aiming to act as a mediator between leaders and laggards (Liefferink and Andersen 1998). Dutch environmental policy strongly influenced the EU’s Fifth EAP (Weale et al. 2000). It has also had an impact on the broadening of the EU’s environmental policy instruments including the EU emission trading scheme. Sweden has often tried to offer a ‘good example’ (Liefferink and Andersen 1998: 74). It provided political leadership in the fight against acid rain. Immediately after Sweden joined the EU, it launched an initiative for a common acidification strategy and seconded to the Commission a Swedish expert on acidification. However, Sweden’s reluctance to agree to far-reaching additional domestic greenhouse gas emission reduction targets within the EU’s collective Kyoto target shows that all environmental leader states have weak points. Sweden’s insistence on flexible mechanisms (i.e. emission trading) for reaching domestic greenhouse gas emission targets was partly driven by its goal to phase out nuclear power. In the late 1990s, Sweden and Germany began to phase out nuclear power while Austria stopped the construction of its only nuclear reactor prior to completion after a referendum in the 1980s. Denmark never built any nuclear power stations. Finland is therefore the only environmental leader state which expanded its new nuclear power stations at the beginning of the twenty-first century. For much of the 1990s, Finland was governed by a coalition in which the Green Party held the office of environment minister. However, although Finland has long had a relatively progressive domestic environmental policy,
80
Who Led Europe?
its overriding foreign policy goal was to become integrated into the EU as quickly and deeply as possible (for fear of a potential military threat from Russia). There have been several occasions when Finland failed to provide environmental leadership because it gave in early to the demands for less ambitious measures put forward by the Commission and/or environmental laggard states (ibid. 75). Austria became an environmental leader only in the 1980s. Like Germany, Austria has relied heavily on emission limits which are derived from the BAT principle. It therefore also had difficulties with the EU’s procedural measures and EQO-centred approach. However, the election of a centre right/far right coalition government in 1999 reduced Austria’s environmental leader ambitions which have increased again after the formation of a grand coalition between the Social Democrats and the Austrian People’s party in 2007. Like Germany, Austria was initially reluctant to support the EU’s emission trading scheme. However, Austria has changed its position since it became clear that it will not be able to fulfil its ambitious Kyoto protocol targets under the EU burden-sharing agreement without emission trading. Importantly, the EU’s environmental leader states differ in their preferences for certain policy instruments and regulatory philosophies (Andersen and Liefferink 1997). Semi-permanent coalitions of environmental leaders across a wide range of environmental issues do not exist on the EU level (Rehbinder and Stewart 1985: 263). Instead ‘they have to be formed on an issue-by-issue basis and remain liable to defection’ (Liefferink and Andersen 1998: 262). During the accession negotiations Austria, Finland, and Sweden (as well as Norway which, however, failed to join the EU) held informal meetings prior to Environmental Councils. However, these meetings were abandoned after full membership. As one Austrian official explained (interview, 2002): ‘We do not coordinate our policy stance because it would be counterproductive if we were seen as having formed a semi-permanent [environmental leader] group within the EU. However, even without formal coordination we often end up pushing for similar stringent standards.’ The EU’s enlargement from fifteen to twenty-seven member states has weakened the environmental leader states’ informal alliance as none of the new members states is an environmental leader. EU Institutional Actors In the 1970s, all EU institutional actors increased staff and time devoted to environmental issues. The Environmental Council’s first meeting took place in July 1973. The Commission set up its Environment and Consumer Protection Service within the DG for Industry, Technology, and Science in the same year (Bungarten 1978: 132).
Environmental Policy
81
The EP’s Committee for Environment, Public Health, and Consumer Protection was set up in 1979, although environmental issues had already been dealt with by the Committee for Health and Social Affairs since the late 1960s. The EP’s highly active environmental committee soon developed into the committee which was ‘predestined to save the earth’ (Judge 1992). The EP is widely seen as the ‘greenest’ of all EU institutions. Over time, the Environmental Committee has developed into one of the most important EP committees which has exercised considerable political influence particular under its longest serving chair, the British Socialist Ken Collins (1979–84 and 1989–99). Since the 1970s, it developed from being a spectator trying to influence EU environmental policy from the sidelines to a co-legislator with rights equal to those of the Environmental Council. The SEA introduced the cooperation procedure in 1987 and the Maastricht Treaty the co-decision procedure in 1996. The cooperation procedure has granted the EP veto powers if the Commission accepts its amendments and the Council subsequently fails unanimously to overrule the Commission’s amended proposal. This happened for the first time in the environmental policy field with regard to the small cars directive (89/458/EEC) in 1990. Under the co-decision procedure, the EP’s Environmental Committee was involved in a high number of conciliation committee meetings. Up until the Amsterdam Treaty, the EP seemed better able to deal with the conciliation committee in the environmental field (Wurzel 2002). However, since then the Council has delegated significant representation powers to the Presidency, making it able to respond more flexibly to opportunities of finding a compromise with the EP. The introduction of the co-operation procedure strengthened the links between the Commission and EP while the co-decision procedure brought the EP and Council together at the expense of the Commission (Judge and Earnshaw 2003; see also Chapter 13, below). In May 2007, the EP’s temporary committee on climate change held its inaugural meeting. It is made up of sixty MEPs and chaired by the Italian Socialist Guido Sacconi. The fact that the EP has set up a temporary committee on climate change in addition to its Environmental Committee illustrates the high political profile which climate change issues have gained within parliament.
Commission The Commission occupies a central node within the EU policy-making process. It has wide-ranging executive powers and is the guardian of the Treaties which can take member states to the ECJ for failing to comply with
82
Who Led Europe?
EU law. The Commission is a collective decision-making body which adopts its policy proposals by consent. However, the Commission is structured into some twenty DGs. The number of DG Environment staff more than doubled between 1987–98. However, it remains small compared to DG Internal Market. Individual commissioners can make a difference to the chances of a particular DG to getting dossiers adopted by the College of Commissioners. An energetic commissioner who has good networking, brokering, and presentational skills is likely to increase the role played by a particular DG. However, the actual influence of the environmental commissioner also depends on wider context variables such as the current level of public environmental awareness and economic climate. So far, the most high-profile environmental commissioners have been Ripa di Meana and Margot Wallström, who exhibited different negotiating styles which took into account the wider context variables at the time. The vociferous Carlo Ripa di Meana did not shy away from conflicts with member governments while raising the profile of EU environmental policy in the media at a time when public environmental awareness was high. Margot Wallström, a Swede who had worked in industry before joining the Commission, preferred a consensual style. Wallström’s competent handling of politically highly contentious dossiers (e.g. on emission trading) and excellent presentational skills earned her the post of commissioner for communications in 2004. Before her departure from DG Environment, Wallström vowed that she would continue to support sustainable development in her new post. However, Commission President Barroso initially downplayed environmental policy while emphasizing economic priorities although he later identified climate change as an issue of high political priority for the EU. Commission presidents have so far shown little interest in environmental policy. The most important exception is Sicco Mansholt who, however, was acting Commission president only from March 1972 to January 1973. Other possible exceptions are Jacques Delors (1985–95) and Romano Prodi (1999– 2004). Barroso’s interest in environmental issues has been largely restricted to climate change. Delors became interested primarily in (the above-mentioned) ecological modernization doctrine which found its way into ch. 10 of the Commission’s White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness, Employment. The Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21st Century (CEC 1994).
Environmental Council The Council of Ministers is made up several technical Councils (such as the one dealing with environment). This helps to depoliticize divisive issues and avoids grand-scale zero-sum games where the winner takes all. How-
Environmental Policy
83
ever, sectoral differentiation can lead to disjointed decision-making which is unable to take into account the holistic requirements of a cross-cutting policy such as environmental policy. Some Presidencies have staged Joint Councils between, for example, the Environmental and Energy Councils. Joint Environmental Councils briefly flourished during the early 1990s. Though theoretically a step in the right direction, Joint Councils are difficult to orchestrate, produce vague policy statements, and often slow down decision-making (Wurzel 2004b). The sixth monthly rotating EU Presidency provides potential leadership for environmental policy. However, the holder of a Presidency must fulfil four main, at times contradictory, tasks: manager and administrator; ‘honest broker’; initiator; and, representative in international (environmental) diplomacy. More recently, the Presidency has also acquired the task of ensuring the integration of environmental requirements into other policy sectors (Wurzel 2004b). Largely because of its honest broker role, the Presidency is best described as an agenda-shaping rather than agenda-setting institution (Talberg 2003) although some have argued that the Presidency has considerable initiative powers (Schout 1998; Chapter 14, below). Most environmental ministers represented in the Environmental Council arguably have more political influence on the EU rather than at the domestic level where cabinet decision-making leads to close scrutiny of environmental policy proposals (Sbragia 1996). Germany’s Klaus Töpfer, who later became the executive director of the UN’s Environment Programme (UNEP), and Denmark’s energetic Svend Auken (Denmark), who was one of the longestserving environmental ministers in Europe, arguably played a particularly influential role amongst the environmental leader states ministers attending the Environmental Council.
European Council The European Council gave the starting signal for the common environmental policy in 1972. However, until the 1990s, it only occasionally dealt with environmental issues. Environmental issues were not always taken seriously when the European Council adopted major political goals for the EU. As was mentioned above, the 2000 Lisbon strategy ignored environmental issues. Overall the European Council has provided little leadership on environmental policy issues. However, it was perhaps advantageous for the rapid development of EU environmental policy that the top political leaders rarely concerned themselves with environmental policy details. Until the early 1990s, the core of the EU’s environmental policy network was made up of the Environmental Council,
84
Who Led Europe?
DG Environment, and the EP’s Environmental Committee. These actors had close links to environmental NGOs and industry affected by EU environmental legislation. The core EU environmental policy network remained relatively insulated from both the European Council and other technical Councils. This is not to downplay intra-institutional conflicts which arose, for example, between DG Environment and DG Internal Market. However, as EU environmental policy matured the relative insulation of the EU environmental policy network became increasingly dysfunctional because further progress would require that environmental concerns are integrated into all major policy sectors (Weale 1999). Since the 1990s, European Council meetings have repeatedly emphasized the need to tackle climate change which became a top political priority for the EU at the beginning of the twenty-first century. This is particularly true for European Council meetings in 2001 under the Swedish Presidency, 2005 under the British Presidency, and 2007 under the German Presidency. The climate change decisions that the EU adopted at the European Council under the British 2005 Presidency and the March European Council under the German 2007 Presidency were also aimed at influencing the G8 summit meetings which both Britain and Germany held simultaneously to their respective EU presidencies. Britain and Germany, which in the 1970s and 1980s were often at loggerheads with each other about EU environmental policy (Wurzel 2002), showed a remarkably similar degree of ambition to provide European leadership on climate change issues within the EU but also for the EU within the G8.
CONCLUSION Monnet style sectoral policy-making has helped to avoid politically divisive grand-scale zero-sum conflicts where the winner takes all. However, it has also produced disjointed policy-making that fails to take into account the requirements of a typical cross-cutting policy area such as environmental policy. So far, the EU actors’ attempts to overcome functional/sectoral policymaking modes have been largely in vain. Prior to the 1987 SEA, EU environmental policy had to be conducted on a weak legal basis. However, while environmental pollution became more visible and public environmental awareness rose, there was an abundance of EU policy actors (most of all the EP, DG Environment, and the environmental leader states represented in the Environmental Council) who were keen to provide political leadership. Environmental NGOs also began to support the EU’s environmental policy efforts while corporate actors based in environmental
Environmental Policy
85
leader and/or high regulatory states were keen to achieve a level playing field. Up to the early 1990s, the main dispute about EU environmental policy centred on the level of stringency at which common standards should be fixed. Already in the 1970s, there were political conflicts about the most appropriate regulatory style, particularly between Germany, which preferred EU-wide uniform standards derived from the BAT principle, and Britain, which pressed for more flexible environmental quality objectives and cost-effective policy measures. However, in the 1990s, these disputes about underlying regulatory principles intensified while affecting a wider range of member states and EU actors. Although the environmental leader states (Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden) have a blocking minority, their political leadership role has been diminished since the EU’s expansion to twentyseven member states. Semi-permanent coalitions of environmental leader states across a wide range of environmental issues do not exist and the EU’s environmental leader states differ in terms of policy instruments, regulatory styles, and philosophies. Whether the Commission can act as an environmental policy entrepreneur depends not only on its staff resources but most of all on whether it is able to muster the support of the Environmental Council and/or EP. The EP has so far been the ‘greenest’ EU institutions. However, the EP has somewhat toned down its demands for stringent EU environmental regulations since the Socialist group has lost its majority status to the Conservatives in the last two European elections (Chapter 13, below). The anxiety about the poor economic performance of many EU member states during the 1990s and the first half a decade of the twenty-first century, the reluctance and/or inability of environmental leader states to offer continued leadership and a moderate decline in public environmental awareness in many member states following the UN Rio summit in 1992, have prolonged the sedate phase from which the EU seemed to be gradually emerging around 2005. Within the EU, global climate change has not only been widely recognized as posing a threat to Europe and the world but has also increasingly been seized by EU actors as an opportunity to provide leadership in order to avert or at least minimize the detrimental effects of a looming major environmental crisis.
NOTES I would like to thank the editor and the participants of ‘Leaderless Europe’ workshop on 30 September–1 October 2005 for their extremely helpful comments.
86
Who Led Europe? The research for this chapter has benefited from a British Academy grant (reference number SG-46048) for which I am grateful.
1. However, most international environmental agreements in which the EU is involved are so-called mixed agreements which have been signed by the Commission and member governments.
REFERENCES A, M. S., and L D. (eds.) (1997) European Environmental Policy: The Pioneers. Manchester: Manchester University Press. B, H. (1978) Umweltpolitik in Westeuropa. Bonn: Europa Union. CEC (1994) Growth, Competitiveness, Employment. The Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21s t Century. Brussels: Commission of the European Communities. (2001a) White Paper on Governance. Brussels: Commission of the European Communities. (2001b) A European Union Strategy for Sustainable Development. Brussels: Commission of the European Communities. D, A. (1972) ‘Up and Down with Ecology. The Issue Attention Cycle’, The Public Interest 28/1: 38–50. Eurobarometer (1999) What do Europeans Think About the Environment? Brussels: Commission of the European Communities. H, N. (1992) ‘The European Community and International Environmental Policy’, in A. Hurrell and B. Kingsbury (eds.), The International Politics of the Environment. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 228–52. H, J. (1996) ‘Conclusion: Has European Unification by Stealth a Future?’, in J. Hayward (ed.) Elitism, Populism, and European Politics. Oxford: Clarendon, 252–8. H, A., K, C., and M, S. (1996) Ringing the Changes in Europe. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. H, P. (1992) ‘The European Community’s Environmental Policy, 1957– 1992’, Environmental Politics 1/4: 13–44. H, K. (1994) Politik des kleinsten gemeinsamen Nenners? Berlin: Edition Sigma. I, R. (1971) ‘The Silent Revolution in Europe: Intergenerational Change in Post-Industrial Societies’, American Political Science Review 65: 991–1017. J, M. (2006) ‘Trend Setters in Environmental Policy. The Character and Role of Pioneer Countries’, in M. Jänicke and Jacob, K. (eds.), Environmental Governance in Global Perspective. Berlin: Free University of Berlin, 51–66. J, A., and L, D. (eds.) (2004) Environmental Policy in Europe. London: Routledge. W, R., and Z, A. (eds.) (2003) New Instruments of Environmental Governance. Frank Cass: London.
Environmental Policy
87
(2005) ‘The Rise of “New” Policy Instruments in Comparative Perspective: Has Governance Eclipsed Government?’, Political Studies, 53/3: 477–96. J, D. (1992) ‘ “Predestined to Save the Earth”: The Environment Committee of the European Parliament’, Environmental Politics, Special Issue, 1/4: 1–12. E, D., and C, N. (1994) ‘Ripples or Waves: The European Parliament in the European Community Policy Process’, Journal of European Public Policy 1/1: 27–52. K, C. (2001) The Europeanisation of National Administrations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. L, D., and A, M. S. (1998) ‘Strategies of the “Green” Member States in EU Environmental Policy-making’, Journal of European Public Policy 5/2: 24–70. M, G. (1996) ‘The Rise of Statutory Regulation in Europe’, in G. Majone (ed.), Regulating Europe. London: Routledge, 47–60. M, S., and R, S. (1993) ‘Conclusion: A European Policy Style?’, in Mazey, S., and Richardson, J. (eds.), Lobbying in the European Community. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 246–58. P, M. (1990) ‘The Competitive Advantage of Nations’, Harvard Business Review (March/April), 73–93. R, E., and S, R. (1985) Integration Through Law. Europe and the American Federal Experience. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. R, G. (1995) Jacques Delors and European Integration. Cambridge: Polity. S, A. (1996) ‘Environmental Policy: The “Push-Pull” of Policy-Making’, in H. Wallace and W. Wallace (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 235–56. S, F. (1988) ‘The Joint-Decision Trap: Lessons from German Federalism and European Integration’, Public Administration 66: 239–78. (1996) ‘Negative and Positive Integration in the Political Economy of European Welfare States’, in G. Marks et al. (eds.), Governance in the European Union. London: Sage, 15–39. S, A. (1998) ‘The Presidency as Juggler’, EIPASCOPE 2: 2–10. S, G. (1989) ‘Alternativen in der Umweltschutzpolitik’, in H. Donner et al. (eds.), Umweltschutz zwischen Staat und Markt. Baden-Baden: Nomos, 43–58. T, K. (1989) ‘Ecological Modernisation of the Industrialised State: A Federal Perspective’, in T. Ellwein et al. (eds.), Yearbook on Government and Public Administration. Baden-Baden: Nomos, 489–520. V, D. (1997) ‘Trading Up and Governing Across: Transnational Governance and Environmental Protection’, Journal of European Public Policy 4/4: 556–71. W, A. (1992) The New Politics of Pollution, Manchester: Manchester University Press. (1999) ‘European Environmental Policy by Stealth: The Dysfunctionality of Functionalism?’, Environmental and Planning C 17/1: 37–51. P, G., C, M., K, D., P M., and F, B. (2000) Environmental Governance in Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
88
Who Led Europe?
W, R. K. W. (2002) Environmental Policy-Making in Britain, Germany and the European Union. Manchester: Manchester University Press. (2003) ‘Environmental Policy: An Environmental Leader State under Pressure?’, in K. Dyson and K. Goetz (eds.), Germany, Europe, and the Politics of Constraint. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 289–308. (2004a) ‘The Europeanisation of German Environmental Policy: From Environmental Leadership to Partial Mismatch?’, in A. Jordan and D. Liefferink (eds.), The Europeanisation of Environmental Policy: European Union and member state Perspectives. London: Routledge, 99–117. (2004b) The EU Presidency: ‘Honest Broker’ or Driving Seat? London: AngloGerman Foundation.
5 Did France and Germany Lead Europe? A Retrospect William E. Paterson
The 2004 round of enlargement of the European Union coincided with and to an extent precipitated a fierce debate about the absence of leadership in the European Union. This sentiment is at its strongest in the discourse of the original six members but there is also a palpable sense of disappointment about the absence of leadership in the new members. This sense of leaderlessness is however cyclical rather than totally novel in the European Union. Leadership has normally been difficult to achieve, subject as it is to a set of institutional rules which have institutionalized diffusion of power and have been designed for obvious reasons not to confront the perceptions of the publics of member states too sharply on the issue of how centralized the European Union institutions would have to be to give effect to the demands for leadership. There has also been an ongoing and continuing tension on the issue of who is to provide the leadership, the supranational institutions, the national leaders or a combination of them both. Neither issue has been wholly resolved and the half century of European integration has experienced all three. It is also very difficult to support the view feared by many eurosceptics and applauded by euroenthusiasts that developments are linear and unidirectional towards a more centralized and supranational European Union. It is important to note that in old, pre-1989 Europe, Gaullist rhetoric notwithstanding, leadership took place within the comfort zone of a bipolar international system and was correspondingly limited in scope and content. In this system the United States acted and was more or less welcomed as a ‘benevolent hegemon’. It was in essence, fair weather, low politics leadership, and institutionally the EEC and then the EU constituted an arena in which larger states were constrained from gaining the leverage that would be derived from employing all their power resources. The use of all power resources and the ability to transfer them is of course the basis for hegemony and was very marked in the hegemonial leadership of the United States.
90
Who Led Europe?
Post-1989, the situation has become more complex but not easier in terms of the exercise of European leadership. The end of the Cold War brought to a close a period of manifest hegemonial leadership by the United States but it remained a massively important though more contested player in European decisions and controversy about the proper role of the United States in the decisions of the European Union will continue to divide members of the European Union. More widely, Europe is no longer a sheltered western European enclave but is exposed to external economic, political, and security pressures in a wholly unprecedented fashion. The latest set of external pressures to hit Europe are those associated with Europe’s very high level of external energy dependency. Leadership can no longer be leadership in Europe; it must now also be about exercising European leadership in an infinitely wider and more turbulent environment, and where there is little agreement on whether the future international order is to be uni- or multipolar. Expectations of leadership have expanded as perceptions of leadership at the domestic level have grown. De Gaulle’s conception of ‘heroic leadership’ marked France out as an outlier in a European system characterized by limited, parliamentary-based leadership and the attempt to upload this leadership style to the European level was unsurprisingly a failure. The reduced role of legislatures and the declining affective attractions of political parties combined with the growth of summits have favoured a concentration of authority on governmental heads. Prime Minister Thatcher was a harbinger of wider change in this respect though the UK’s first past the post electoral system offered a more facilitative environment than those systems based on some sort of proportional electoral system. Within their respective systems both François Mitterrand and Helmut Kohl nevertheless exercised a considerable degree of leadership. In recent years the demand for leadership at the domestic level in Europe has grown even louder ironically just at a point when all west European systems appear to be suffering from a lack of it.
SOURCES OF LEADERSHIP In a current period of uncertainty and moroseness, there has been a temptation, especially marked in the old Europe, to enshrine atavistic myths about leadership and in a very unhistorical manner to cherry-pick from periods in the history of the Franco-German relationship to present a model of unswerving Franco-German leadership which could somehow present a model for the future. This rhetoric reached its apogee at the time of the
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
91
40th Anniversary of the Franco-German Treaty in the autumn of 2003 but has enjoyed a paradoxical revival after the failure of the Dutch and French referenda in the autumn of 2005. Interestingly there is no comparable rhetoric about a possible return to the supranational leadership style of Hallstein and Delors. The argument of this chapter is not only that an exclusive reliance on the Franco-German relationship as the source of future leadership in the European Union would be counter-productive, but that it seriously misrepresents the record of the Franco-German relationship where, to vary the well-known metaphor, it has acted as the brake rather than the motor of European integration (Paterson 2004). In the history of European integration there has been both supranational and intergovernmental leadership. Both sources of leadership have shown quite wide variations in style but intergovernmental leadership, with the arguable exception of the negotiation of the Single European Act and the genesis of the EEC, has been to a very large extent Franco-German. This chapter will look at the two principal attempts at supranational leadership, the Hallstein and Delors Commissions but will primarily focus on the three key episodes of joint Franco-German leadership, Konrad Adenauer and Charles de Gaulle, Giscard d’Estaing and Helmut Schmidt, and François Mitterrand and Helmut Kohl.
PRESENT AT THE CREATION: FRANCE, GERMANY, AND THE CREATION OF THE EUROPEAN COAL AND STEEL COMMUNITY The launching of the Schuman Plan in May 1950 is often presented as the first stage in the establishment of an unbroken Franco-German leadership in European integration and it is true that it was a French initiative and that France and Germany remained the central players in its realization. It also established a long-running path dependence where the United Kingdom was an absent player in European discussions. At a very obvious level, it lends itself to a realist explanation in that both France and Germany had very pressing material reasons to strike a bargain. Jean Monnet, the drafter of the plan on the French side, was also the head of the Commissariat du Plan and as such had a vital interest in access to German coal and at a point where it looked as if there might be a demand problem for the expanded French steel production the prospect of a market access for French steel to German markets was extremely compelling. The material reasons on the West German side
92
Who Led Europe?
were if anything more pressing. West Germany was still occupied and subject to discriminatory provisions. Adenauer saw that if these provisions were to be lifted and Germany secure access to export markets, then the resulting arenas of competition would have to be flanked by arenas of cooperation (Bulmer and Paterson 1987: 7). The leadership represented by Schuman and Adenauer was in these circumstances in no real sense a joint leadership but very much a leader–follower relationship. It can best be viewed through a realist prism where France, in the absence of Britain (from the Treaty of Paris) structured European integration in a manner that ensured and sought to perpetuate the leading position for France. The treaty negotiations reflected this struggle for advantage. ‘The Schuman Plan negotiations can easily be sentimentalised as the crucible of a new European spirit. They were, in reality often tough and even brutal’ (Gillingham 2003: 25). If the negotiations themselves can best be understood in classical realist terms with France as the leader, then the institutional structure that was established and the type of leadership it envisaged is more ambivalent, an ambivalence that can be explained by the dominating role of Jean Monnet. ‘He set the agenda, chaired the conference, headed the French delegation, and behind the scenes co-ordinated his own policy with that of the US Embassy in Paris and the Allied High Commission in Bonn, both of which were headed by friends and disciples’ (Gillingham 2003: 25). The institutions envisaged for the Coal and Steel Community were entirely novel; leadership in the coal and steel sectors was to be exercised by a supranational technocratic High Authority rather than an intergovernmental body. During the course of the negotiations a political check in the form of the Council of Ministers was introduced but at Dutch rather than French and German insistence. Jean Monnet himself was to be the president of the High Authority. Certainly, there is a sense in which both the very ambitious supranational institutions and Monnet’s (self-)nomination can be seen as an extension of French leadership. Having embarked on a process which lifted the remaining restrictions on German coal and steel production and aware of the massive American pressure to have the full weight of the West German economy engaged in the struggle against the Soviet Union, Monnet and the French government had a strong interest in a set of institutions which would continue to tie a future revived Germany down. ‘He meant to hogtie the Germans until they could be trusted or until France had got mean enough to handle them’ (ibid.). This interpretation is, however, only half, and perhaps not even half the story. Monnet was a very committed European whose career, which combined national and international responsibilities had made him very aware of the limitation of the nation state in a post-classical age. His conception
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
93
of the supranational High Authority was not a static one, designed only to guard against a German Gulliver unbound, but was dynamic and expansive. Integration of the coal and steel sectors was seen as being the key to further integration since they were such central elements in the economy, that spillover into other sections was inevitable, a process which was to be stimulated and managed by the High Authority, a supranational entrepreneurial body. The creation of the European Coal and Steel Community was multifaceted in terms of leadership. It established a continuing expectation (not always realized in practice) where France and Germany were the central players in setting the terms for future integration. The pattern of French leadership that it represented was inevitable, given British reticence and German weakness. It was also a leadership that was entirely welcome to the German government. Participation in supranational institutions allowed West Germany to regain power, to resume access to export markets and to strengthen its impaired and weak state identity. It is crucial to recognize the understandable lack of self-confidence in Germany about the establishment of a stable form of democratic government capable of peaceful and productive interaction with its neighbours after Weimar and the Third Reich. The emerging institutions of European integration were in these circumstances a displacement of responsibility (we are happy to have others govern us) and partly an insurance policy (we are not sure we trust ourselves to govern). The leader–follower relationship was surrounded and legitimated at a popular level by a rhetoric of reconciliation and a view of European integration as a Werte und Friedensgeneinschaft. Joseph Weiler (1994) has written of the founding and legitimating concepts of European integration and the FrancoGerman relationship from the ECSC onwards as integral to two of the central concepts, peace and prosperity. The concept of a dynamic, supranational, technocratic leadership which would gradually, through expansive spillover into an increasing number of sectors, hollow out the traditional nation state, was centrally present in the Schuman declaration. ‘Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a single plan. It will be built through concrete achievements which first create a de facto solidarity’ (Nielsen and Stubb 1988: 14). The conception of leadership based on the channelling of economic forces by a supranational leadership attracted little of the public attention that attended other aspects of the Franco-German leadership but it was of consuming interest to narrower political circles. Quite quickly, this novel form of leadership which was counterpoised to traditional state leadership became known as the Community method and was underpinned by the scholarly concept of neo-functionalism (Haas 1958).
94
Who Led Europe?
Neither the Franco-German relationship not the Community method as practised by the High Authority led by Monnet was able to deliver the leadership that had been promised in 1950. The shifting coalitions of the Fourth Republic provided very fragile support for France’s leadership position in Europe. The failure of the EDC project to survive in the French National Assembly in August 1954 placed considerable strain on FrancoGerman relations and the Adenauer government which had taken a very exposed position in favour of EDC given the strength of public opposition to rearmament in Germany. Despite this disappointment, Adenauer’s guiding and incontrovertible instinct was that France was central to the European project. The initial failure of Monnetism was much more spectacular. ‘It neither accelerated industrial growth nor stimulated technological or organizational change; the long-term decline of heavy industry would continue inexorably. Morale suffered at the HA from lack of progress, Euroenthusiasm went limp. Unable to conceal his dismay at the detumescence in Luxembourg, Monnet spent as little time as possible there and immersed himself in other areas (Gillingham 2003: 27). Curiously the early writers on neo-functionalism ignored this failure and the ECSC fulfilled the role in their explanations of leading inexorably on to the EEC and Euratom but all contemporary governments and politicians were convinced it had been a failure. The curious paradox is the way in which the idea of a supranational community method outlived this contemporary perception (Gillingham 2003: 27).
THE RELAUNCH OF EUROPEAN INTEGRATION If the Schuman Plan and the European Coal and Steel Community had been almost exclusively a French plan and the negotiations primarily FrancoGerman, the moves which led to the establishment of the EEC were to be quite different. In the intervening years European integration had suffered from French weakness. In the wake of the defeat of the EDC, discussion focused on trade liberalization and the lead here was taken by the Low Countries. The key text produced by the Dutch foreign minister Willem Beyen, became the basis of the Benelux memorandum for the discussions at Messina presided over by Paul Henri Spaak. France did have a major input on the resulting Treaty of Rome but it did not arise as in the Treaty of Paris from a positive leadership role but from the negative strength derived from the EDC failure. All the other members were interested in trade liberalization and the key question revolved around the concessions that would be needed to bring France on board. Not
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
95
for the last time France was to act as the brake rather than the motor of European integration. The two key concessions made to France related to agriculture and the place of the French Empire. By the mid-1950s the huge agriculture surplus created by modernization required some solution to the problem of subsidies and the obvious solution was to protect and extend preferential trade access to Germany for agricultural products. The key German interest in access for industrial products made this an acceptable trade-off. Ludwig Erhard, the Economics Minister would have preferred a wider free trade area but the logic of an arena of cooperation alongside an arena of competition prevailed. Charles de Gaulle was to be at the centre of two early attempts to provide firm structural leadership for the EEC. The difficulties that had surrounded the ECSC and the failure of the EDC ensured that the supranational content of the Rome Treaty was quite differently constructed from that of the Treaty of Paris. The Treaty of Paris had granted massive authority to the High Authority with the Council of Ministers inserted only during the actual negotiations. By contrast, the Treaty of Rome gave to the Commission the role of agenda-setter with the final power decision being anchored in the Council of Ministers. However, whereas the Treaty of Paris envisaged the relationship between the supranational body and the intergovernmental institution as static, the Treaty of Rome had a dynamic conception where authority would flow towards the Commission as its functional competence expanded and the unanimity would cease to be the decision rule in the Council of Ministers. In the first years of the EEC, leadership was given by the European Commission under the presidency of Walter Hallstein. Hallstein, Adenauer’s foreign policy confidant, had in effect acted as German foreign minister from 1951 to 1955, given that Germany did not then possess a foreign minister (Hallstein represented Germany at the Messina Conference) and had the closest possible links to the Federal Government. In the founding years de Gaulle was an ally of Hallstein in rebuffing British proposals for a wider free trade area and did not initially respond to the challenge of Hallstein’s supranational leadership aspirations and style. Hallstein made a brilliant use of the Commission’s power of initiative through very complicated ‘package deals’. In these early years member-state representatives arrived for Council meetings at an informational disadvantage in relation to the Commission since the use of Permanent Representatives and Permament Representations to filter the Commission Proposals developed only later. Perhaps Hallstein’s greatest advantage, however, was that policy in the first years was dominated by ‘negative integration’ by tariff reduction to which all member states were committed by the Treaty and where it was possible to score successes. Hallstein’s early
96
Who Led Europe?
successes were, however, to be deceptive. Intoxicated by the ease with which the Commission had expanded its competences, Hallstein suggested a radical fast forwarding in the integration process in 1965. The Rome Treaty had foreseen a move towards ‘own resources’ for the Common Agricultural Policy in 1970. The transition to the third stage of the Customs Union had been completed early and Hallstein now prepared a move to ‘own resources’ in 1965 when the existing system of national contributions was due to expire. His hope was that this would lead to the Commission acquiring budgetary authority. The proposals also envisaged a move towards majority voting in the Council of Ministers. His calculation was neo-functionalist in that he assumed that the move towards ‘own resources’ would be popular with French agricultural interests since they were promised increased resources; agricultural interests would in turn exert pressure on the French Government and the French Government would accept this since it would also reduce the burden on France. At the centre of Hallstein’s calculations was the assumption that de Gaulle would swallow an unwelcome political deal in return for economic advantage. This proved to be a very crucial miscalculation and precipitated the ‘empty chair’ crisis whereby de Gaulle withdrew France from the Community until a compromise was agreed at Luxembourg in 1966 which effectively killed off any departure from the unanimity rule. Hallstein had not only made a major miscalculation in relation to the French Government; the replacement as federal chancellor in 1963 of Adenauer by Ludwig Erhard, who had always been in favour of a wider free trade area, left him without an ally in Bonn. This reverse brought down the curtain for the next two decades on the concept of neo-functionalism (Hoffmann 1966).
FRANCO-GERMAN LEADERSHIP De Gaulle was from the beginning careful to initiate warm and cordial relations with Konrad Adenauer, and in their second meeting in 1958 he assured Adenauer of his commitment to the Rome Treaty and won Adenauer’s support for the emerging French conception of the CAP. Adenauer’s policy had been built on a strong support of supranational institutions (reflex multilateralism) and equal commitment to European integration and the Atlantic alliance, an existential matter given Germany’s front-line position. De Gaulle’s vision of a French-led, intergovernmental Europe defined by distance from the United States involved a fundamental challenge to pre-existing German policy. Adenauer’s previously unbending commitment to the Atlantic Alliance
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
97
buckled under the pressure of his disappointment with what he perceived as lack of resolve by the United States in the Berlin crisis and the departure of John Foster Dulles, his key ally in Washington. This was now de Gaulle’s opportunity. In September 1960 he launched his initiative for a European security community. This initiative was taken forward by a committee under the chairmanship of Christian Fouchet that drafted a design for a confederation of European states which included a common foreign and defence policy. The institutional arrangements envisaged were a riposte to Hallstein’s supranational Commission. The smaller member countries, especially the Netherlands, worried by the challenge to the United States inherent in the proposals, committed to securing the entry of the United Kingdom and gravely concerned about the possibility of creating a Franco-German hegemony unmediated by supranational institutions brought about its demise in 1962. Thwarted in his ambition to produce a general revision on a multilateral basis, de Gaulle now switched to an exclusive concentration on the bilateral track at whose end would lie a French-led directorate. Adenauer had also been central to his multilateral revisionism but the Franco-German duo had proved vulnerable to the obduracy of the Low Countries and Adenauer’s visible weakness which had been de Gaulle’s opportunity had rendered German support less compelling. The diplomacy which led to the Élysée Treaty yoked together a determined and purposeful de Gaulle and an Adenauer in terminal decline. De Gaulle’s key aim was to frustrate the further advance of a European construction built on supranational lines and to lead a Europe based on intergovernmental lines, an aspiration that prompted Harold Macmillan (1973: 118) to remark that de Gaulle wanted ‘L’Europe à l’anglais sans les Anglais’. Adenauer was driven less by a clear vision than by disappointment. In his last year his disillusionment with the Democratic Administration in the United States fed into wider fears sometimes verging on paranoia that détente between the superpowers would be concluded at Germany’s expense. From his entry into political life in the Weimar Republic, Adenauer had been a francophile and in his last year in office only France really commanded his attention. De Gaulle flanked his diplomatic initiative in favour of a bilateral FrancoGerman arrangement with brilliant choreography. Adenauer personally, and West Germans more widely, were moved and flattered by a public discourse that dramatized Franco-German reconciliation and accorded the Federal Republic as a state and the Germans as a people a level of respect and recognition that was unprecedented since the establishment of the Federal Republic. The level of recognition accorded in bilateral state visits played especially well
98
Who Led Europe?
in a country where the state identity was so weak. And yet this diplomacy was largely built on sand, since its central aims to exclude British membership, an endorsement of a more European Europe (code for less United States), and the construction of an intergovernmental Europe based on a Franco-German directorate were contrary to majority opinion in the Bundestag. It was this reliance on Adenauer, and the recognition that he was likely to make way soon for Chancellor Erhard and a team that would reverse Adenauer’s foreign policy priorities, that underlay de Gaulle’s frantic pace. The enthusiasm with which his putative successors pushed British entry and the centrality of the Atlantic Alliance only encouraged Adenauer’s increasingly one-eyed reliance on France. The manner in which these calculations played off against each other is illustrated by two dramatic events in January 1963. The bilateral meeting in Paris took place against the background of grave concern (not shared by Adenauer) in Germany that France planned to veto the entry of the UK. Until then a decision had not been arrived at that the Franco-German agreement which they were negotiating would take the form of a Treaty, but once negotiations started it became clear that the agreement was ‘more and more taking on the character of a solemn treaty that would have to be ratified’ (Schwarz 1997: 672) The reason why de Gaulle had been so keen on concluding a treaty so speedily became apparent a week later when the French veto of British accession to the EEC was announced. This ensured an earlier succession of Ludwig Erhard to the chancellorship and torpedoed any lingering prospect that European integration could proceed under a Franco-German directorate. When the Élysée Treaty came to be ratified in the Bundestag in May 1963, a month after Adenauer’s enforced retirement, a preamble asserting Germany’s overriding commitment to existing NATO obligations was inserted and for de Gaulle the treaty was a broken reed. ‘It works with Treaties as with young girls and with roses. If the Franco-German Treaty is not filled with life, it would not be the first time in history. Ah, how many young girls have I seen die’ (ibid. 702). The de Gaulle–Adenauer attempt to exercise an explicit leadership of the EEC was a predictable failure. De Gaulle’s aspirations ran against the grain of what was perceived as a very successful new supranational organization that enjoyed especially strong backing from the United States. French and German views were ultimately too divergent and while Adenauer, and Germans more widely, were flattered by the respect accorded to them, the reality of a FrancoGerman duopoly was implausible given Germany’s divided status and their own insecurities and fears about the reaction of other states which had been demonstrated in the rejection of the Fouchet Plan. De Gaulle’s blandishments convinced many that Adenauer’s policy of winning back sovereignty
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
99
by participation in multilateral institutions had borne fruit and Germany was now being taken seriously, but for most the policy was threatening to undermine the legitimating vision by which Germany’s re-emergence was made possible. Germany continued to display a ‘leadership avoidance reflex’ (Paterson 1993: 10) and a Franco-German directorate was simply too exposed. As has been observed earlier in relation to the ECSC, short-term failure does not necessarily equate with absence of long-term influence. The rhetoric of reconciliation and the inspired symbolic mastery of de Gaulle were to exert a very powerful and persisting influence on the political classes of France and Germany. Perhaps more importantly, the Élysée Treaty began a profound institutionalization of the relationship. The infrastructure of the Fouchet Plan which foresaw regular meetings between the French president and the German chancellor and relevant ministers was imported into the Treaty, and this institutionalization was to prove to be of enormous significance. Ludwig Erhard, a staunch adversary of de Gaulle, nevertheless continued to attend regular bilateral meetings during his term as Chancellor from 1963–6.
HELMUT SCHMIDT AND GISCARD D’ESTAING The failure of Walter Hallstein to bring about a settled leadership and the equally dramatic collapse of the Adenauer–de Gaulle attempt to create an intergovernmentally based leadership left the EEC without a viable leadership model, though President Pompidou and Chancellor Brandt were able to deal with the long-running issue of British accession and facilitate the entry of the United Kingdom along with Denmark and Ireland. The seemingly permanent anchoring of unanimity as the decision rule after the Luxembourg Compromise, and the weak leadership of post-Hallstein Commissions seemed likely to perpetuate a condition of leaderlessness. In these rather unpromising circumstances a new, more pragmatic FrancoGerman leadership gradually developed. The precondition for this new leadership was the almost simultaneous arrival in office of Helmut Schmidt and Giscard d’Estaing in 1974. They had learned to work together as finance ministers and the institutionalized meetings introduced by the Élysée Treaty encouraged a ‘coordination reflex’. As heads of government they quickly came to the conclusion that they had to provide the leadership. Schmidt, who had been an especially committed supporter of UK entry (he was the sole member of the SPD to vote against the EEC on the grounds that the UK was not a member) now shared the almost universal view, strengthened
100
Who Led Europe?
by the 1975 Referendum and its aftermath, that Britain was unlikely to contribute towards the leadership of the EEC. The Callaghan Government was more interested in neutralizing Europe as a source of division within the Labour Party than playing an active role. As a lifelong anglophile, Schmidt was in a much better position than Adenauer to persuade the political class in the Federal Republic of the necessity of a Franco-German alliance. Schmidt also represented a new, more self-confident Federal Republic. Under Schmidt Germany’s domestic institutions were seen as embedded and effective; the rise of extremism had been seen off and Germany’s economy was now the envy of her neighbours and the talk was now of ‘Model Germany’. Schmidt was however acutely aware that a unilateral attempt to export German preferences would fail; Britain was unavailable as a partner (though Schmidt preserved good relations with Callaghan in contrast to Adenauer’s poisonous relationship with Macmillan) and France was therefore the inevitable choice. Giscard did not lack self-confidence, but he had been impressed by the growing strength of the German economy and weaknesses in the French position. While the cooperation was deep, there was no investment in the rhetoric of reconciliation or the symbolic dimension of the relationship. Neither figure had any confidence in the European Commission as a potential leader. Helmut Schmidt had a more hostile view of the competence of the European Commission than any German chancellor before or since. It was not only that they saw themselves as condemned to lead, in the wake of the oil price crisis and the primacy of international economic issues; a marked convergence on preferences had occurred. France was now prepared to accept the primacy of price stability. Agreement on the need to cooperate on international energy issues was also secured and both leaders became increasingly critical of the global economic leadership provided by the United States. The dilemma was how to make these converging preferences operate in an institutional setting where the Commission’s leadership function had been disabled and the intergovernmental Council of Ministers proceeded by unanimity on a case-by-case basis. As neither had any appetite for kissing the Commission’s supranational aspirations into life, the focus had to be on giving the Council leadership potential. A directorate, the Gaullist model, was clearly not an option. The French Government, building on an earlier decision in 1973 to establish summit meetings of European leaders, proposed at the Paris Summit in 1974 the establishment of a European Council. Fears of a directorate were countered by the argument that the European Council would not be a formal decision-making body and
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
101
that the Commission’s role in the community system would be honoured. (Giscard then tried to prevent the Commission president attending the Council.) It was also agreed to move towards direct election of the European Parliament. In practice what emerged was a more strongly led intergovernmentalism. The role of the Permanent Representatives and Permanent Representations was greatly strengthened, thus making it unlikely the Commission could ever again benefit from the informational advantage of surprise and specialized expertise that it had deployed against national governments under the Hallstein Commission. Under the new Council arrangements the French and German partnership become more tightly coordinated. The impact of Giscard and Schmidt rested not only on their converging views and improved coordination, but perhaps primarily on the same reasons that brought them ascendancy in their domestic political systems. Both leaders had an unrivalled grasp of economic and monetary issues and were able to dominate Council meetings. They were also helped by the economic and political weakness of the United Kingdom government. There was no need to exclude the United Kingdom from discussions which would in any case have been unacceptable to German opinion. The highest aspiration of the United Kingdom government was damage limitation and it simply excluded itself. The leadership model provided by Giscard and Schmidt thus possessed a necessary contingent element relying as it did for much of its influence on the unlikely coincidence of the simultaneous brilliance of the governmental leaders of France and Germany. Over a longer term, however, the creation of the European Council as a forum for the exercise of leadership was to be of enormous significance.
THE LAUNCHING OF THE EUROPEAN MONETARY SYSTEM The most obvious illustration of the leadership exercised by Giscard and Schmidt was the launching of the EMS. The stimulus came originally from a lecture by the Commission president Roy Jenkins at the European University Institute in Florence in September 1977. Jenkins’s use of the initiative function was at the other end of the spectrum from Hallstein who would have confronted member states with a Gesamtplan (an all encompassing plan) of some complexity whose rejection would plunge the Community into crisis. Jenkins’s approach was suggestive rather than direct, hoping governments would pick up the idea of monetary union.
102
Who Led Europe?
Persistent concerns about the United States handling of the international economy and the fall in the value of the dollar leading to constant upward pressure on the mark with its clear impact on German competitiveness converted Helmut Schmidt to the idea of the primacy of exchange rate stability. Schmidt was able to convince Giscard d’Estaing to support this idea given the advantage to France of linking the weak franc to the strong mark, especially if Germany were prepared to pay the cost of maintaining the parity between them. Schmidt and Giscard then persuaded other EC leaders, with the exception of Prime Minister Callaghan, to support it through a succession of European Councils finishing in Brussels in 1979. A key element of Franco-German leadership under Kohl and Mitterrand was prefigured at the Brussels Summit with final agreement only being possible by the offer of a side-payment inducement through extra financial assistance from Germany. The advantage to Germany was obvious. ‘It constituted a regional set of rules based in favour of the biggest member state in the EC, protecting it against pressure for revaluation of its currency and granting its export industry a major competitive edge’ (Pedersen 1998: 86). Through the EMS Germany was able to exercise control on the economies of the member states who aligned their currencies to the Deutschmark, the anchor currency. This gave enormous power to one institution, the Bundesbank, over whose policies other governments had no influence and whose statutes required it only to take German domestic economic conditions into account. The limits of this leadership model were however palpable. ‘The political drawback of the EMS was first of all that the asymmetry was not balanced by political voice opportunities and secondly that it was a weak institution in which exit remained an option’ (Pedersen 1998: 86).
MITTERRAND–KOHL: TOWARDS COOPERATIVE HEGEMONY For contemporary observers, the Giscard–Schmidt alliance had seemed likely to constitute a high-water mark of collective leadership in the European Union resting as it did on two heads of government, unusual both in their degree of ambition and the convergence of their policy aims. In the early years of their incumbency it looked unlikely that Helmut Kohl and François Mitterrand would develop a collective leadership. Kohl had come to power committed to a Wende (change of direction in domestic policy) and his strong European commitment seemed most likely to be expressed in declaratory
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
103
policy designed to appeal to the pro-European constituency inside his own CDU party rather than providing leadership at the European level. Mitterrand was also initially focused on the domestic level and a ‘socialist dash for growth’. Kohl quickly discovered that the change of direction he had envisaged was too difficult to achieve given the numerous veto points of the Federal Republic’s semi-sovereignty system (Katzenstein 1987) and by 1983 Mitterrand had been forced to abandon a ‘socialism in one country’ approach. French policy underwent ‘a European turn’ and at the Fontainebleau Summit in May 1984 a joint initiative from Kohl and Mitterrand on treaty reform led to the setting up of the Dooge and the Adonnino committees. These were only the latest, however, of a long list of initiatives in the area of treaty reform from the Commission, heads of Government, and the European Parliament and would have been likely to founder on the unanimity decision rule. A fundamental obstacle to change was removed at the Fontainebleau Summit by the reaching of a settlement on the long-running and poisonous British budgetary question, and in the next four years Prime Minister Thatcher, while still fundamentally opposed to deeper integration, could be persuaded to go along with it. If the resolution of the British question removed the most crucial negative factor, the most positive facilitating factor in terms of the emergence of a collective leadership was the selection of Jacques Delors as Commission president in 1984. Known to all heads of Government from his time as French minister of finance, he was the ultimate strategic insider (see Chapter 1, above). Hallstein had been persona non grata in Paris but Delors was someone who had unmatched access in Paris and Bonn and was even able on occasion to co-opt Mrs Thatcher until he sold his social vision of European integration to the TUC Conference in 1988. His internal market agenda intersected with that of Kohl, Mitterrand, and Thatcher and at the Milan Summit of June 1985 the Commission White Paper was included as the programme for achieving the goal of a functioning internal market. The process that led to the Single European Act was not a simple case of Franco-German leadership. Delors and the Commission played a crucial trigger role and were important in flanking and supporting Franco-German initiatives. While it is the case that the integrationist thrust of the SEA was provided by the combination of the French and German Governments, Prime Minister Thatcher was also crucial. Britain was persuaded to accept the QMV proposals by its interest in seeing the internal market realized and threats of exclusion by the French and Germans. The passing of the Single European Act provided a much more far-reaching platform for the joint leadership by Kohl and Mitterrand since the practice of
104
Who Led Europe?
majority voting, or at least the threat of it, proved quite contagious and was not confined to the sections of the Treaty where it had been expressly provided for. Henceforth the threat of exclusion could be used much more credibly against the ‘footnote’ countries (i.e. Britain, Denmark, and Greece), for whom so many exceptions had to be written in. This threat of exclusion was buttressed by the willingness of the Federal Government to bankroll any settlements through side payments, a tactic that rescued the German presidency in 1988 which had been threatened by a dispute over the financing of cohesion with the poorer member states.
POST-WALL EUROPE The collapse of Soviet rule throughout Central and Eastern Europe in 1989/90 led to the constitution of a quite different kind of Europe with radically altered political opportunity structures. On a realist reading one might have expected Germany to abandon its commitment to further integration and to a reflexive coordination with France. An uncompromised statehood, the end of German division, and international acceptance had all been visibly achieved. Since the advent of the EMS, Germany had been able to exercise influence and control over the macroeconomic policies of the other member states without having to concede them a ‘voice’ in the formulation of German monetary policy which remained firmly in the hands of the Bundesbank. In the years immediately following German Unity there was no move whatsoever in a realist direction, however, and the direction was towards ever closer union around an even more explicit Franco-German core. There are a number of fairly obvious reasons why the path of deeper integration and strengthened core was adopted. There was an almost universal assumption that German unity would equate to a significant increase in German power. This gave other states an elemental interest in containing this assumed increase in German power. For France and Mitterrand the answer to German unity, after a short hesitation, was obvious. Deeper integration around a Franco-German core had been a very successful formula and had allowed France to structure the institutional balance and the key portions of the European Union. It also continued to offer France and Mitterrand leadership roles. France was expected to bear the cost of the balance of adjustment as a newly enlarged and much more powerful Germany would have a much greater say in delivering the tone and direction, but on the vital plane of the economy deeper integration offered the prospect of wresting monetary policy away from the unilateral control of the Bundesbank. For the British
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
105
Government no such option existed since deeper integration was unacceptable and damage limitation suggested self-exclusion (opt-out). In the new situation the choice appeared to lie with Germany but for Kohl and the German Government no choice seriously presented itself. His deepest instincts based on historical memory were to avoid manifest and sole exercise of German power since this would force others to counterbalance Germany and to seek to contain her in other ways. Pedersen writes of stones being ‘left on the path enabling the Federal Republic to find its way out of the forest’ (Pedersen 1998: 199) The formula of flanking ‘an arena of cooperation’ with ‘an arena of competition’ had worked perfectly for Germany. On a wider canvas Kohl and the German political class in general saw themselves as having a vital interest in the preservation of the stability of the European Union and multilateral governance since the alternative in their minds was nationalism. The stability of the European Union thus precluded too obvious a display of German power in a realist sense. German power resources were to be invested rather in ‘shaping the regional milieu’ and the uploading of German models of governance to the European level (Bulmer, Jeffery, and Paterson 2000). In continuing and deepening joint leadership aspirations Kohl was enormously aided by Delors, who played the key role in squaring German unity with the requirements of the European Union. The formula of enlargement without accession greatly simplified the procedures that might have been required and avoided the protracted timetable that might have destabilized a process characterized by a plethora of internal and external negotiations moving forward at compatible speeds. At no point in Delors’s view should doubts be allowed to creep into German minds on the benefits of European integration. In the case of the Maastricht Treaty, ‘Political leadership from Kohl and Mitterrand acted as the vital animating force behind the EMU negotiations, assisted by Delors in oiling the wheels of the process’ (Dyson and Featherstone 1999: 757). The preconditions for this leadership were their dominating roles in their own domestic political systems (an obvious contrast here is between Kohl at Maastricht and at Amsterdam when his power was visibly declining). Given the depth of integration that was now envisaged, it was necessary to operate differently from Giscard and Schmidt who were problem-led and cultivated a pragmatic style. Intergovernmental coordination had to be strengthened and encompass many more ministries. There was a return to the dramatic style centred on a rhetoric of reconciliation that had characterized the Adenauer-de Gaulle period and both Mitterrand and Kohl took care to present a vision of European policy, a practice Helmut Schmidt regarded with anathema (Paterson 1999; Mitterrand 1996).
106
Who Led Europe? COOPERATIVE HEGEMONY
Thomas Pedersen has attempted to capture the scope and intensity of the leadership of the European Union by Kohl and Mitterrand by developing a theory of cooperative hegemony (Pedersen 1998). At the core of this contribution is the perception that Germany is the potential hegemon and that France was offered ‘a share in its evolving regional hegemony and the opportunities for regional hegemonic rule, which such a continental leadership offers both countries’ (ibid. 198). In the pursuit of a cooperative hegemony two strategies are crucial in seeking to neutralize the balancing reaction that is otherwise likely to set in. One strategy is cooperation by the provision of side payments, a role that was assigned to Germany and which Kohl was for a time more than willing to fulfill. The second strategy focuses on differentiation. Cooperative hegemons have an interest in the avoidance of defection and balancing and will normally favour an open core structure. The possibility of participation is calculated to weaken the periphery and the position of the core is further strengthened if it commands a clear resource superiority. In the first half of the 1990s this explanation does have some force. The coordination reflex between France and Germany was so intense that it would have been difficult for either partner to envisage individual initiatives and differentiation in the service of a logic of convergence was central to the Economic and Monetary Union. And yet even in these years the EU remained a multi-actor, multifaceted system, and the idea of cooperative hegemony really only applies to the conclusion of historic decisions. Even here Derek Beach (2005) makes a strong case for the role of the Commission (especially in relation to EMU) and the Council Secretariat. The concept of cooperative hegemony is also difficult to fit with Germany’s semi-sovereign system. The Federal Republic is deliberately not adapted to play the role of a realist state characterized as it is by institutional pluralism and a multitude of veto players. It is true, however, that in relation to historic decisions on Europe, Chancellor Kohl for a time abrogated to himself and the Chancellor’s office the power of decision. Even at its height this period of Franco-German dominance was eroding from within. It had represented a very bold attempt to realize, in the postWall environment, a set of goals (EMU, CFSP, the Rights Agenda) which had been developed in the easier environment of the 1980s. Two central assumptions of the policy of institutional export through a Franco-German core revealed themselves as being based on very fragile foundations. Central to the way in which the Franco-German core operated was the assumption of a powerful German economy with resources available to lubricate the
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
107
settlements that had been agreed upon. The continuing financial transfers associated with German unity and the faltering performance of the German economy produced a ‘resource crunch’ and very seriously compromised the ability of Germany to play the paymaster role (Jeffery and Paterson 2004). Moreover, serious doubts began to emerge in post-unity Germany about the superiority of German models which had provided the rationale for their uploading to a European level. If the problem of shrinking German resources proved a threat to the efficacy of the core, the big picture challenge was the longer-term inevitability of enlargement in a post-Wall Europe. This prospect produced a discourse of irreversibility associated especially with EMU where it was hoped that the centralizing logic at the core of EMU could be hard-wired into the EU system before enlargement took place. It was hoped that these pressures would draw the United Kingdom into EMU, but they proved much less powerful than envisaged and the enlargement process has been associated with a shrinking core and expanding periphery (see Chapter 10, below).
CONCLUSION This retrospective seriously questions the post-Dutch and French Referendum rhetoric about the desirability of a focus on a Franco-German-led core of original member states. Our analysis of who has led Europe demonstrates that this leadership has often been more intermittent and contingent than some would now argue. Moreover, in the period at which it was at its most powerful under Kohl and Mitterrand after 1990, the central assumption about German economic power was mistaken and in that central aspect it was an unsustainable model. That it was able to drive integration as far forward as it did also owed a great deal to the role of Jacques Delors as strategic insider. It is very unlikely that any future Commission will possess that sort of certainty. The collapse of ‘permissive consensus’ in mass attitudes towards European integration (Featherstone 1994) and the way in which the Commission has been disabled by being scapegoated by national leaders has gravely eroded the Commission’s leadership abilities on ‘heroic issues’ though not on ‘humdrum issues’ (Hayward, see Introduction), though even on humdrum issues there is much populist resentment as the long-term liberalizing effects of the Single Market Programme bite more deeply into domestic interests. The shrinking of the permissive consensus and the diffusion of the practice of referenda clearly also constrains the leadership that national leaders can offer on institutional issues.
108
Who Led Europe?
One of our key findings was that leadership at the European level has only occurred when there was a coincidence with strong domestic leadership. Where this was absent as in Adenauer’s final period then little could be achieved. Strong domestic leadership was not enough (see Chapter 9, below) however; national leaders have to possess sufficient latitude to put themselves at the centre of constitutive bargains. The major current and future constraint on the chances of realizing the core model, however, is the size and resultant complexity of an enlarged EU. Enlargement to twenty-seven members with the almost certain prospect of a number of others entails institutionalizing a logic of diversity and there is a clear aggregation of preferences problem since the new members are increasingly heterogeneous. Simon Hix (2005) identifies a number of coalitions in the Council of Ministers. These include the Franco-German coalition, the Benelux coalition, a Cohesion bloc, a Nordic bloc, and an Eastern alliance. Even at present the Franco-German coalition is seen as pivotal in only 25 per cent of cases. Moreover Germany, given its public finance deficits, is now unwilling and unable to make side payments on the scale that lubricated the acceptance of the Kohl–Mitterrand agenda. In the new, more complex EU the strident assertion of core interests offends not only Italy but also Spain and Poland which see themselves and are seen by others as rising powers. It also offends the expanding periphery of small member states, worried by the whole thrust of the institutional discussion in recent years. Whilst the issue of leadership of Europe has become even more difficult, it has been joined post-Wall by the even trickier issue of how a claim to European leadership more widely is to be realized. As the world’s largest trading bloc, it is unsurprising that the EU sought a global leadership role in competitiveness through the Lisbon Process, but to date protectionist pressures have ensured that little progress has been made. The situation is even more intractable in the security area since ‘the rapid deployment of power in international affairs requires precisely the kind of centralized decisionmaking apparatus that the EU so patently lacks’ (see Chapter 7, below). The weaknesses of European leadership in terms of agency are compounded by a weakening demographic position and a global system at present dominated by the United States, but where the rising powers are China and India rather than Europe. The advent of new leaders in Germany, France, and the United Kingdom has slightly modified though not essentially changed the analysis. Chancellor Merkel has played a key role in unblocking the UK budgetary rebate issue and negotiating a Reform Treaty in place of the Constitutional Treaty at the Brussels Summit of June 2007. In securing a settlement on the Reform Treaty she was greatly aided by the newly elected President Sarkozy. Differences remain,
Did France and Germany Lead Europe?
109
however, between France and Germany on the issue of the independence of the ECB (non-negotiable for the German political class) and EADS. The new leaders of both France and Germany also recognize that the Franco-German relationship is no longer wide enough in an enlarged Europe and have been very keen to engage the UK in a new, more trilateral pattern. This recognition has been aided by the emergence of Poland as the new ‘awkward partner’. This drawing together of the big three does not presage a full-blown directorate, which would in any case be unacceptable to other member states. The institutional road is for the foreseeable future exhausted, but wide divergences persist on how to respond to globalization, and the emergence of a purposeful leadership is very unlikely.
REFERENCES B, D. (2005) The Dynamics of European Integration: Why and When Euopean Institutions Matter. Basingstoke: Palgrave. B, S., and P, W. E. (1987) The Federal Republic of Germany and the European Community. London: Allen & Unwin. B, S., J, C., and P, W. E. (2000) Germany’s European Diplomacy: Shaping the Regional Milieu. Manchester: Manchester University Press. D, K., and F, K. (1999) The Road to Maastricht: Negotiating Economic and Monetary Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. F, K. (1994) ‘Jean Monnet and the “Democratic Deficit” in the European Union’, Journal of Common Market Studies 32, 2 June 1994, 149–70. G, J. (2003) European Integration 1950–2003: Superstate or New Market Economy? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. H, E. (1958) The Uniting of Europe, Political, Social and Economic Forces, 1950– 1957. London: Stevens. H, S. (1966) ‘Obstinate or Obsolete? The Fate of the Nation State and The Case of Western Europe’, Daedalus 95/3: 862–915. H, S. (2005) The Political System of the European Union, 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Palgrave. J, C., and P, W. E. (2004) ‘Germany and European Integration: The Shifting of Tectonic Plates’, in H. Kitschelt and W. Streeck (eds.), Germany: Beyond the Stable State. London: Frank Cass, 59–78. K, P. J. (1987) Policy and Politics in Germany: The Growth of a Semisovereign State. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. M, H. (1973) Memoirs, vi. At the End of the Day. London: Macmillan. M, F. (1996) De l’Allemagne, de la France. Paris: Odile Jacob. N, B., and S, C.-G. (1998) The European Union: Readings on the Theory and Practice of European Integration. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
110
Who Led Europe?
P, W. E. (1993) ‘Mus Europa Angst vor Deutschland haben?’, in R. Hrbek, Der Vertrag von Maastricht in der wissenschaftlichen Kontroverse. Baden-Baden: Nomos. (1999) ‘Helmut Kohl, “The Vision Thing”, and Escaping the Semisovereignty Trap’, in C. Clemens and W. E. Paterson, The Kohl Chancellorship. London: Frank Cass, 17–36. (2004) ‘Of Core Groups and Directorates: From Avant Garde to Arrière Garde’, in Redefining the European Project Conference, Halki, June 2004. P, T. (1998) Germany, France and the Integration of Europe: A Realist Perspective. London: Pinter. S, H. P. (1997) Konrad Adenauer, German Politician in a Period of War, Revolution, and Reconstruction, ii. The Statesman, 1952–1957. Oxford: Berghahn. W, J. (1994) ‘Fin de Siècle Europe’, in R. Dehousse (ed.), Europe After Maastricht: An Ever Closer Union? Munich: Loebe.
Part II Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
This page intentionally left blank
6 Political Leadership in the European Commission: The Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005 Michelle Cini
INTRODUCTION This chapter looks at the European Commission in the period 1995–2005, focusing in particular on the presidencies of Jacques Santer and Romano Prodi. It reviews the political leadership—or lack of it—demonstrated by the Commission during this time, and seeks to understand what this tells us about the changing position of the European Commission in the EU system. It argues that while the decade under discussion constitutes a transition period between the Delors Commissions and a new phase in the Commission’s history, it is still too soon to determine the kind of role the Commission will perform in future, and whether or to what extent that role will involve a political leadership component. The chapter begins, however, by explaining the expectation that the European Commission should perform a political leadership role within the EU. This is followed by a discussion of the two presidencies of Jacques Santer (1995–9) and Romano Prodi (1999–2004). A final section considers the extent to which Commission leadership is a function of a wider European politico-economic and inter-institutional context.
GREAT EXPECTATIONS: POLITICAL LEADERSHIP AND THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION Media commentators are quick to criticize the Commission for failing to provide political leadership. But this begs the question: why should it? If one considers the Commission as the EU’s administration, or as the servant
114
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
of the EU’s member states, as do intergovernmentalists, the expectation of Commission leadership would seem to be misplaced (Moravcsik 1998). Even if we don’t accept this view, the assumption that the Commission ought to be providing some kind of leadership for the EU, indeed for Europe, is rarely explained. This expectation of Commission leadership is derived from two linked sources. The first is the EU Treaty, the functions with which it endows the Commission, and the concomitant set of ideas about the Commission’s raison d’être that appear in neo-functionalist writings, and which constitute an important dimension of the ‘Monnet Method’ of European integration. The second source, which feeds off the first, is derived from experience of past presidents, and the mythology surrounding periods in the history of European integration when the Commission has been able to perform a leadership role. In earlier times, the symbolic strong Commission president was Walter Hallstein, who led the Commission at the start. Since 1995, it has been Jacques Delors, Commission president for the ten years preceding that date. While the EU Treaty spells out the formal functions of the European Commission, there are various ways of conceptualizing the different categories of tasks, both formal and informal, that the Commission performs. The Commission has an agenda-setting role; it has the right to initiate legislation in many policy areas; it is involved in consensus-building among national governments, the EP, and other interested actors; it represents the EU in external (economic) relations; it manages Commission programmes; it provides oversight and enforcement of European law; and it speaks for the EU’s general interest (see Cini 1996). Arguably, the Commission has, since the 1990s, inherited new functions that relate directly to the proliferation of new policy modes, though another way of understanding these changes is to conceptualize this as a reweighting of Commission functions, prioritizing some at the expense of others. Closely associated with the functions identified above is an expectation placed on Commission leadership prevalent in neo-functionalist writings and in the more practical ‘Monnet method’ of European integration. Neofunctionalism sees the supranational institutions, and the Commission in particular, as one of the driving forces behind the European integration process. Although functional spillover might seem an automatic process, the cultivated spillover promoted by the Commission is what neo-functionalists believe sustains European integration. Such views have been challenged over recent decades to the extent that they are no longer considered mainstream, even though they still carry some implicit weight in discourse on the European Commission.
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
115
The early literature on the Commission distinguished between the institution’s political and administrative functions (Coombes 1970), and this remains a useful heuristic. It reflects an understanding of the Commission as a hybrid institution, which serves as a civil service to the EU, whilst performing explicitly political functions in proposing legislation, and supporting the advance of European integration. However, there is also some acknowledgement that the political role of the Commission stretches beyond the obviously political functions it performs, to encompass tasks that might on the surface appear administrative or managerial. Be that as it may, the explicitly political functions performed by the Commission have always possessed a higher status than its administrative functions. This is often the case in public organizations, where policy-making roles are seen as the more prestigious, attracting the highest calibre of staff. Over the years, reviews and reports have commented on the organizational weaknesses in the Commission that have damaged its effectiveness and credibility. They pointed, in particular, to the Commission’s incapacity for horizontal coordination; a tendency for senior positions to be allocated in line with national quotas, rather than on merit; a ‘nationalization’ of the personal offices (cabinets) of commissioners, and their over-involvement in the promotion of officials of ‘their’ nationality; inadequate financial management systems which facilitated the defrauding of the Community budget; a lack of flexibility in staffing, meaning that some departments were severely overworked, whilst others were overstaffed; and a tendency to take on new responsibilities, without consideration given to resource implications within the institution. Finally, the Commission suffered from a ‘management deficit’, which arose in part from a lack of management culture within the Commission, exacerbated by low expectations on the part of senior officials and inadequate training. In the meantime the Commission has prided itself on performing its policy tasks exceptionally well, seeing little incentive in addressing the more mundane administrative problems that have affected the quality of policy implementation. Moreover, over time, as the scope of policy and the sheer number of decisions taken increased, and the number of member states grew, the Commission began to find it increasingly difficult to cope with the growth in its managerial responsibilities. To a large extent the problem rested as much if not more with the member states and Council who continued to ask the Commission to act in various policy areas, without giving them the resources to do so effectively. Leadership is closely associated with the political functions performed by the Commission, and in particular with its agenda-setting and policy initiation roles. To expect leadership from the Commission is to admit that the
116
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
institution has the capacity or potential to act politically. But it is not just about acting politically in specific policy domains (policy leadership): it is also about using the capacity to act politically to influence wider political outcomes. While influence over specific policy outcomes may denote a particular type of leadership from the Commission, or directorates-general within it, directing and shaping the broader parameters of the European integration process or EU/European politics is what most commentators would understand as providing evidence of Commission political leadership. Even if this is a useful point of departure, however, it still begs the question of how easily the Commission’s influence might be identified. Whilst journalists tend to report on what is visible and immediate, some academic commentators have emphasized the Commission’s capacity to influence informally, a process difficult to trace. While this might suggest that the Commission influences outcomes in a more subtle way than journalists might warrant, for the purposes of this chapter the Commission is not engaging in political leadership unless it is active and visible in the public domain (see Chapter 13, below). The expectation of Commission leadership comes not only from the treaties and the Commission’s functions, formal or otherwise, but also emerges from the mythology surrounding the presidencies of strong leaders, notably Walter Hallstein (Loth, Wallace, and Wessels 1995), president 1958–67; and more recently, Jacques Delors, president 1985–95 (though some might also include Roy Jenkins, president 1977–81 in this list). It is the Delors presidency which is now held up as a model for future Commission presidencies. A great deal has been written on the Delors decade (see Grant 1994; Ross 1995; Endo 1999; Drake 2000), but three points seem particularly important to emphasize. The first is that Delors was able to take advantage of a propitious set of circumstances to mobilize national actors, to use their often divergent interests to revitalize the European integration project. He was able to position himself vis-à-vis national governments so as to continue to influence the integration process right up until the signing of the Maastricht Treaty. While he was not always successful, with Drake (2000) suggesting that his leadership emerged ‘as much by accident as by design or intent’ and the final years of his presidency were deemed disappointing, his successes are acknowledged to outweigh any failures he might have experienced. Second, Delors had the respect, albeit sometimes grudging, of national leaders, who were impressed by his grasp of detail, and who felt able to treat him as an equal. And third, he was able to optimize and mobilize resources from within the Commission (Endo 1999). The assumption is that these characteriztics and conditions ought to be replicable in a future Commission (or Commission president), allowing the Commission to perform a political leadership function once again in the EU.
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
117
BLEAK HOUSE: SANTER, PRODI, AND THE COMMISSION’S LEADERSHIP VACUUM It is ironic, perhaps, that Commission leadership is so closely affiliated with the personal approach and priorities of one individual, the Commission president. After all, the Commission president has long been little more than a first among equals; only recently—since the Amsterdam Treaty—has it gained powers that differentiate the role of president from that of commissioner. And even now, these powers are far from extensive. It is also worth emphasizing the importance that is still placed on the collegiality of the Commission team. It is not the Commission president who takes decisions, but the commissioners (by a simple majority). When it comes to a vote, the Commission president is now really only one of twenty-seven. Yet there is a general acknowledgement, both in academic and more journalistic writings, that Commission leadership depends very heavily on the choices made by the Commission president (Nugent 1995; Christiansen 2006: 113–14) or, as in the case of Prodi, the priorities thrust upon him. In the rest of this section, first the presidency of Jacques Santer (1995–9) is considered; and second, that of Romano Prodi (1999–2004).
The Santer Presidency The failure of national governments to reach a unanimous agreement on the candidature of proposed Belgian candidate, Jean-Luc Dehaene, in 1994, necessitated the selection of a compromise candidate. They settled on Jacques Santer, a former Luxembourg prime minister. The manner of his selection suggested that he would be in a weak position from the outset. This perception was reflected in the European Parliament’s vote on his candidature in July 1994, with 260 MEPs voting for Santer, and 238 voting against (with 23 abstentions) (Hix and Lord 1996). This was hardly a legitimating vote of confidence. The reluctance of many parliamentarians to support Santer not only stemmed from his compromise status however. It was also down to the weakness of his programme, especially when contrasted to that of his predecessor Jacques Delors. Santer was not a man of vision, and this was very much reflected in his rather timid plans for the Commission. The new president arrived in post with the aspiration that the Commission should ‘do less, but do it better’. This was hardly the most inspiring slogan for a political leader, but it did seem to fit the spirit of the times. After all, it was acknowledged, post-Maastricht, that the European publics were becoming increasingly frustrated with the elitist approach to European integration that
118
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
had long been reflected in the priorities of the European institutions. The ‘less’ spoke directly to those for whom the EC, and since late 1993, the EU’s extension of competences had been a worrying development. The ‘better’ spoke to concerns about the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of EU policies, and the oft-repeated suggestion that the EU institutions, and especially the Commission, was an incompetent, and possibly even corrupt, policy manager. The ‘less but better’ slogan pointed to an inward-looking technocratic tendency in the Santer Commission, even though the quality of appointments to the College was impressive. Whereas Delors had done little to improve the inner workings of the Commission (Peterson 1999a: 56), Santer recognized that the Commission could not continue to function as it had, especially with the new responsibilities it would be taking on, if it did not improve the way it worked. Reforms were launched with more of a whimper than a bang, however. Indeed, outside the Commission, few were aware that there was a reform project underway (Cram 1999). This low-profile approach may well have been thought appropriate given that internal reform was not seen at that point as a legitimating device for the Commission. The reforms were led in the main by Commissioners Erkki Liikanen and Anita Gradin and consisted, in the first instance, of two elements. The first of the programmes became known as SEM 2000 (Sound and Efficient Financial Management). It sought to improve the rigour of financial regulation and evaluation in Commission programmes and policy and to introduce to the Commission a ‘new financial management culture’ (Laffan 1997: 430), which would allow for the transfer of responsibility to managers within the services without threat to the consistency of standards operating within the Commission. Most of the measures proposed were implemented by mid-1998. It was at the second stage that MAP 2000 (Modernization of Administration and Personnel Policy) was initiated, in 1997, and that the implications of financial management reform were followed through in matters concerned with staffing and personnel. MAP sought to modernize personnel management by decentralizing and devolving powers, simplifying procedures, and identifying and applying new approaches in the administration and management of human resources (Commission 1998). Even though some of the objectives of the two programmes were implemented by the time Santer left office, they far from constituted a comprehensive reform package. Santer’s programmes of administrative reform placed great weight on transforming the Commission to enable it to work better. This was recognized by Heads of Government when in the final declaration of the Cardiff European Council in June 1998, the Commission was praised for ‘its efforts to improve its efficiency and management’ (Peterson 1999a: 57). However, while officials working within the Commission acknowledged that
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
119
some reform was necessary, there was internal resistance to Santer’s reform programme from the start. By April 1998, hostilities had broken out between the Commission’s management and its unions. Seeking to make amends after the strike, the Commission president established a High-Level Working Group which ultimately advocated changes to the Staff Regulations, but in a manner that was rather less contentious than the earlier report. The former secretarygeneral, David Williamson, heading the Group, suggested a reluctance to engage in a complete overhaul of procedures, which would, in his words, have provoked ‘an administrative earthquake’ (quoted in European Voice, 12 Nov. 98). This worthy but flawed reform was only one dimension of Santer’s presidency, however. His term of office came at a time when attention was turning to the eastern enlargement of the EU (following the successful 1995 enlargement which brought in Sweden, Finland, and Austria); progress was being made towards the EMU deadline in 1999; and the Amsterdam Treaty was negotiated, signed, and ratified. While there was some measure of success in these very important fields, and particularly in presiding over the launch of the Euro in 1999, there is very little evidence of political leadership from the Commission president in these fields. Indeed, the consensus is now that Santer was ‘out of his depth’ as Commission president (BBC Online, 16 March 1999). And even if this judgement is unfair, he was an uninspiring leader who lacked political judgement, especially in the run-up to the resignation (Peterson 1999b). Although always described as genial and affable, he demonstrated a distinct lack of vision. At the same time, however, he did seem to be a safe pair of hands for the Commission (ibid.), someone who would manage the Commission’s entry into a new postDelors phase in a competent manner. After all, that is why the member states agreed on his candidature, and why the European Parliament was so reluctant to approve his appointment. Santer’s presidency was to end in humiliation. However, many commentators have now noted how ironic it is that the most reformist of Commission presidents at the time should fall from grace in such a way, criticized for his failure to address the problems that had long been facing the Commission (Peterson 2000; Stevens and Stevens 2001: 193; Cram 1999: 59). But Santer’s problems, it seems, were not only that the reforms he introduced were lowkey and low-profile and, in many cases, only introduced on a voluntary basis (Stevens and Stevens 2001: 187), but that he lacked the capacity to follow through even on his original internal reform objective (Peterson 1999b). Without success on reform, and given the way it concluded, the Santer Commission had few, if any, redeeming features, and no evidence of strong, assertive leadership on the part of the Commission president.
120
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
The Prodi Presidency The appointment of Romano Prodi, a former Italian prime minister, to the post of president of the Commission involved a very different process from that which had characterized Santer’s appointment. Only days after the resignation of the Commission, at the Berlin European Council on 23 March, and ‘after 10 minutes of discussion’ (Peterson 2002: 79), the member states agreed to support Prodi’s nomination. Fortuitously, he was free to take on the position. He was approved by the European Parliament by an impressive 392 to 72 votes in early May and began work straight away, though his formal appointment did not start until September. As a consequence of the circumstances of his appointment, internal Commission reform had to be one of the key priorities of the new Commission. Having initially been offered a position dealing with relations with the European Parliament, Neil Kinnock managed to persuade Prodi to give him a more ‘meaty’ portfolio (see Westlake 2001: 695), and though he had not wanted this particular job, he accepted Prodi’s offer to become one of two vicepresidents with responsibility for Commission Reform (Westlake 2001: 699). While this decision to nominate a Vice-President for Reform was criticized by some (see Spence 2000, for example), it did send an extremely strong signal to the outside world about the new president’s commitment to reforming the Commission. Although Prodi’s reform agenda might have seemed to constitute a break with the past, in fact there was a good deal of continuity with Santer’s reform, with Kinnock, at least to some extent, picking up where Santer had left off. Drawing in part on the DECODE survey, which comprised a kind of ‘state of the art’ of Commission organization and practice, Kinnock oversaw the drafting of a speedily written consultative document, which by March 2000 had become the Reform White Paper. But even before this document was agreed, a number of changes were introduced by the president. These included the reduction of the number of cabinet members to six for each commissioner; the cabinets became more multinational in their composition (see Christiansen 2006: 114); a press and communication service was created; the commissioners’ offices were relocated in the same building as their directorates-general; and a new system for enhanced mobility amongst senior officials was introduced, with director-generals now having to come from a different member state from their commissioner. But despite the significance of these early efforts to respond to particular organizational criticisms, it was the Reform White Paper that most clearly spelt out the Commission’s approach. At the centre of the reform programme was the prioritization of ‘core functions’. These were defined as ‘policy
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
121
conception, political initiative and enforcing Community law’ (Commission 2000). Non-priority areas were to be identified and resources reallocated where necessary. A judgement was to be made as to whether the Commission’s resources were ‘commensurate with its tasks’. If they were not, the Commission would discontinue tasks, or refuse to take on new ones. Practical measures to implement these objectives, including the introduction of an annual reporting cycle alongside a system of so-called ‘Activity Based Management’ comprised the first strand of the Commission reform (Commission 2000: 6). The second and third strands dealt with the creation of ‘optimal structures and systems for the deployment of its resources’: in other words, the management of human and financial resources. Changes in human resources policy were intended to ‘place a premium on performance, continuous training and quality of management, as well as improving recruitment and career development’ (ibid.). As for financial management, an overhaul of the existing system was planned in order to introduce an effective internal control system, which defined clearly ‘the responsibilities of each actor’ and which involved ‘regular checks by the new Internal Audit Service on the quality and reliability of each internal control system’ (ibid. 7). These were comprehensive and fundamental reforms, and the reaction to them from within the Commission was mixed. On the one hand, there was a general acknowledgement that reform was necessary. However, on the other, the proposals were contested on a number of fronts. Disputes concerned both the substance of the plans, and the way in which they were being introduced or implemented. This was despite an impressive programme of consultation led by the reform team (Kassim 2004). Particularly contentious were those aspects of the reform that involved revision of the Staff Regulations, especially those elements that involved the modernization of pay and personnel policy (e.g. European Voice, 15 March 2001). Reform was not the only big priority of the Prodi Commission however. Prodi’s term of office coincided with the enlargement negotiations and the eventual accession of applicant states from Central and Eastern Europe on 1 May 2004; as well as the lead up to the changeover from ‘old money’ to Euro notes and coins on 1 January 2002, and with the management of the post-EMU disputes over the Stability and Growth Pact. Enlargement and EMU, as was the case for Santer, took place at the same time as the process of institutional reform continued with the Nice IGC underway in 2000, the Treaty signed in 2001 and ratified between 2001 and 2 February 2003, when it came into force. Prodi was also involved in the Convention on the Future of Europe (2002–3) and in the subsequent IGC. Prodi sought to demonstrate leadership in all three areas of enlargement, EMU, and treaty reform. John Peterson has generously pointed out that Prodi
122
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
did manage to provide some policy leadership on the enlargement process, driving the agenda in advance of the Helsinki European Council decision to open negotiations with twelve applicants (Peterson 2002: 79; 2003: 10). Peterson (2003: 6–7) also considers the Commission’s contributions to the Convention on the Future of Europe to have been ‘(arguably) considered and even sensible’, stating also that ‘The Commission is in fact quite a lot stronger than it sometimes appears’ (ibid. 6). However, identifying moments when Prodi was able to influence the agenda are not easy to find. Examples of failures to do so are much more in evidence. On institutional reform, there was the embarrassing humiliation of being sidelined at the Nice European Council (Peterson 2002); and, in 2003, the disastrous submission to the European Council of a paper advocating a federalist European Union (the Penelope document), without the agreement of the College. As much as its content, to which some member states took exception, it was the secretive manner in which the paper had been drafted that weakened the Commission’s position by suggesting that the institution did not have a coherent, agreed view on the future of the EU. On EMU, Prodi’s term of office witnessed the incremental undermining of the Commission’s role in the Stability Pact, not only by national governments who did not want to be held to its rules, but also by Prodi himself who, in a notorious remark, called it ‘stupid’ and in need of drastic reform (see e.g. Guardian, 18 October 2002). Although substantively he had a point, the comment was not an appropriate one from the president of the institution whose responsibility it was to enforce the Pact. Earlier in his term, Prodi had also adopted a misguided maximalist line in defending the Commission’s prerogatives. In the Commission’s White Paper on Governance the impression given was of a Commission on the defensive. Rather than grappling objectively with the big issues of governance, the paper seemed to express a conservatism, suggesting that the Commission, under attack, was seeking to justify its own powers. As Peterson (2003: 11) states, ‘the Commission is almost entirely immune from self-criticism’ in the Paper. This kind of approach from the Commission served only to weaken its credibility, and the credibility of its president, with national governments. Even though Prodi had been a high-profile appointment, as a former prime minister of a large European state, he was treated with varying degrees of disdain by national leaders. Prodi’s capacity to lead was also constrained by his inability to communicate effectively. His lack of charisma and his inability to get his message across clearly was well documented. Moreover, from early on in his term, it became clear that he was prone to political gaffes. ‘Notable amongst them was on the occasion of the unveiling of the Commission’s White Paper on Governance when Prodi self-deprecatingly stated that he was sorry that
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
123
the paper was so dull and boring, but that it could not be helped because governance was essentially a dull and boring topic’ (European Voice, 25 July 2002, quoted in Peterson 2003: 10–11). He also antagonized national leaders by claiming the Commission to be a kind of European government, and referring to himself as a European prime minister (ibid. 10). His invitation to the Libyan leader Gadaffi to visit Brussels also caused a political storm and was soon retracted. All these early experiences seemed to make Prodi much more cautious in the latter part of his term of office. By the end of his term, Romano Prodi had failed to exhibit strong leadership. He had failed both in the sense of being unable to win support for his own vision of the EU and in communicating his message clearly. He had demonstrated ‘questionable political judgement’ (Peterson 2002: 83).
HARD TIMES: A CONTEXT FOR COMMISSION LEADERSHIP The personality and political priorities of Commission presidents provide only a partial, and therefore an inadequate explanation of Commission leadership. In accounts of the Delors decade, though Commission leadership was certainly attributed to Delors himself, other factors, namely the international political and economic context, and the position of the Commission within the EU political system, were also identified as having allowed the Commission to fulfil its leadership potential during this period. Without the latter, even the most charismatic and politically astute leader would have found it impossible to enhance the Commission’s role. Both politically and in economic terms, the European and international context within which the Commission was operating since the early 1990s was not conducive to proactive leadership by the Commission. In the 1990s the world economy was hit by a number of very deep crises. In Europe, the economic weakness of Germany, in part as a consequence of unification in 1990, had knock-on effects across the Continent. As is often the case, when faced with economic pressures, governments tend to look inwards to their own workforces and industry, rather than outwards and upwards to supranational actors and enhanced interstate cooperation. At first sight, then, it might seem paradoxical that governments continued to engage in a process of treaty revision throughout the 1990s and into the following decade. There was, however, a certain path dependency attached to this process once the Maastricht Treaty had been agreed; and one can hardly say that there was an overt enthusiasm for the process, which became increasingly technocratic as Amsterdam was approved and national leaders moved on to negotiate the very institutional
124
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Nice agenda. Moreover, EMU had already been set in motion by 1992, despite scepticism in the 1990s about whether monetary union would ever come about; and enlargement remained on the agenda, a consequence of the fall of communism in Central and Eastern Europe, and the concomitant calls for a ‘return to the West’ by elites in the newly formed democratic states to the east of the Union. By the mid-1990s, although there was a vast amount on the Commission’s agenda, there were no new grand initiatives to be introduced. Over this period, the Commission’s relationship with governmental actors also changed, although it would be wrong to overstate this point. The Commission has always had an uneasy relationship with national political elites, especially those of the larger member states, and examples of tension between Commission presidents and national leaders are legion. However, there are a number of ways in which institutional and policy changes have altered the Council’s relationship with the Commission. First, the proliferation of ‘comitology’ has hampered the Commission’s capacity to act independently (Franchino 2000). Comitology is shorthand used to refer to the network of committees, composed of national appointees that oversee the Commission’s work and that manage political control of the Commission (Stevens and Stevens 2001: 227). Most contentious are those committees involved at the implementation or execution stage of the decisionmaking process. While responsibilities have been delegated to the Commission in this area, it is hardly surprising that member states are keen to retain as much control as possible. However, these committees have been much criticized for the secrecy surrounding their operation, and because as well as keeping the Commission in check, they also exclude the European Parliament from part of the legislative process, which though ostensibly apolitical is, de facto, anything but (see Chapter 13, below). Second, a new Commission–Council dynamic has arisen out of the emergence of new categories of policy and the new modes of policy-making. Of the latter, most prominent in recent years has been the application of the ‘open method of coordination’ (OMC) in a number of new policy areas. OMC is a voluntary process, which makes use of ‘soft law’ and other informal instruments of persuasion (rather than control). It can involve the establishment of indicators and benchmarks against which national programmes of action (in social protection, for example) can be measured, and comparisons across member states made. Above all, it seeks to enhance the transparency and visibility of national policy, encouraging cooperation through peer pressure and policy learning, rather than by means of the formal legal instruments that the EU also has at its disposal. Thus, OMC is an intergovernmental policy mechanism, which marginalizes the Commission. Although the Commission may be involved, its role in OMC policies becomes akin to network
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
125
management (see Metcalfe 2004, for example) and dependent on the goodwill of national governments. There have been other developments since the early 1990s that have also been interpreted as intergovernmental in the sense that they weaken—or at least do not empower—the EU’s supranational actors. The pillarization of the Treaties at Maastricht was a first step in this direction, extending the competence of the Union by limiting the input of the Commission into new policy domains, that is, foreign policy, and justice and home affairs. Many conclude, as a consequence, that the Commission has been weakened by the treaty changes of the 1990s, and that the eurosceptic claims of an inexorable centralization process within the EU over this period is simply wrong. However, it is equally true that the Commission retains intact its function as regulator of the internal market, which for some constitutes its only crucial task (see Majone 2002). In this area, there is no question of the Commission’s role being reduced, at least for the foreseeable future. Thus, a huge proportion of the Commission’s work remains protected. As such, it would be incorrect to assume that what might be seen as an ‘intergovernmentalization’ of the EU will ultimately lead to the obsolescence of the Commission. The changes taking place may be more intergovernmental than supranational, if one chooses to use this now rather outdated terminology. The reality of changing interinstitutional relations is far more complex and multifaceted, however, than such a limited conceptual dichotomy can confer. It is not just relations with the Council that have changed, however. Efforts to democratize the EU since the early 1990s have also dramatically altered the Commission’s inter-institutional position. The increasing involvement of the Parliament in EU policy-making, through the introduction of new legislative procedures (the most important of which is co-decision), and the willingness of the European Parliament to use to the full its enhanced scrutiny role vis-à-vis the Commission, has meant that the balance of power between the two institutions has shifted substantially. The co-decision procedure in particular has squeezed the Commission out of ‘mainstream’ Community policy-making, despite its continuing formal role in that process. Crises involving the two institutions have forced a consolidation of this changing relationship, and have made it clear that the Commission must work with the European Parliament if it is to avoid the damaging ‘blow-ups’ exemplified by both the 1999 resignation and the 2004 crisis over the appointment of Barroso’s team of commissioners. The Commission’s weakened role within the inter-institutional triangle of Commission, Council, and Parliament is also exacerbated by fact that the Commission is at times its own worst enemy. It is nowadays almost a truism to state that the Commission is not (or is rarely) a unitary actor within
126
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
the EU. Back in 1994, Laura Cram referred to the Commission as a ‘multiorganization’ (Cram 1994: 195) and this label has stuck, with only the most formal of theorists failing to look inside the ‘black box’ to identify the at times contradictory policies being pursued and fought over by directorates-general that possess very different organizational identities and cultures (Cini 2000; MacDonald 2000). Although there are many examples in the literature on the Commission focusing on disputes between the services (DGs), there are also case-study illustrations of the way in which inconsistencies have manifested themselves at the top of the Commission. For example, Dimitrakopoulos and Kassim (2005) explain the Commission’s meagre role in the Convention on the Future of Europe in 2003 as, in part, a consequence of the mixed messages that were transmitted simultaneously from within the Commission, contributing to a loss of credibility for the Commission’s representatives on the Convention. More recently, under President Barroso, there were said to exist so-called ‘kingdoms’ and a lack of cohesion arising out of Barroso’s failure to instil a sense of collegiality amongst his commissioners (Minder 2005; Parker 2005). One manifestation of this from early 2005 was the confusion over the conflicting positions of commissioners on the subject of the Ukraine’s bid for EU membership (European Voice, 3 March 2005, 9) Even if ‘the Commission makes very little of its own luck’ (Peterson 2005: 15), it has often acted in a fashion that has not always helped to improve its position. It has had a tendency, in particular, to submit counter-productive initiatives, which have antagonized national governments, and which have led to the marginalization of the Commission on particular issues. The old Commission tactic of presenting a maximalist line in the hope that some of the Commission’s agenda would ultimately be accepted often seems to backfire. Once again, Dimitrakopoulos and Kassim (2005) provide examples of this in the case of the Commission’s strategy on the Constitutional Treaty. They claim that acting as the defender of the smaller member states was not a good move on the part of the Commission, as it failed to strengthen the Commission’s hand in the negotiations. Building alliances with the larger member states, and seeking compromises on less important issues, they argue, would have provided the Commission with more credibility, making it more likely that their position would have been taken seriously.
CONCLUSION Changes in the European Union since the late 1980s have reduced the traditional role of the Commission in the EC/EU, and as noted above, in altering the inter-institutional balance of power, have made it more difficult for
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
127
the Commission to assert itself within the EU political system (see Metcalfe 2004: 85). There are still some in the Commission who seem to believe that pillarization, comitology constraints, and the open method of coordination are all just temporary steps on the road to a return to a more streamlined, unitary Community, with the Commission once again at its centre. Retaining the Community Method is therefore crucial because it allows for a smooth reversal of fortune along these lines. It seems unlikely, however, that this new era of supranationalism will ever come about. Changes in the way that policy is made, with new and varied modes offering governments a flexible approach to European-level problem-solving, and the Europeanization of national polities, integrating governmental and non-governmental actors into the EU in a way that makes the old intergovernmental–supranational distinction virtually meaningless, are not going to disappear. Thus, ‘the Commission must adapt to the new EU, and cannot expect to play its traditional role in all EU policy areas’ (Peterson 2005: 12). To revitalize itself, the Commission needs to redefine its role in the EU. To do that, it needs to become a credible organization (see Chapter 12, below). By and large, the reforms that allow the Commission to do this were in place by the time the Barroso Commission took office at the end of 2004 (Kinnock 2004). By January 2005 Barroso was able to build his strategy on the effective implementation and management of EU policies in a way that would not have been credible before this time. The Kinnock reforms were, thus, a prerequisite for the approach that Barroso was to adopt in his January 2005 Strategy paper. Whereas the previous two presidents were appointed on a platform emphasizing reform (in the case of Santer, the ‘less but better’ slogan exemplified this) to ensure effective implementation, Barroso could begin his term of office on a platform that presupposed the reform, and concentrated on the implementation of existing policies. Barroso has fortified this approach by making sure that he engaged in ‘legislative restraint’, which has been interpreted in some quarters as a kind of ‘self-censorship’ (European Voice, 3 March 2005, 9). This sows the seeds of a credible approach for the Commission in what is a truly pragmatic strategy. Admittedly, Barroso’s pragmatic, some might say technocratic, approach to the Commission’s work, is far removed from the kind of agenda pursued by Delors. There are two ways to interpret Barroso’s strategy. The first is to see it as further evidence of the decline of the Commission. What Barroso is doing, from this perspective, is admitting defeat and acknowledging that the days of political leadership by the Commission are long gone. The second interpretation is more nuanced and more convincing. It sees the period between 1995 and 2005 as a transition period for the Commission with, externally, shifting inter-institutional relationships and policy developments and, internally, administrative reform (that is, the shift from inadequate managerial structures
128
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
and practices to a more credible organizational basis for future development) as the unifying themes of both presidents. From this perspective, Barroso’s term of office marks a new phase in the Commission’s institutional history, and as such it is hardly surprising that Barroso entered it tentatively. If this interpretation is more optimistic, it still begs the question of what this new phase will look like. One suggestion, advanced by Metcalfe (2004), is that it would be (or should be) a period marked by the Commission finding its leadership potential through the effective management of policy networks (policy leadership), rather than in engaging in high politics (political leadership). For some, set in their old conceptual ways, this might suggest the victory of intergovernmentalism over supranationalism; yet it might not be a bad thing to put some of the old concepts and assumptions to one side, if only temporarily, while opening our minds to new ways of thinking about the opportunities (as well as the challenges) that may face the Commission as a policy leader in the years to come.
REFERENCES C, T. (1996) ‘The European Commission. The European Executive between Continuity and Change’, in J. Richardson (ed.), European Union. Power and Policy-Making. London: Routledge. (2006) ‘The European Commission’, in J. Richardson (ed.), European Union: Power and Policy-Making. 3rd edn. London: Routledge. C, M. (1996) The European Commission: Leadership, Organisation and Culture in the EU Administration. Manchester: Manchester University Press. (2000) ‘Administrative Culture in the European Commission: The Cases of Competition and Environment’, in N. Nugent (ed.), At the Heart of the Union. Basingstoke: Palgrave. C (1998) General Report on the Activities of the Union 1997. Luxembourg: Office of Official Publications. (2000) Reforming the Commission, Consultative Document, Communication from Mr Kinnock in agreement with the President and Ms Schreyer, CG3(2000) 1/17, 18 January. C, D. (1970) Politics and Bureaucracy in the European Community. London: Allen & Unwin. C, L. (1994) ‘The European Commission as a Multi-Organisation: Social Policy and IT Policy in the EU’, Journal of European Public Policy 1/1: 195–218. (1999) ‘The Commission’ in L. Cram, D. Dinan and N. Nugent (eds.), Developments in the European Union. Basingstoke: Macmillan.
Santer and Prodi Commissions, 1995–2005
129
D, D., and K, H. (2005) ‘Inside the European Commission: Preference Formation and the Convention on the Future of Europe’, Comparative European Politics 3/2: 180–203. D, H. (2000) Jacques Delors: Perspectives on a European Leader. London: Routledge. E, K. (1999) The Presidency of the European Commission under Jacques Delors: the Politics of Shared Leadership. Basingstoke: Macmillan F, F. (2000) ‘The Commission’s Executive Discretion, Information and Comitology’, Journal of Theoretical Politics 12/2: 155–81. G, C. (1994) Delors. Inside the House that Jacques Built. London: Nicholas Brealey. H, S., and L, C. (1996) ‘The Making of a President: The European Parliament and the Confirmation of Jacques Santer as President of the Commission’, Government and Opposition 31/1: 62–76. K, H. (2000) ‘A Historic Accomplishment? The Prodi Commission and Administrative Reform’, in D. G. Dimitrakopoulos (ed.), The Changing European Commission. Manchester: Manchester University Press. K, N. (2004) ‘Reforming the European Commission: Organisational Challenges and Advances’, Public Policy and Administration 19/3: 7–12. L, B. (1997) ‘From Policy Entrepreneur to Policy Manager: The Challenge Facing the European Commission’, Journal of European Public Policy 4/3: 422–38. L, W., W, W., and W, W. (1998) Walter Hallstein: The Forgotten European? New York: St Martin’s Press. MD, M. (2000) ‘Identities in the European Commission’, in N. Nugent (ed.), At the Heart of the Union. Studies of the European Commission. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Macmillan. M, G. (2002) ‘The European Commission: the Limits of Centralization and the Perils of Parliamentarization’, Governance 15/3: 375–92. M L. (2004) ‘European Policy Management: Future Challenges and the Role of the Commission’, Public Policy and Administration 19/3: 77–94. M, R. (2005) ‘Barroso’s Accord with Parliament remains Brittle’, Financial Times, 10 March. M, A. (1998) The Choice for Europe. London: Routledge/UCL. N, N. (1995) ‘The Leadership Capacity of the European Commission’, Journal of European Public Policy 2/4: 603–23. P, G. (2005) ‘ “Must do Better” Warn Critics at the End of Commission President’s First Year’, Financial Times, 26 July. P, J. (1999a) ‘The Santer Era: The European Commission in Normative, Historical and Theoretical Perspective’, Journal of Common Market Studies 6/1: 46–65. (1999b) ‘Jacques Santer: the EU’s Gorbachev’, ECSA Review 12/4: 4–6. (2000) ‘Romano Prodi: Another Delors?.’, ESCA Review 3/1: 1–8. (2002) ‘The College of Commissioners’, in J. Peterson and M. Shackleton (eds.) The Institutions of the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 71–94.
130
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
P, J. (2003) ‘The European Commission: Plateau? Permanent Decline?’ Collegium 26, Spring, Special issue on ‘
[email protected]’, 5–27. (2005) ‘The Enlarged European Commission’, Notre Europe, Policy Paper No. 11. R, G. (1995) Jacques Delors and European Integration. Cambridge: Polity. S, D. (2000) ‘Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose? Attempting to Reform the European Commission’, Journal of European Public Policy 7/1: 1–25. S, A. with S, H. (2001) Brussels Bureaucrats? The Administration of the European Union. Basingstoke: Palgrave. W, M. (2001) Kinnock. The Biography. London: Little Brown & Co.
7 Security Policy and the Logic of Leaderlessness Anand Menon
During the course of the last decade and a half, the EU’s role in security affairs has expanded dramatically. Major international tensions—like prolonged negotiations with Iran over that country’s nuclear ambitions—along with the prospect of continued instability as the ‘war on terror’ continues to gather pace, all imply the need for such a role. So, too, does the absence of any other multilateral institution capable of coordinating the cross-sectoral panoply of European responses to these challenges. Yet it is commonly accepted that the EU has failed to exert the influence it could in international affairs, as evidenced by a note from the Presidium of the Convention on the Future of Europe to Convention members (Presidium 2002): There is widespread acknowledgement amongst Europe’s citizens of the potential benefits to be gained when the European Union acts collectively on the global stage. At the same time, there is criticism that the Union’s international impact currently falls short of what might reasonably be expected given its economic weight, its high degree of internal integration and the resources collectively at its disposal.
Such shortcomings are generally felt to be most marked in the area of security policy. The experience of the Iraq war in particular proved a salutary reminder of the Union’s limitations in this sector. In keeping with many of the debates about European integration, subsequent discussion focused on process. The Union’s apparently poor performance in handling the greatest foreign policy challenge of the new millennium was attributed by most observers to its institutional shortcomings. Prominent amongst these was the absence of effective leadership. This clamour for leadership should hardly come as a surprise. Of all areas of public policy, it is that of security which is most associated with a ‘heroic’ policy style. Yet, of all areas of EU competence, it is in the realm of security that
132
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
leadership is most lacking. This chapter explores and explains this apparent paradox, arguing that the lack of leadership over EU security policy is not only inevitable but also not necessarily as dysfunctional as most analyses are wont to claim. It is divided into five sections. The first briefly considers the relationship between leadership and security policy, highlighting how the latter is generally associated with strong notions of the former. The second outlines the lack of leadership inherent in EU security policy. The following sections discuss the problems inherent in the incoherence that results from the structure of EU security policy-making and the clamour for leadership that has resulted. The final section argues that strong leadership is far from being the panacea for such ills.
LEADERSHIP AND SECURITY POLICY When they think of security, most people tend to think in terms of its military dimension. Until relatively recently, and certainly during the Cold War, security meant security from external military aggression, and security and defence policy were largely synonymous. Defence policy has long been considered, by scholars and policy-makers alike, as qualitatively different from other policy sectors. Concerned, as it has historically been, with the very survival of the state, it has not been subject to the same constitutional and political constraints. From the kings of old leading their troops into battle, to a Metternich or a Bismarck using war as a tool of foreign policy as they saw fit, security affairs were the realm of heroic policy-making par excellence. Such thinking has shaped the conduct of security affairs within even modern liberal democratic societies. As Siedentop (2000: 118) explains: Liberal constitutional thought acknowledged that the need for speed and coherence in decision-making over foreign and military affairs justified granting an unusual degree of independent action or power to the executive, freeing it from the constraints otherwise imposed by constitutional safeguards and publicity. This relative independence and secrecy of executive action in foreign and military affairs was allowed in the name of the national interest.
Moreover, politically as well as procedurally, in: almost all democratic countries there is a widely-held belief that foreign policy ought to be insulated from the rough-and-tumble of domestic debate, that bipartisan policies should be sought by both government and opposition, that politics should stop at the water’s edge; that continuity in foreign policy, wherever possible, should be ensured even when governments change. (Wallace 1971: 9–10)
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
133
Speed, continuity, and coherence are thus seen as crucial in a policy sector on which the very survival of the state might depend. Whilst other sectors might be characterized by doubtless worthy debates about process, this is an area where output matters above all else. An interesting manifestation of the prevalence of such assumptions is the paucity of political science literature dealing with questions of security policymaking. Foreign policy phenomena are, in the words of one respected scholar, the ‘unwanted stepchildren of political systems’ (Rosenau, cited in Wallace 1971: 41) with the result that, whilst in ‘domestic affairs, the policy process is discussed frequently but the policies themselves are generally neglected . . . in foreign affairs the policies are described and assessed ad nauseam but the policy process is seldom investigated’ (Hayward 1983). Partly as a consequence of such neglect, not only has the (at best questionable) notion of executive dominance over security affairs gone largely unchallenged, but normative assumptions concerning the desirability of such arrangements based on efficiency criteria have been allowed to flourish. These assumptions have been instrumental in shaping the negative assessments of the security policies of a European Union which, by any standards, lacks effective leadership in this domain. The problem with such assessments, however, is twofold. First, modern conceptions of security are far messier and more all-encompassing than their predecessors. Careers have been built on endless definitions and redefinitions. Terms such as ‘human’ or even ‘environmental’ ‘security’ have gained common currency. ‘Security’, in short, is now a far broader and more amorphous concept than it once was, and certainly no longer a synonym for defence. Moreover, the Union itself has very little in the way of a defence capability, and has no responsibility for defence in its strictest sense—the defence of member-state territories. EU security policy is not about survival, and hence it is particularly inappropriate to assess it on the basis of the assumptions that for so long have dominated our thinking about security. Indeed, the potential effectiveness of the EU as a security actor stems from the very diversity and complexity of the various tools it can bring to bear in pursuit of a wider conception of security. The Union’s foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, neatly summarized both the opportunities and the challenges that this poses in a report submitted to the Nice European Council [The] capabilities [of the European Union] include trade policy instruments, cooperation agreements, development assistance and other forms of economic cooperation, social and environmental policies, humanitarian assistance . . . civilian and military crisis management capabilities, diplomatic instruments and cooperation in the area of Justice and Home Affairs. In many of these areas the Union has very considerable influence. It is the world’s largest provider of development and humanitarian
134
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
assistance and the biggest trading partner . . . The central issue for the Union is one of coherence in deploying the right combination and sequence of instruments in a timely and integrated manner. This demands greater coherence and complementarity at several levels: between the instruments and capabilities available within each pillar, between the pillars themselves, between member states and Community activities, and between the Union and its international partners in conflict prevention. (Solana 2000)
Mindful, therefore, of the disjuncture between what observers tend to assume and what the Union itself can do, it is time to turn to an assessment of the leadership exercised over its security policies.
THE EU’S LEADERLESS SECURITY POLICY Whatever the conceptual issues, one fact is inescapable. The European Union lacks leadership when it comes to security policy. Responsibilities are shared and overlapping between different institutions, organizations, and levels of government, with none in a position to control or lead the others. A brief overview of existing structures should serve to illustrate the chronic lack of hierarchy, and hence leadership, that characterizes current arrangements both within and between these structures.
Security and the EU Institutions Perhaps the most obvious indication of the lack of clear leadership over EU security policy is its distribution amongst several institutions. Security policy cuts across the Union’s pillared structure, generating the need for effective coordination between the various institutions. Those elements of security policy that fall within the first pillar—notably the use of economic instruments or international agreements—come under the traditional community method, which has the benefit of being relatively clearly defined. In contrast, decision-making under the second—Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP)—pillar is characterized by an intergovernmental mode of decisionmaking, although the Commission has a right to attend all meetings and (article 22(1) TEU) can ‘refer to the Council any question’ relating to CFSP. Moreover, in terms of external representation, both the Council—via the High Representative for foreign policy and the presidency—and the Commission—the commissioner for external affairs and the president—have roles to play.
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
135
Perhaps inevitably, the fact that both institutions are involved in security policy, along with a lack of clarity as to who is in ultimate control, has led to at least implicit tensions between them. It has become commonplace to attribute the lack of open conflict between Chris Patten, commissioner for external relations under the Prodi Commission, and Javier Solana, High Representative for foreign policy, to the quasi-saintly collaborative impulse each brought to his post. As a consequence, open rivalry was averted and informal understandings arrived at on subjects as momentous as the speaking order when representatives of the two institutions shared the platform at press conferences. Yet tensions—both implicit and explicit—were bound to emerge in a situation so chronically lacking in organizational clarity. One observer speaks of ‘intense competition between the Council and the Commission for control of the policy ‘spaces’ within the existing security framework’ (Deighton 2002: 729). Ambiguity in inter-institutional relations has merely been heightened as a consequence of the development of an administrative infrastructure to deal with the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP), launched by France and the UK at the Saint Malo summit of December 1998. Of most relevance here was the steady development of the role of the Council Secretariat. The creation of ESDP has led to an expansion in the size of the Council bureaucracy charged with a role in security affairs. Inevitably, this has generated the potential for tension with the Commission, given the ambiguities inherent in the treaty base: Whereas in the legislative process and in the treaty reform process Commission and Council Secretariat have distinct responsibilities which lend themselves to informal cooperation and division of labour arrangements, the situation is rather different in the area of external relations. Here there is much greater propensity for the two institutions to develop a competitive approach given the overlap in responsibilities . . . The treaty provides no clear division of competences. . . . Certainly, sensitivities and suspicions are detectable on either side. In the Council Secretariat, there is a perception that the Commission is defensive about the potential loss of influence in external relations as the Council Secretariat builds up its institutional strength in this respect. On the Commission’s side, concerns are being voiced about the dangers of duplication of tasks and expertise. (Christiansen 2001: 762)
The author in fact (ibid. 762–6) goes on to paint a relatively rosy picture of the state of relations between the Commission and Council Secretariat. Yet Commission officials nevertheless have expressed frustration at, for instance, their marginalization from the process of drafting the 2003 EU Security strategy (interviews, Brussels, December 2003). Moreover certain member states have been unabashed in their efforts to use ESDP as an alibi for
136
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
intergovernmentalizing certain areas previously handled by the Commission—as the French attempted to do with mine clearance operations during their presidency in the second half of 2000. Moreover, the creation of administrative capacity in the Council has clearly had the effect of duplicating pre-existing resources, thus while a director for the Balkans exists in the Commission, a Balkans specialist has also been appointed to the policy unit in the Council Secretariat. At the political level, no such ambiguities exist. ESDP is the preserve of the member states in the Council. Yet this has hardly made for effectiveness, for the simple reason that the member states themselves are profoundly divided. There is widespread disagreement concerning the appropriate objectives of the EU’s security policies. Should the Union be equipped to participate in the war against terrorism? Should it be able to intervene globally or merely in its own near abroad? What kinds of missions should it carry out—peacekeeping or more ambitious peace enforcement tasks? What form should the relationship between the EU and NATO take? Once again, an absence of hierarchy has proved problematic in that consensus-based decision-making structures are far from effective in the presence of such marked disagreements. Indeed, more generally, competition between institutions has been nicely complemented by rivalries and tensions within them. Four commissioners in the Prodi Commission were charged with different aspects of EU external policy: enlargement, development, trade, and external relations and European Neighbourhood Policy. Because of the collegiate nature of the College, there was no formal order of seniority between them. Each enjoyed autonomy and had to submit policy initiatives to the college for approval by simple majority vote. Inevitably, this division of the external relations portfolio has implications for the coherence of policy. Similarly, an absence of hierarchy between different Council formations, especially in an area as broad and cross-sectoral as security, has spawned rivalries. Thus, tensions erupted between ECOFIN and the General Affairs Council over their respective stances towards Western Balkans during the Kosovo conflict. Problems, moreover, run deeper than the political level. Once again, many of the tensions within the system have stemmed from the development of ESDP. The Nice Treaty (article 25 TEU), replaced the Political Committee, comprised of national political directors with a Political and Security Committee.1 Tensions were apparent between the two groups of officials from an early stage as the political directors opposed the involvement of the interim PSC in the Nice Treaty negotiations.2 The creation of new institutions almost inevitably fosters resentments and rivalries with pre-existing ones. The role of the PSC is to ‘monitor the international situation in the areas covered by the common foreign and security
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
137
policy and contribute to the definition of policies by delivering opinions to the Council at the request of the Council or on its own initiative’. At the same time, however, the Treaty stipulates that these tasks should be carried out ‘[w]ithout prejudice to Article 207 of the Treaty establishing the European Community’, which itself refers to COREPER as ‘responsible for preparing the work of the Council and for carrying out tasks assigned to it by the Council’. An obvious ambiguity, therefore, relates to the relationship between COREPER 2 and the PSC. Tradition, coupled with the Council’s own guide for chairs of CFSP working groups, stipulate that COREPER does not tamper with the ‘substance of PSC recommendations, except where necessary to ensure their coherence between first and second pillar aspects of a single dossier’ (Duke 2005: 13). Yet one can only wonder, given the need to coordinate first-pillar elements of security policy with ESDP, how long this truce can and will last. An absence of clear lines of authority extends right down the Council hierarchy in matters of security policy. Within the Council secretariat itself, internecine rivalries and tensions are prevalent. To take but one example, it is hardly surprising that the High Representative’s Policy Unit—created at least in part to circumvent the CFSP directorate of the secretariat general and act as almost a personal think-tank for Javier Solana—should provoke a degree of hostility and rivalry within DG-E (interviews, Brussels, December 2003). Of course the Council is also afflicted by disputes concerning leadership at its summit. The inconsistency generated by the rotating presidency has been the subject of much lamentation (see Chapter 14, below). So, too, has the lack of any hierarchy between legally sovereign and equal member states. Most obviously, the larger member states—particularly the so-called ‘Big 3’ of the UK, France, and Germany—regularly claim that their size should provide them with a leadership role in security matters. To date, this has had the effect merely of provoking irritation. After a meeting of foreign ministers in Brussels in early December 2003, small countries reacted angrily to the reluctance of Berlin, London, and Paris to spell out their position on the possible inclusion of a mutual solidarity clause in the constitutional treaty. The Finnish foreign minister was heard to remark afterwards that it was as if the French, Germans, and British did not want to talk to the peasantry (interview, Brussels, December 2003). Finally, for the EU to be effective in the security sphere, it must also work with other institutions. This is particularly true of NATO, as it is anticipated that many if not most ESDP missions would be of a ‘Berlin Plus’ kind—carried out by Europeans but using NATO procedures and possibly assets. As ESDP developed, it therefore became necessary to take steps to ensure effective cooperation between the two institutions. On 19 September 2000, the first meeting between the interim PSC and NATO’s North Atlantic Council occurred. It
138
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
was not long, however, before different member-state attitudes towards the relationship between NATO and the EU, and the absence of any effective mechanism for either defining a single EU position or imposing a degree of order on proceedings, soon had a negative impact on negotiations. Discussions in the series of working groups created to hammer out the modalities of cooperation were almost farcical in nature. Thus, whilst the US and pro-NATO EU member states favoured meetings at twenty-three (fifteen EU member states plus eight non-EU NATO member states), with two representatives for each member state, France insisted that they take place at fifteen and nineteen (so that members of NATO and the EU were represented by two people), with the two sides sitting opposite each other across a table. In addition, whilst most members wanted the meetings to be jointly chaired by the presidency and secretary general’s office, Paris insisted that the two institutions be seated at opposite ends of the table, to underline the separateness of NATO and the EU.3
Pathologies of Leaderlessness None of the above would matter were it not for the fact that such internecine wrangles and rivalries often translate into practical impacts on the EU’s effectiveness as a security actor. In some instances, these are largely reputational, as with the farcical Downing Street dinner when what was intended as a small gathering of large member states expanded rapidly as, initially uninvited, the prime ministers of Belgium (in the Council presidency), Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, as well as High Representative Solana, forced their way to the table. (The Economist, 10 November). Such occurrences serve merely to undermine the image of the Union and call into question its credibility as an effective actor. Even farce, however, can have serious consequences. It is little wonder, for instance, that the initial outcome of the negotiations between NATO and the EU referred to above and contained in the December 2000 Nice Summit Presidency Conclusions, was described by one observer as: ‘littered with ifs and buts and apparent contradictions’, to the point where it ‘does little to clarify the EU’s new defence role (Guardian, 27 February 2001). The obsession with institutional design and with decision-making processes that is such a feature of the Union in general, and has characterized the development of security policy in particular, has led to a curious inversion of priorities. Much of the development of the Union’s security role is explicable in terms of a desire to secure certain institutional as opposed to substantive policy outcomes. The French attempt, discussed above, to shift responsibility for mine clearance activities from the Commission to the Council had nothing
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
139
to do with policy effectiveness. The Commission has been remarkably active in this area. It devoted 30 million Euros to mine clearance in 2000 (Allen and Smith 2000: 103), making the EU the largest donor in the world in this area, in addition to being one of the strongest promoters of the Ottawa convention. The danger is clearly that a focus on institutions can serve to undermine what are otherwise relatively successful policies. More specifically, certain sub-optimal policy outcomes can be attributed directly to elements of the EU’s institutional structure. A case in point is the presidency. Individual presidencies tend to try to impose their own pet projects on the Union as a whole. Thus we have witnessed the Finns promoting a ‘northern dimension’, Belgium stressing the African Great Lakes area and Spain promoting the Euro-Med partnership and relations with Latin America (Pernice and Thym 2002: 393). More insidiously, during the Italian presidency of 2003, the close relations between Silvio Berlusconi and Russian president Vladimir Putin meant that the communiqué produced by the Russia–EU summit of November that year made no criticism of Russia’s abysmal human rights record in Chechnya or its refusal to sign up to the Kyoto protocol (Financial Times, 4 December 2003).4 The danger of inconsistency and incoherence is further heightened in the absence of any form of clear leadership. Mention has been made of the tensions between the GAC and ECOFIN during the Kosovo crisis. Meanwhile, even once agreed between the member states, sanctions against Zimbabwe— in the form of travel restrictions on the regime’s leaders—could only be applied in the late spring of 2003, once France had welcomed Mugabe at a meeting of African Heads of State. Tensions within institutions can have a similar effect. A case in point was the EU’s security strategy, finally published in December 2003. The document had been through several iterations, with a first draft circulated to member states at their Rhodes summit in May. This version had adopted a markedly tougher tone than many had anticipated, with reference to the role of preemption in the preservation of security. However, several months of furious bargaining within the Council machinery, as well as between member states only too happy to use their seconded national experts within the Council to push their own preferences, resulted in the final version referring only to preventive engagement—a far weaker and woollier concept (Financial Times, 4 December 2003). The fact both drafts were published, however, did little to enhance faith in the consistency or credibility of the Union. Finally, inchoate structures have made for confusion in the implementation of policy. EU activities in the Balkans are a case in point. Macedonia alone was host to a bewildering variety of EU actors operating under separate lines of command. The EU Special Representative was, to an extent, a primus inter
140
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
pares, answering directly to the High Representative for foreign policy. Operating alongside him, however, and each with their own chain of command, were the Commission delegation, an independent reconstruction agency, operating out of Thessalonica,5 the EU Military Mission operating under its own chain of command via the UN head of mission in Sarajevo and, finally, operation Concordia—an EU operation drawing on NATO assets via D-SACEUR. Little wonder that Romano Prodi pointed to the danger of EU efforts getting ‘buried in a complex web of competing structures’ (Allen and Smith 2000: 111). Perhaps most damagingly, interstate divisions over ESDP, absent any institutional mechanism for their resolution, threatens to undermine its effectiveness. The only stipulations concerning its scope can be found in the Amsterdam text (17 (2) of Treaty on European Union), which lists the so-called Petersburg tasks: ‘humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping tasks and tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacemaking’. The range of potential missions this includes could cover everything from Kosovo to a minor peace-keeping deployment. Here, a fundamental difference between defence and other policy sectors is crucial. Ambiguity has arguably been a defining characteriztic of many of the key policy developments in the history of European integration. The Single Market and EMU were both, throughout their inception and early implementation, characterized by a lack of clarity about their ultimate nature. Unfortunately, the cultivated ambiguity that has worked so effectively in the economic realm has profoundly negative consequences when it comes to security matters. Particularly in areas such as defence policy, a clear definition of ends is crucial in order to create appropriate policy instruments. One’s choice of appropriate military structures and hardware depends fundamentally on one’s view of what they are for. A tank is of limited utility for fighting in the Afghan foothills. Moreover, deployment of certain kinds of defence hardware imply a lead time of ten to fifteen years. Political decisions about what the ESDP is for can therefore not be put off or fudged. All of which serves to underline the fact that, absent mechanisms to overcome them, continued cross-cutting cleavages between the member states will impede the effectiveness of a crucial aspect of the EU’s security policies.
THE CLAMOUR FOR LEADERSHIP It should come as little surprise, given the incoherence and inconsistency that can result from the lack of formal hierarchy within and between the institutions, that the clamour for effective leadership has become steadily more
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
141
intense, culminating in debates within and around the Convention on the Future of Europe. Particular hostility was focused on the six monthly rotating presidency of the Union, for reasons enumerated by Tony Blair in a speech in Cardiff in November 2002: ‘The system has reached its limits. It creates for Europe a weakness of continuity in leadership: a fatal handicap in the development of an effective Common Foreign and Security Policy. What’s worse, each Presidency sees itself as setting its own distinctive agenda for the Union’ (Blair 2002). His European Affairs Minister, Peter Hain, had made a similar point when outlining British plans for a permanent chair of the European Council to replace the Presidency: ‘The aim is to give Europe a high-profile political leader, who would serve as the EU’s face in international affairs and take a key role in developing defence and foreign policies’ (Financial Times, 16 May 2002). Nor was it only the larger member states who called for reform. Javier Solana, in a ‘contribution’ to the Nice European Council, stressed the need to make the PSC central to both civilian and military crisis management, calling—in fact if not in name—for it to assume a leadership role in the emergent ESDP (Missiroli 2001: 188). Others were quick to suggest that more effective leadership by the bigger member states was the most effective way to enhance the Union’s international role (Keukeleire 2001), whilst representatives of the supranational institutions offered alternative solutions. Romano Prodi, in a speech to the European Parliament in Strasbourg on 3 October 2001, called for the integration of the functions of the High Representative for foreign policy into Commission. Given the problems outlined in the previous sections, it is hardly surprising that numerous reform proposals have been put forward. Given prevalent assumptions about security, it is not unexpected that these have tended to focus on the need for effective leadership. As we go on to argue, however, such analyses are based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of the Union.
The Logic of Leaderlessness Whilst one can appreciate the reasons for the kinds of proposals being put forward, many of them simply fail to recognize the limits imposed by the nature of the EU system. The most striking illustration of this is the fact that most analyses of the current shortcomings of the Union tend—often implicitly—to be based on inappropriate comparisons with other institutions. Much of the critical comment on the Union’s role—or lack of it—during the Iraq crisis, for instance, compared its performance unfavourably with those of the member states or the United States.
142
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
The nation state, however, is neither an apposite, nor a helpful comparator. Structurally, the EU is made up of sovereign states, each with its own foreign and security policies. Moreover, unlike national federal systems such as the United States, the ultimate basis of political authority and legitimacy in this multi-tiered system of governance are the parts, not the centre. This serves to place profound limits on the scope for an EU security policy, and spawns a tension between, on the one hand, the desire increasingly shared by member states for the EU to be more effective, and, on the other, the fundamental problems involved in achieving greater coherence when the centre is—at their behest—so weak. This tension was underlined in the self-contradictory call by British prime minister Tony Blair for the Union to develop into a ‘superpower, not a superstate’. The rapid deployment of power in international affairs requires precisely the kind of centralized decision-making apparatus that the EU so patently lacks. As an ‘introductory note’ prepared by the Convention’s secretariat put it: ‘the traditional business of the EU has been largely in legislative fields, where speed has not been a particularly important factor. The development of Common Foreign and Security Policy has begun to introduce more of a culture of quick reaction . . . but reacting to crises in real time with the deployment of concrete instruments remains a challenge’ (European Voice, 21 November 2002). Such power exists in the United States—in stark contrast to the ‘federalist pause’ required for coordination between levels of government which characterizes responses even to disasters such as Hurricane Katrina. Yet there is little if any support for the notion that power over security affairs should be centralized in Brussels. As former commissioner Chris Patten acknowledged, ‘foreign policy remains primarily a matter for democratically elected memberstate governments’ (cited in Missiroli 2001: 177). The absence of a decision-making structure appropriate for security tasks requiring rapid and highly coordinated responses is especially problematic in the realm of defence policy. This is true even when it comes to medium-sized military missions. These require a degree of centralization of command. The Union is not institutionally configured in such a way as to be able to perform this role. Here again, misplaced analogies have served to blur the picture. The institutional structures created for ESDP are strikingly similar to those of NATO. Thus the PSC is the broad equivalent of the North Atlantic Council, whilst the Military Committee serves the functions carried out in NATO by SHAPE. Yet NATO is very different in both form and function to the EU. As an institution primarily designed to ensure the territorial security of Western Europe, its institutions were formed with a view to ensuring that national capitals lost freedom of decision in the event of an attack, by depriving them
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
143
of autonomy in the event of a Central European conflict. The obsession with process that characterizes the Union stands in stark contrast to this outcomeorientated system. Moreover, and again unlike NATO, the Union adopts a broad conception of security. There is, therefore, a need to coordinate its various aspects. A NATOstyle institutional structure, in which the institutions dealing with defence are clearly separated from those dealing with other aspects of security, is hardly optimal. Given the nature of EU security policy, it would have been preferable to create structures which integrated all aspects of security—both military and non-military—in order to ensure adequate coordination between them. The Union, therefore, is neither a state nor a military organization. Its structural weakness means that member states will continue to retain primacy when it comes to major foreign and security policy issues. It has become fashionable to bemoan this situation. Indeed, prominent critics such as the American Robert Kagan (2003) have somewhat disingenuously intimated that the relative military weakness of the EU is symptomatic of a broader European malaise. This is simply not the case. The absence of a significant EU military capacity is not the same as the absence of European capacity. Whilst several member states retain significant military capabilities, the role of the Union in security matters is to complement, rather than duplicate, these capacities. Seen in this light, and with an appreciation of the structurally imposed limits on security policy ambitions, the issue of leadership takes on a different complexion. If the Union is to focus on those less military aspects of security that its structure would seem to make it capable of carrying out, hierarchy and impositional leadership become less of a problem. A fledgling military capacity serves to reinforce the broader security capabilities of the Union, enabling it to intervene in conflict situations that otherwise would be beyond its scope. The Union can thus be viewed as complementing not only its member states but also NATO, which, whilst rather well adapted to war fighting, ‘lacks a peace agenda’ (interview, Brussels, January 2005). Thus, in December 2000, NATO secretary general Lord Robertson wrote to Javier Solana asking for EU help in policing the Kosovo/Former Republic of Yugoslavia border because of the problems the NATO force was experiencing in carrying out such non-military tasks.
CONCLUSIONS Humdrum rather than heroic is the adjective that best captures the nature of leadership—in so far as leadership exists—in security policy. A variety of
144
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
actors, without clear hierarchy between them, participate in defining EU policy. Moreover, according to the analysis of Judge and Earnshaw (Chapter 13, below) the ambitions of the European Parliament in this sector imply greater rather than less complexity in future. To some extent, as Dimitrakopoulos makes clear in Chapter 15, leaderlessness is inherent in any system of collective leadership, in that the need for compromise militates against ‘precision, uniformity, clarity and promptness’. Yet leaderlessness appears all the more problematic in a sector traditionally associated with decisive and heroic leadership. This, it has been argued, is largely a question of perspective. Because many analyses of the Union’s security role are based on misplaced comparisons with the nation state or security institutions such as NATO, they fail to take into account its specific structural features that preclude effective, unitary leadership. If these features are taken into account, it becomes clear that many of the most ambitious schemes for EU security policy are simply unrealistic. Leaving to one side the inordinate ambitions for the Union to develop into some kind of larger-scale equivalent of the member states, coordination rather than leadership becomes the key ingredient for effectiveness. The Community system enshrines a state of mutual dependence between the Commission and the Council, which is mirrored in the security field. Whilst the Council enjoys political authority stemming from the member states, the Commission controls virtually all the Union’s foreign policy resources. Thus whereas Solana’s Policy Unit has a staff of fewer than forty, the Commission (if its external delegations are included), employs some 7,000–8,000 staff in securityrelated roles. Similarly, the CFSP budget accounts for only 0.5 percent of the overall EU external relations budget—and most of this is devoted to administration. Rather than investing resources in attempting to make the Union resemble traditional models of a security actor, member states would be better advised to ensure the presence of institutional mechanisms to ensure effective coordination between the Council and Commission on security matters. Certainly, as Hayward and Wright (2002) have illustrated, coordination is hugely problematic from a leadership point of view, not least because of an absence of factors including time, political will, and information. Nevertheless, the creation of structures and procedures aimed at institutionalizing consultation, coordination, and information sharing between the two key EU institutions—at all levels—would certainly represent a useful first step in attempting to enhance the effectiveness of what is, by necessity, a highly fragmented system. Within the individual institutions, a greater degree of hierarchy could conceivably help address leadership problems—whether this be between commissioners, or Council formations, or within the Council secretariat itself.
Security Policy and Leaderlessness
145
Whilst not an institution primarily designed to take security policy decisions, the European Union has, during its relatively short lifetime, come to play an increasingly prominent role in the security field. Yet shared and overlapping institutional competences are part of the very nature of what remains a unique and sophisticated international organization. Rather than wishing these away, it is by designing mechanisms to minimize the extent of any incoherence resulting from them that the Union can be made to function effectively.
NOTES The author would like to thank participants at the workshop in Hull at which the papers in this volume were originally discussed, and particularly the editor for helpful comments on this chapter. 1. PSC, more commonly known by the acronym of its French title, COPS, is made up of either ambassadors or political directors. 2. All this touches on a fascinating issue which, however is beyond the scope of this chapter—the coordination of security policy matters within national capitals. 3. Lest this spawn nostalgia, it should be remembered that the joint exercise of June 1998 between EU and WEU to test provisions of the Amsterdam Treaty identified twenty-five procedural steps necessary to trigger management of an international crisis. Up to forty-five would have been necessary if NATO assets were to be used (WEU CM (∗ ) 39, Modus Operandi of Article J.4.2/Article 17.3 and Flow Chart (13 November 1998). 4. Though note that Adriaan Schout (Chapter 14, below) is less convinced of the inconsistencies in foreign policy resulting from rotation. 5. That the European Agency for the Reconstruction of Kosovo is based in Thessalonica is itself a stark reminder of the intergovernmental deals that constitute the heart of EU politics.
REFERENCES A, D., and S, M. (2000) ‘External Policy Developments’. Journal of Common Market Studies 38 (Annual Review): 101–20. B, T. (2002) ‘A Clear Course for Europe’, speech, November. Cardiff. C, T. (2001) ‘Intra-institutional Politics and Inter-institutional Relations in the EU: Towards Coherent Governance?’ Journal of European Public Policy 8/5: 747–69. D, A. (2002) ‘The European Security and Defence Policy’, Journal of Common Market Studies 40/4: 719–41.
146
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
D, S. (2005) ‘The Linchpin COPS: Assessing the Workings and Institutional Relations of the Political and Security Committee’, Maastricht, European Institute of Public Administration: Working paper. H, J. (1983) Governing France: the One and Indivisible Republic. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. W, V. (2002) Governing from the Centre: Core Executive Coordination in France. Oxford: Oxford University Press. K, P. (2003) Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order. London: Atlantic Books. K, S. (2001) ‘Directorates in the CFSP/CESDP of the European Union: A Plea for “Restricted Crisis Management Groups” ’. European Foreign Affairs Review 6: 75–101. M, A. (2001) ‘European Security Policy: The Challenge of Coherence’, European Foreign Affairs Review 6. P, I., and T, D. (2002) ‘A New Institutional Balance for European Foreign Policy?’ European Foreign Affairs Review 7: 369–400. P (2002) Note from the Praesidium to the Convention on External Action. S, L. (2000) Democracy in Europe. London: Allen Lane. S, J. (2000) ‘Improving the Coherence and Effectiveness of European Union Action in the Field of Conflict Prevention: Report Presented to the Nice European Council by the Secretary General/High Representative and the Commission’. Brussels. W, W. (1971) Foreign Policy and the Political Process. London: Macmillan.
8 Franco-German Relations: From Active to Reactive Cooperation Alistair Cole
Colourful metaphors abound when writers describe the post-war relationship between France and Germany. The Franco-German relationship is variously described as an axis, a motor, or a couple. These metaphors are typically used by politicians to justify maintaining an official bilateral alliance within the European Union as a form of enlightened leadership of the European integration project. The Franco-German axis evokes the centrality of Franco-German relationship to the European Union and its pivotal location (Hendricks and Morgan 2001). The Franco-German motor assumes literally that the two countries drive European integration (Picht, Uterwedde, and Wessels 1990). The Franco-German ‘couple’ is a rather more static appreciation that invites unhelpful comparisons with domestic household disputes. These metaphors all illuminate perceptions of the centrality of the Franco-German relationship. They also all assume its internal cohesion. Neither centrality nor cohesion can be taken for granted, however. This chapter addresses the related issues of the Franco-German relationship and the leadership of the European Union. The main question is a simple one that is difficult to answer. Have France and Germany traditionally exercised joint leadership (or ‘hegemony’ in the realist lexicon) within the European Union? If so, can France and Germany still offer leadership for the European integration process?
FRANCE, GERMANY, AND THE LEADERSHIP OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Definitions of leadership are many and varied. In the context of European integration studies, there are several versions of the leadership debate. Neorealist and liberal intergovernmental accounts presuppose a leading role for
148
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
nation states in the process of European integration. This is implicit in the writings of scholars such as Hoffmann (1995), Milward (1984), Taylor (1983) and Moravscik (1993, 1998). One version of the realist paradigm that is leadership-focused specifically identifies the Franco-German relationship as a directorate leading the European Union (Baun 1996, Chang 1999; Pedersen 1998). Common to any definition of leadership is an understanding of leadership resources, be they institutional, symbolic, economic, or political. The FrancoGerman relationship arguably has more institutional, symbolic, economic, and political leadership resources than any other grouping within the EU. Its institutional capacity is far more developed than that of any other comparable pairing. Most observers of Franco-German relations insist upon the high degree of institutionalization of the bilateral relationship (Schild 2002). The two countries are bound by a far-reaching treaty signed in 1963 and strengthened in 2003 (Vailliant 2002; Defrance and Pfeil 2005). The scope of the 1963 treaty is ambitious. In terms of institutional structures, the treaty established a detailed and elaborate procedure for negotiations at various levels, including twice-yearly summits between leaders, even more frequent meetings between the foreign, defence, and education ministers, an inter-ministerial committee to coordinate all activities and a special office to promote cultural and educational exchanges between the countries. The treaty also envisaged that the two countries would consult each other on all important issues and attempt to develop common positions. The 1963 treaty explicitly points to those arenas where France and Germany expected to collaborate: the EEC, NATO, the WEU, the OECD, the UN, and the Council of Europe. No other bilateral relationship even comes close to having such a developed institutional structure. Arguably more important, the Franco-German relationship can lay a powerful claim to exercise symbolic leadership of the European integration project. The Franco-German relationship has always been kept alive by symbols: the prayers of de Gaulle and Adenauer in Reims in 1963; Mitterrand and Kohl kneeling in the cemetery of Verdun in 1984; the march of German troops on the Champs-Elysées on 14 July 1994. The ‘relaunch’ of the FrancoGerman relationship, in the pomp and ceremony of the Palace of Versailles in January 2003, signified continuing reconciliation. As the most significant founding fathers of the EU, France and Germany arguably count more than others. Their union symbolizes reconciliation, solidarity, and peace—these are precious qualities within the context of European history. Other member states have looked to France and Germany to bridge their differences and reach agreements precisely because of their symbolic leadership role. The discourse of reconciliation is a diminishing resource, however, based on generational
Franco-German Relations
149
memory and particular sets of historical circumstances that belong to another age. Traditional arguments supporting the Franco-German relationship have lost their raison d’être, post-war reconciliation first and foremost amongst them. But declaring the symbolic and diplomatic importance of the FrancoGerman relationship remains a key concern for both countries, as demonstrated by Angela Merkel’s first foreign visit as Chancellor being to Paris in November 2005 and President Sarkozy visiting Berlin on the very day he was sworn in as French president in May 2007. A third leadership resource is economic power and the capacity for emulation this inspires. Germany and France were for long the leading EU economies. For many smaller member states, it is still difficult to envisage adopting policy positions that openly defy Paris and (especially) Berlin. Though Germany is the most significant European economic power, by its own high standards its economic performance has been mediocre in recent years. Historically, the Franco-German relationship drew its force from its capacity for emulation, but neither France nor (especially) Germany now appears as a model of best behaviour, whether in terms of its low levels of economic growth, its rate of unemployment, its level of public debt, its inability to control budget deficits, or its unwillingness to respect the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact. The reversal is most striking in the case of Germany, which, having insisted upon exporting its model of central bank independence and monetary stability, has been incapable of respecting the Maastricht convergence criteria. The weakening of the French and German models has been accompanied by declining political influence for the Franco-German couple. The rejection of the constitutional treaty in May 2005 by French voters was a major setback for Franco-German political influence. The fourth resource traditionally enjoyed by France and Germany has been their capacity to exercise political leadership and their ability, as a quasiregime, to steer the course of the European ship. There exists a powerful neorealist interpretation of the Franco-German relationship within the European Union (Baun 1996; Chang 1999; Pedersen 1998). From the perspective of neo-realism, the Franco-German relationship is predicated upon the mutually reinforcing strategic calculations of France and Germany. The post-war Franco-German relationship survived and prospered because it fulfilled specific functions. It allowed France to exercise a preponderant weight within the European Union, while facilitating Germany’s readmission into the international concert of nations. There were fundamental complementarities in strategic and economic terms. In the cold war period, France and Germany were forced together in the defence of Western Europe against the threat of Soviet aggression. Ultimately protected by US strategic leadership, France and
150
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Germany were able to channel their energies into the development of the European Union. Historically speaking, the Franco-German relationship has performed a double role: to initiate new moves in European integration and to work out acceptable compromises for other member states. We can formulate two hypotheses about Franco-German leadership of the European Union. The strong hypothesis, present in certain neo-realist accounts, is that France and Germany form a directorate, a duopoly that steers the destiny of the European Union. A rather weaker hypothesis is that the EU cannot ‘progress’ without Franco-German cooperation, leaving open the circumstances of their actual cooperation. The strong hypothesis—that the Franco-German relationship leads the EU—necessitates closer observation of the genealogy of particular decisions and the dynamics of particular policy sectors. Viewed historically, the FrancoGerman relationship appears as the principal bilateral relationship within the European Union, though its intensity has been variable. It can lay a stronger claim to leadership than any other coalition of member states, or, arguably, than any other coalition of interests within the EU. Many important decisions in the history of the EU have been driven, or at least fronted, by French and German political leaders. The constitutive bargain of the Treaty of Rome set the EEC on a path that manifestly favoured the interests of its two leading members. The EEC not only symbolized historic reconciliation between France and Germany, but also allowed each country to pursue its enlightened economic self-interest: a common market underpinned the revival of German industry; a common agricultural policy protected French farmers and promoted French farm produce. Through the logic of the acquis, the forces of path dependency within the EU are strong (Pierson 1996, Bulmer and Lequesne 2005). The preponderance of France and Germany in treaty-making or major redistributive or budgetary decisions has had a lasting impact, long after these early decisions were made. The Common Agricultural Policy provides probably the best exemplar of these powerful path-dependent forces at work. The CAP was based on a founding Franco-German agreement. Respecting the CAP has been an important element of the Franco-German compact, though narrow French and German interests diverge in relation to the common policy. Recent evidence demonstrates how important the CAP is as a concrete symbol of FrancoGerman collaboration. Throughout the 1990s, there was profound disagreement between France and Germany over financing the CAP, Germany reluctant to continue to subsidize a policy that mainly benefits French farmers. Yet, the CAP forms part of the initial bargain between France and Germany, and Germany feels duty bound to respect France’s position. After years of
Franco-German Relations
151
public recriminations, France and Germany came to a bilateral agreement over CAP reform in October 2002 that was subsequently presented to the other member-states for ratification. The agreement on agriculture was a classic Franco-German bargain. UK premier Blair was excluded, and had not foreseen this renewed Franco-German strategy. The European Commission was also ignored, neither France nor Germany referring to the conclusions of a report published months before by Agriculture Commissioner Junckler. This episode demonstrated that the Franco-German relationship remains a very powerful defensive coalition when it can reach agreement on issues that otherwise endanger the functioning of the EU. Agreement on agriculture on French terms was essential to allow enlargement to take place. Most definitions of leadership focus upon political leaders. The claim to leadership of the EU has depended, in part, upon the relationships maintained between individual French and German political leaders. Their propensity to drive forward an integrationist agenda has been variable. For most of the Gaullist period (1958–69) France looked to tie Germany in, but was unwilling to go beyond an asymmetrical bilateral relationship, conceived of as a directory. The Gaullist rhetoric of European autonomy was unacceptable in most respects to the semi-sovereign, pro-Atlanticist Federal Republic under Erhard or Kiesinger. De Gaulle’s successor Pompidou and German Chancellor Brandt distrusted each other, the former focused upon facilitating British entry into the EEC, the latter preoccupied with ostpolitik. President Giscard d’Estaing and Chancellor Schmidt were the first leadership couple since de Gaulle and Adenauer to enjoy a relationship based on mutual confidence. Giscard d’Estaing and Schmidt together piloted two major decisions whose effect was to enhance European integration: the creation of the European Council in 1974 and the European Monetary System (EMS) in 1979. The integrationist tempo was further accelerated under President Mitterrand and Chancellor Kohl: the internal market and the Single European Act (1986), moves towards economic and monetary union and closer defence and security collaboration in the Maastricht Treaty (1992), were all directly associated with Kohl and Mitterrand, though other actors were also important (see Chapter 5, above). The period since Maastricht has been one of an ebbing integrationist tide, combined with a lessening propensity of the leaders of France and Germany to promote integration. France has been struggling to come to terms with its role in a post cold-war world and an enlarged European Union. Germany has been focused on the core business of managing unification and integrating the east German länder. The later leadership couple of Chirac and Schröder defended established positions, rather than launching new ideas. Both men were instinctively ‘nationals’ and neither felt a personal imperative to promote
152
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
European integration. Neither the current Chancellor, Angela Merkel, nor the French president Nicolas Sarkozy are unconditional supporters of an exclusive Franco-German relationship. At least as important as personal relations are underlying environmental pressures and political circumstances. Franco-German cooperation in the 1960s was, in the end, undermined by disagreements about the basic Gaullist premise of enhanced European autonomy and distancing the Franco-German relationship from the United States. Closer collaboration from the early 1970s to early 1990s was closely interwoven with the turn of domestic and global events: the ending of the Bretton Woods fixed parities system in 1971 promoted closer monetary collaboration; tighter economic interdependency amongst the leading European nations provided the stimulus for the Single European Act; the gradual recognition of the need to develop European capacity in security and defence or spatial technology drove the development of common policies in these areas. If Maastricht represented the height of the integrationist agenda, the period since 1991 has been one of finishing off the business of Maastricht and tidying up the treaties. Since 1991, the main imperative has been to integrate the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe (accomplished in 2004 and 2007) and to provide a stable framework for political and market governance across the continent. France and Germany adopted rather different attitudes towards enlargement. France was reluctant to agree to a rapid enlargement; Germany saw it as a means of embedding stability and creating a buffer zone around Germany itself (Martens 2002; Stark 2006). We can also understand leadership in terms of the genealogy of particular decisions. Many of the most important decisions in the history of the European Union are of French or Franco-German origin. When they have produced common initiatives, as over the single market, EMU, or even CAP reform, they have operated as a very persuasive and powerful moral force. Franco-German leadership has been most effective when France and Germany have been encouraged by other states to be proactive. Historically, the FrancoGerman relationship has performed a powerful agenda-setting role, especially in treaty negotiations and major decisions such as budgetary reforms. FrancoGerman bargains are one important variable for understanding EU constitutive politics; analysis of the Maastricht and Amsterdam Treaty negotiations highlighted the powerful agenda-setting role of France and Germany (Cole 2001; Mazzucelli 1997). By Nice in 2000, however, this agenda-setting role had been shaken to its core. For once, there was no joint letter preceding the summit. Germany was irritated by France’s resolution to defend its parity with Germany in the Council at all costs. The German press pointed to French arrogance, France refusing to make concessions to Germany on the grounds of
Franco-German Relations
153
demography, yet insisting that smaller countries should give up some voting rights. When co-operation between France and Germany breaks down on ‘historymaking decisions’, as at Nice, deadlock is the feared consequence. In ‘normal’ EU policy-making, however, Franco-German cooperation is only one possible configuration. Selck and Kaeding (2004) reject the hypothesis that there is a Franco-German axis in Council proceedings. Based on mapping votes under QMV in Council from January 1999 to December 2000, they argue that the UK is the most likely to see its preferences taken up in EU legislation; and that the UK and Germany were likely to be much closer than France and Germany. For its part, France headed up a Mediterranean axis and its closest ally in Council meetings was Italy. Such mapping is insightful, but does not contradict the basic argument that Franco-German agreement is vital to overcome obstacles to broader agreement. Franco-German agreement over the constitutional treaty—especially its clauses dealing with ‘political union’, such as the Council president or the minister of foreign affairs—was a necessary, though by no means sufficient, condition for allowing the draft treaty to be signed. Likewise, Franco-German agreement over agriculture and reform of the CAP removed the final obstacles to enlargement going ahead at the Copenhagen summit in 2002. The Franco-German relationship has never exercised a hegemonic role, and in many respects its role has diminished with time. The Franco-German directory model promoted by the neo-realists underplays the dynamic qualities of the EU policy process and the changes wrought on the EU as a result of successive enlargements. The governance of the EU is inherently complicated and militates against the emergence of clear leadership structures such as an overarching Franco-German alliance. The metaphor of the Franco-German motor that we referred to in the introduction underplays the complexities of European integration. There are too many other bilateral and multilateral relationships. Helen Wallace (1990) argued that EU coalitions are variable, according to the issue area and institutions involved. If anything EU policymaking has become even more complex since the early 1990s, as a result of enlargement and increased supranational activism. As the community has expanded, coalitions have become more diverse and more complex. The blocking role of the Franco-German alliance has weakened. Since the mid1980s (and the passage of the Single European Act) France and Germany have been less able to resist the activism of the European Commission, at least in those areas where the latter has clear legal competencies. In the field of public services, state aids to industry, or mergers, Commission activism has appeared to be directed against France and Germany more than other countries. Economic and monetary union has also created new actors, in the
154
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
form of the European Central Bank, which is beyond the tutelage of the French and German governments. If there is little to support theses of Franco-German hegemony, our weaker hypothesis is that the EU cannot ‘progress’ without Franco-German cooperation. Conscious of its symbolic leadership role, at its height the FrancoGerman regime felt an obligation to negotiate and seek compromise solutions. France and Germany acted as political and geographical brokers, roles that have weakened since the Maastricht Treaty. Successive enlargements of the Union have diluted Franco-German influence. The 1995 enlargement introduced into the EU two Scandinavian states and Austria, which were much less deferential to either France or Germany. The 2004 and 2007 enlargements introduced twelve new members, ten of which were formerly Communist regimes. A number of these new countries looked to the United States as a safeguard against Russia, also to a lesser degree against Germany. The new entrants are much less sensitive to the idea that Franco-German leadership of the EU is a legitimate aspiration, or that they should exercise a subordinate role. Politically, France and Germany have had a weaker steering capacity, in part because of their serious disagreements throughout the 1990s. The convention that France and Germany should attempt to reach common joint positions during treaty negotiations and in fora such as the Council of Ministers has become less powerful. Throughout the 1990s, there were some very serious divisions between France and Germany: on the Balkans, reform of the CAP, budgetary reform, the GATT round, and structural funds amongst others (Cole 2001). At the Berlin Summit of March 1999, the French refused to budge in defence of farm subsidies. At the Nice Summit of December 2000, not only did France and Germany not present a joint text, but they openly and publicly clashed over their respective weight in the European institutions (Council and Parliament) and the scope of qualified majority voting. There were direct and open conflicts on issues of great importance for the future of the EU. Where there was progress—as in defence at the St Malo Summit—the driver was not the Franco-German relationship. Since Maastricht, when France and Germany have attempted to impose their leadership without the agreement of other states they have generally failed. As demonstrated at Amsterdam in 1997, or in the negotiations over the constitutional treaty, the Franco-German relationship must negotiate when confronted with the determined defence of established interests on behalf of other EU coalitions, such as the ‘cohesion group’ countries, the Benelux states—or Spain and Poland. Even before the most recent enlargement, the Franco-German relationship had had to cope with the emergence of new players. Spain has emerged as an important country in its own right and as a powerful and ambitious spokesperson for the ‘cohesion fund’ countries;
Franco-German Relations
155
this was demonstrated at the Amsterdam Summit, during the Agenda 2000 negotiations, and in the constitutional treaty negotiations of 2003–4. British influence has increased since the election of the Blair Government in 1997. In certain spheres such as defence and security policy Britain has assumed a leading role. The Benelux states have always been influential, not least because of their activism within the Commission and their over-representation in the Council (on a population basis). Even a small country such as Denmark can place obstacles in the way of Franco-German grand strategy; this was the lesson to be drawn from the 1992 Danish referendum on the Maastricht Treaty. The new countries of Central and Eastern Europe have stoutly defended their interests. Poland (which, along with Spain, is another rising force) held up the conclusion of the constitutional treaty negotiations for several months. The support of the Central and Eastern Europeans for the Anglo-American position over Iraq prevented France, Germany, and Belgium fronting a European consensus against the war. From the above, we conclude that the weaker hypothesis—that the EU cannot ‘progress’ without Franco-German cooperation—is a more accurate representation that the Franco-German directory model. Franco-German leadership capacity is strong in some areas, weaker in others. It is strongest where the mode of decision-making is intergovernmental. The Franco-German relationship has mattered most in the history-making decisions embodied in treaties and in complex, multilevel negotiations, such as budgets, where nested bargains are struck. The Franco-German relationship has had less influence in the Commission, or in other supranational arenas such as the European Parliament. It makes little sense to talk of Franco-German leadership in institutions such as the European Central Bank or the European Court of Justice. If the logic of the Franco-German relationship is intergovernmental, the governance of the EU is multilayered and multidimensional. Even in the intergovernmental arena, the extension of qualified majority voting has made it much more difficult to implement solid national alliances. Close FrancoGerman relationships on one level can be counterbalanced by conflicting relations on another (as in the case of the European Parliament against the Council). The strengthening of the European Parliament has complicated further the Franco-German relationship, not least because the Germans are more numerous, disciplined, and influential, while the French continue not to take the institution as seriously as they ought. The more institutions, actors, and levels of intervention there are, the less convincing it is to conceive of the leadership of the European Union in terms of an overarching Franco-German alliance. On the other hand, evidence from recent episodes of disagreement— such as the Nice Treaty—certainly suggests that, when France and Germany are disunited, the European project stalls.
156
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
The leadership potential of the Franco-German relationship thus depends upon the specific qualities of the policy sectors, the agreement of the other principal players, the constraints and opportunities offered by the overarching environment, and development of circumstances. On balance, this pattern falls rather short of hegemony—single or joint. The direction of change is towards a rather weaker steering role for the Franco-German relationship across the whole dimension of EU policy. Paradoxically, as France and Germany have lost capacity, they have also converged in important respects, a theme we now develop.
THE FRANCO-GERMAN RELATIONSHIP: FROM AVANT-GARDE TO DEFENSIVE CORPORATION? The Franco-German relationship traditionally performed two functions of leadership and coalition building. If the period from 1989 to 2000 was characterized by rivalry and disagreement, from the late 1990s to early-2000s France and Germany moved much closer on a range of issue-areas. From being proactive, however, their relationship assumed a defensive character. In some areas of policy—such as agriculture—Franco-German influence has continued to make itself felt in time-immemorial fashion. In others, such as the Stability and Growth Pact, the Franco-German relationship has acted in a defensive capacity. In still others, as in security and defence policy, France and Germany collaborated more closely than they had ever before, a collaboration driven by Iraq. As the debate over the constitutional treaty showed, however, even Franco-German agreement is no guarantee that other countries will fall into line. Enlargement has demonstrated more clearly than ever that widening the Union has undermined its hollow core.
France, Germany, and the Convention on the Future of Europe During the debates over the constitutional treaty, France and Germany initially approached the issue of political union from opposing angles. Germany, supported by the Benelux countries, espoused an openly federal solution, with a directly elected head of the Commission, a Council of Ministers transformed into a Senate, and a European Parliament vested with much greater powers. French institutional preferences were in most respects diametrically opposed. France wanted the Council to be strengthened, and the Council president to
Franco-German Relations
157
become the most important personality within the Union. The European President should be responsible to the Council. For its part, the Council should be able to dissolve the Parliament and the Commission should be responsible to it. These two positions articulated two distinctive European philosophies and two different versions of the European finalité. For France, the stance was that of the strong Europe with weak institutions that had been expressed since June 2000 in different forms by President Chirac,1 former premier Jospin,2 and Raffarin’s foreign minister de Villepin.3 For Germany, the initial stance borrowed heavily from the European Federation advocated in May 2000 by German foreign affairs minister Joshka Fischer and by the SPD (de Bresson and Vernet 2001). As so often, French and German positions were opposed in important senses. If anything, French institutional ideas in the Convention were as much influenced by Franco-British cooperation as by the Franco-German relationship. The proposal for a Council president, for example, came from Blair and Chirac and was supported by Giscard d’Estaing in the Convention . . . but not initially by German Chancellor Schröder. The Germans, with their traditionally federalist beliefs, argued in favour of a president of the Commission, but opposed creating a separate president of the Council. France sought to weaken the Commission and strengthen the intergovernmental Council as the driving force of closer political union. Their contrasting positions notwithstanding, at the fortieth anniversary celebrations of the Elysée Treaty in January 2003, France and Germany announced they had reached a broad agreement on Political Union, with both countries now supporting the double presidency of the Union,4 the creation of the ‘double-hatted’ European foreign affairs minister,5 and the strengthening of the European parliament (de Bresson 2003; Audibert 2003). In most respects, the agreement looked closer to the French blueprint than to the German one. But the key conclusion is that the Franco-German relationship had once again served to prevent the isolation of either partner and to bridge seemingly irreconcilable differences. This important episode lends support to the second hypothesis elucidated above—that European progress is not possible without Franco-German agreement. The stronger hypothesis—that France and Germany drive European Union—is not confirmed by debates in the Convention or by the subsequent fate of the constitutional treaty. Rather than a single Franco-German motor, there were variable configurations of actors. During the Convention on the Future of Europe, and the debates leading up to the constitutional treaty, one could identify at least five rival issue-based coalitions.6 We should note that the European Commission was largely absent throughout, divided and discredited after the ‘Penelope’ episode (Dauvergne 2004).7 The rejection of the constitution by voters in France and the Netherlands demonstrated the
158
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
limits of elite-driven integration. Amongst other conclusions, the subsequent fate of the constitutional treaty suggests that France and Germany acting alone do not determine the course of European history. A large number of countries had accepted the Constitution only because it had been promoted by France and Germany. That the French electorate chose to reject the constitution was incomprehensible for many and augured ill for future Franco-German influence.
Economic and Monetary Union We have argued elsewhere (Cole 2001) that a phased progress to monetary union was agreed by German chancellor Kohl at the Maastricht Summit of 1991 in order to reassure Germany’s European allies (and especially France) of the future orientation of the unified German state. The EMU decision formed part of a nested game of high-level leadership bargaining, with the Franco-German partnership performing the leading role. If the EMU decision was forced upon Kohl by Mitterrand, the detailed implementation of economic and monetary union was controlled by Germany at every stage: from the location of the European central bank in Frankfurt, to the name of the currency (the Euro, rather than the ECU favoured by France), to the ‘stability pact’ accompanying its implementation (de Bresson 1996; Dyson 1999). By insisting upon the Stability Pact (which became the Growth and Stability Pact [GSP] after the 1997 Amsterdam Summit) Germany was able to insist on tough convergence criteria accompanying the implementation of the single currency. The criteria outlined in the Maastricht Treaty included precise objectives for inflation (within 1.5 per cent of the best performing state), budget deficits (no more than 3 per cent of GDP), and public sector debt (below 60 per cent of GDP). These criteria were designed to ensure a lasting convergence of economic performance once the single currency had been introduced (see Chapter 2, above). If the basic institutional design of the new monetary institutions was imposed by Germany, the end game of monetary union revealed itself to be a process with unintended consequences. Since the introduction of the single currency in 1999, the Europeanization of monetary policy institutions has reduced Germany to one voice amongst others. Above all, neither Germany nor France have been able to respect the tough criteria written into the Growth and Stability Pact that were intended to ensure the compliance of ‘weak’ states such as Italy and Greece. France and Germany defended their short-term national interests when they jointly buried the Growth and Stability Pact in November 2003. Faced
Franco-German Relations
159
with the threat of immediate financial penalties for non-respect of the GSP criteria, France and Germany managed to unite a blocking minority (they were joined by Italy and Portugal) at a crucial ECOFIN meeting, thereby defeating the attempt of the European Commission to levy stiff fines for failure to control their budget deficits. The Franco-German relationship demonstrated its force as a defensive corporation, to the consternation of the smaller states that had done everything to respect the criteria. France and—especially— Germany lost credibility over this episode. French and German positions have evolved since the 1996 decision to create the Stability Pact. Back in 1996, France and Germany argued different cases. For Germany, every state had to comply with the criteria, whatever their circumstances. For France, political criteria had to be taken into account. By 2003, the large states—France, Germany, Italy—all argued in favour of flexibility, while the Commission and the smaller states demanded strict compliance. Germany had moved much closer to the French position. Both France and Germany now wanted to make the pact more flexible. France argued that public service investments be excluded from the deficit calculations; Germany that measures promoting employment should be excluded. Both France and Germany now argued that finance ministers should have a greater role in determining their economic policies, and that the Commission should be kept at a distance. The reform of the GSP in 2005 represented a move in the direction of Franco-German concerns.8 We might also note a moving closer together on issues of competition and industrial policy (de Bresson 2004). Chirac and Schröder both criticized the Commission for its excessive interventionism and for the absence of an industrial policy. Thus, the French were supported by the Germans in their determination not to allow national champion Alstom to go under. For their part, Germany had also intervened in favour of its automobile and chemical industries. Both French and German governments were furious about a number of the decisions taken by the former competition commissioner Mario Monti. Of direct relevance to the debate on the European constitution, France and Germany were also both bitterly opposed to the implementation of the Bolkestein Services Directive, which set out to create a common market in services through the ‘country of origin’ principle.9 Faced with German and French resistance, the Services directive was shelved in March 2005.
Defence and Foreign Policy There is a long history of institutional collaboration and cooperation, but also of mutual misunderstanding on defence issues. The 1963 Treaty focused in
160
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
part on defence and security. The Treaty called for ‘a convergence of strategic and tactical doctrines’ to allow for a common defence identity to be developed and called for France and Germany to cooperate on defence issues in all international fora. The 1963 Treaty set up a ‘strategic community’ with Germany. But at the same time it excluded a nuclear community that France reserved for itself. The lower house of the German parliament, the Bundestag, did not appreciate the Gaullist text signed by Adenauer. The German parliament feared for the German–US relationship and insisted on introducing a preamble that emptied the treaty of its content. Thus, the preamble referred to the strategic defence community with the United States and to the need to associate the UK, both red rags to the general’s bull. De Gaulle’s partial withdrawal from NATO in 1966 and the pro-US stance of the Federal Republic limited convergence and cooperation in this sphere. From these modest beginnings, France and Germany have worked hard on strategic issues. Such collaboration has been pragmatic and piecemeal. In the course of the 1980s in particular, under the Mitterrand–Kohl partnership, France and Germany engaged into a series of bilateral initiatives which preceded closer European defence integration (Gordon 1995). In 1983, Mitterrand supported the deployment of the ‘Euro missiles’ in a speech to the German Bundestag. From 1986 onwards, there were regular exchanges of diplomats from the foreign affairs ministries. In 1987, French and German troops held joint military manoeuvres for the first time and, in 1988, the two governments created the Franco-German brigade, eventually subsumed under the Eurocorps. France also began timidly associating Germany with its nuclear decision-making processes. In 1988, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Elysée treaty, France and Germany announced the creation of a number of new instruments that were annexed as protocols to the Treaty: the Security and Defence Council was the first and foremost amongst these. The French were the driving force behind this process of institutional creation. France was also the main instigator of the common foreign and security policy, fronted by France and supported by Germany at the Maastricht and Amsterdam summits (see Chapter 7, above). German unification changed the terms of reference of the debate. As long as the cold war existed, France and Germany were bound together as key continental players in the Western alliance (with French political resources traded against German economic power). Unification redistributed the cards within the Franco-German alliance. Not only had Germany become the main economic player, it had recovered sovereignty in its foreign and security policy. In the course of the 1990s, Germany began to play a much more active role on the international arena: in the Middle East and in Afghanistan notably. Germany demonstrated that it was now much more likely to pursue its own
Franco-German Relations
161
interests. The recognition of Croatia and Slovenia in 1991 was the most obvious example. Since 1994, the German army has had a mandate to intervene anywhere, with the consent of the United Nations. For its part, France lost its status as victor. Moreover, its nuclear arsenal has become a less valuable resource. France can no longer ‘free ride’, combining a policy of European autonomy with protection by the Western alliance. After the cold war, France moved much closer to the idea of European defence. Under pressure from France, the WEO was finally integrated into the EU in 1997. In 1998, with the St Malo process, integration went a step further (Marsh and Mackenstein 2005). The St Malo process launched the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP), which involves developing an autonomous EU capacity that can be called upon by the Union in those instances where NATO is not involved. The main players agreed that the Europeans needed to take more responsibility for their own defence, develop rapid reaction forces, and go beyond peacekeeping (‘Petersburg tasks’). The main players agreed upon the need to develop European capacity, whether as complementary to a NATO-led defence (the UK preference), or as an embryonic European defence policy (the French alternative). The St Malo process was an intergovernmental Franco-British initiative, subsequently extended to include the Germans (Cole 2001). In this precise case, the Franco-German relationship did not lead the European Union, neither was Franco-German collaboration essential to the pursuit of the policy, but Britain and France both wanted Germany to be closely associated with it. The Iraq war of 2003 produced a more genuine convergence between France and Germany in favour of a European defence identity (Roger-Lacan 2005). After their opposition to the Iraq war, France and Germany were probably closer on a major issue of foreign policy than at any time since the end of the cold war. Under Schröder, Germany moved much closer to the traditionally French idea of Europe puissance, the idea of defending maximum European autonomy in foreign policy and defence, even against traditional allies such as the United States (Guérot 2005; Zecchini 2003). The main shift in the 2000s has come from Germany. Traditionally equidistant between France and the US, since unification Germany has developed its own sovereign foreign policy. After Schröder’s re-election in 2002 on an anti-US, anti-Iraq war ticket, the balance veered to a much more anti-American stance, a shift that weakened Germany’s restraining influence over French anti-Americanism. In their opposition to the Iraq war, however, it is fanciful to suggest that France and Germany exercised leadership; rather, their anti-war stance crystallized deep European divisions on the subject of Iraq and, more generally, in relation to the US.
162
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
These various examples demonstrate that, while the Franco-German relationship has become less central in steering the European Union, the French and German Governments have moved closer together in defence of their own national interests. Both are invested with a belief in the legitimacy of their joint role within the European Union—and in support of a rather traditional view of European integration.
CONCLUSION At the beginning of this chapter, we asked a simple question that was difficult to answer. Have France and Germany traditionally exercised joint leadership (or ‘hegemony’ in the realist lexicon) within the European Union? There is no simple answer to this simple question. The capacity for Franco-German leadership depends upon a number of variables: the role that France and Germany have been able to perform in treaty-making or major redistributive or budgetary decisions; the existence or otherwise of powerful countercoalitions; the specific history of particular policy areas; the constellation of actors in different policy domains; whether or not public opinion intervenes, as in the constitutional treaty referendum in France in May 2005. Moreover, Franco-German influence is not static, but must be appreciated with reference to overarching historical circumstances and the evolution of the European Union itself. While General de Gaulle could on occasion present France and Germany as a directorate in a Europe of the Six, no such illusions would be possible in 2007, with an expanded European Union of twenty-seven members. Enlargement has challenged French influence in particular. The new entrants are less inclined to defer to Franco-German leadership and will resist any idea of a Franco-German political union that would enhance their sense of instability. Focusing upon France and Germany always made more sense in statecentric than in supranational explanations of European integration. Statecentric explanations are more convincing in certain issue-areas (such as budgetary policy, security and defence, or agriculture) than in others (such as competition policy). Franco-German explanations can be quite convincing in understanding constitutive bargains and the functioning of well-established policy areas such as the CAP. Franco-German bilateral dynamics are much less pertinent in areas of regulatory politics and in new policy spheres where supranational actors have developed their competencies. It appears fanciful, for example, to explain the regulatory politics of the post-Single European Act period in terms of an overarching Franco-German relationship.
Franco-German Relations
163
The institutional, symbolic, economic, and political leadership resources of the Franco-German relationship have all diminished with the ebb of the integrationist tide since the early 1990s. The Franco-German relationship is much less a source of proposition than it used to be during the heady days of Mitterrand and Kohl and is manifestly less able to steer the European ship. The French rejection of the EU constitutional treaty in May 2005 produced a noticeable cooling of Franco-German relations. On the other hand, the arrival in power of Angela Merkel in Germany in 2005, at the head of a Grand Coalition, changed the dynamics of European leadership. By December 2005 Chancellor Merkel had emerged as a powerful new European power broker. The German Chancellor showed resolute leadership at the Brussels Summit of December 2005, forcing a compromise between Blair and Chirac over the CAP and the British budgetary rebate. On the French side, the election of Nicolas Sarkozy as president in May 2007 ended a period of French isolation and opened the prospect of a revived Franco-German relationship. During the 2007 campaign, Sarkozy campaigned in favour of a ‘mini-treaty’. If this option fell well short of the ratification of the EU constitutional treaty advocated by Merkel, from the German perspective, at least the Sarkozy position would allow France to ratify a minimal treaty without calling a further referendum. Returning to the key question addressed in this chapter, since the 1995, 2004, and 2007 enlargements, the direction of change is towards a rather weaker steering role for the Franco-German relationship across the whole dimension of EU policy. Our first hypothesis (the Franco-German directorate) does not stand up to scrutiny in 2007, though the ability of France and Germany jointly to steer the destinies of Europe has been stronger at some stages (the mid-1980s to early 1990s especially) than at others. Our weaker hypothesis (that the EU can not ‘progress’ without Franco-German cooperation) draws more support from the evidence we have presented, though FrancoGerman agreement no longer carries the force of moral persuasion that it used to. Franco-German leadership capacity is weakened in an expanded Europe.
NOTES 1. In his speech to the Bundestag in June 2000, President Chirac called for Pioneer Groups, envisaged as intergovernmental alliances that would push ahead with more integrated European policies. 2. In 2001, Jospin supported the idea first launched by Jacques Delors of a Federation of Nation States. 3. De Villepin called on two occasions for the creation of a Franco-German political union.
164
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
4. The constitutional treaty proposes a president of the Council, to be elected for two and a half years by the Council, alongside the president of the European Commission. 5. The constitutional treaty proposes the creation of a foreign affairs minister, combining the functions of the high commissioner for foreign and security policy (position occupied by Javier de Solana) and the external affairs commissioner. The minister would be responsible both to the intergovernmental (Council) and supranational (Commission) branches. 6. Thus, in opposition to Giscard’Estaing’s draft treaty, the eighteen smallest countries opposed any reduction of their powers. In turn, the six largest countries joined forces to advocate reweighting Council votes in their favour. At one stage, there was an attempt to rebuild an alliance of the six founder countries, which did not get far on account of suspicion of Italian premier Berlusconi. Most important, the contours of the coalitions shifted throughout the course of the negotiations. 7. Out of the blue, in December 2002 Commission president Romano Prodi produced a highly federalist text that had not been discussed in the College of Commissioners, let alone the Convention. The manoeuvre backfired badly against the European Commission. 8. The renegotiated Growth and Stability Pact excludes certain types of heavy expenditure from the calculations of the deficit. 9. Service providers across Europe would be subject to the norms and regulations of their country of origin, rather than the host country. France and Germany feared an influx of cheap labour from Central and Eastern European countries, undercutting their national agreements.
REFERENCES A, D. (2003) ‘Chirac-Schröder relancent l’axe’, Le Point, 17 January. B, M. (1996) An Imperfect Union. The Maastricht Treaty and the New Politics of European Integration. Boulder: Westview. B, S., and L, C. (2005) The Member-States of the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. C, M. (1999) ‘Dual Hegemony: France, Germany and the Making of Monetary Union in Europe’. Paper presented to the European Community Studies Association Conference, Pittsburgh, US, June. 33 pp. C, A. (2001) Franco-German Relations. London: Longmans. D, A. (2004) L’Europe en Otage: L’Histoire secrète de la Convention. Paris: Saint Simon. B, H. (1996) ‘Le fonctionnement de l’Union monétaire fait l’objet de difficiles tractations entre les Quinze’, Le Monde, 3 December.
Franco-German Relations
165
(2003) ‘France—Allemagne, une nouvelle alliance pour relancer l’Europe’, Le Monde, 22 January. (2004) ‘Paris et Berlin se concerteront pour l’émergence de champions industriels européens’, Le Monde, 15 May. V, D. (2001) ‘L’Europe, la France et le projet fédéral allemand’, Le Monde, 4 May. D, C., and P, U. (eds.) (2005) Le Traité de Élysée et les relations francoallemandes, 1945, 1963, 2003. Paris: CNRS Éditions. D, K. (1999) ‘The Franco-German Relationship and Economic and Monetary Union: Using Europe to ‘Bind Leviathan’, West European Politics 22/1: 25–44. G, P. (1995) France, Germany and the Western Alliance. Boulder: Westview. G, U. (2005) ‘Paris, Berlin, disputez-vous’, Libération, 13 June. H, G., and M, A. (2001) The Franco-German Axis in European Integration. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. H, S. (1995) The European Sisyphus. Essays on Europe 1964–1994. Boulder: Westview. M, S., and M, H. (2005) The International Relations of the European Union. London: Longman. M, S. (2002) ‘Pour un nouveau prisme d’analyse de l’entente francoallemande’, La Revue internationale et stratégique 48: 13–21. M, C. (1997) France and Germany at Maastricht. Politics and Negotiations to Create the European Union. New York: Garland. M, A. (1984) The Reconstruction of Western Europe 1945–51, London: Routledge. M, A. (1993) ‘Preferences and Power in the European Community: A Liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach’, Journal of Common Market Studies 31/4: 473–524. (1998) The Choice for Europe. Social Purpose and State Power from Messina to Maastricht. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. P, T. (1998) Germany, France and the Integration of Europe: A Realist Interpretation. London: Pinter. P, R., U, H., and W, W. (eds.) (1990) Motor für Europa: Deutschfranzösischer Bilateralismus und europäische Integration. Bonn: Institut für Europäische Politik. P, P. (1996) ‘The Path to European Integration: A Historical Institutionalist Analysis’, Comparative Political Studies 29/2: 123–63. R-L, V. (2005) ‘Où va la défense européenne’, Le Monde, 20 June. S, J. (2002) ‘Les Relations franco-allemande dans une Europe élargie: la fin d’une époque? La Revue Internationale et Stratégique 45 (winter): 35–42. S, T. J., and K, M. (2004) ‘Divergent Interests and Different Success Rates: France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom in EU Legislative Negotiations’, French Politics 2/2: 81–94. S, H. (2006) ‘La France et L’Allemagne face à l’Europe de l’Est’, Allemagne Aujourd’hui, Special issue on ‘50 ans de relations franco-allemandes’ (May): 104–11.
166
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
T, P. (1983) The Limits of European Integration. London; Croom Helm. V, J. (2002) ‘La Coopération franco-allemande à l’épreuve du traité de l’Elysée. Retour sur quarante ans d’attentes, de déceptions et de succès’, La Revue internationale et stratégique 48 (winter 2002/3). W, H. (1990) ‘Institutionalized Bilateralism and Multilateral Relations: Axis, Motor or Detonator’, in R. Picht, H. Uterwedde, and W. Wessels (eds.) Motor für Europa. Deutsch-französischer Bilateralismus und europäische Integration. Bonn: Institut fur Europäische Politik, 145–57. Z, L. (2003) ‘Deux visions de l’Europe et de sa défense’, Le Monde, 6 October.
9 A Bid Too Far? New Labour and UK Leadership of the European Union under Blair Hussein Kassim
New Labour’s election victory in May 1997 promised to transform Britain’s ‘awkward’ relationship with Europe (George 1994). Increasingly proEuropean since the mid-1980s, the party announced its intention under Tony Blair’s leadership not only to bring an end to the ambivalence and ambiguity that had characterized British membership, but to assume a leading role in the Union. These aims were remarkably ambitious given the steep deterioration of Britain’s relations with its partners from the late 1980s and the degree of divisiveness the European issue had assumed in British politics.1 Two election victories later and at the end of the Blair premiership,2 it was with respect not to the first, but the second arguably more difficult objective that success had been achieved. The UK has become an important player in the European Union, constructively engaged and in some areas a prime mover. Yet while Blair succeeded in normalizing relations with the UK’s partners—‘bringing Britain to Europe’, as Stephens (2005) puts it—he was considerably less successful in ‘bringing Europe to Britain’. This chapter examines and evaluates New Labour’s European policy under Blair’s leadership. It looks at how the party arrived at its aims in opposition and at the strategy that it devised for their realization in office. It argues, first, that, while the transition from anti- to pro-European party had been effected under Neil Kinnock, UK leadership was added by New Labour, reflecting its ideological view of how Britain could best manage the challenges of globalization and a pragmatic calculation that ‘Europe’ could best be sold domestically if the UK were cast in a leading role. The second argument is that New Labour in power has, surprisingly, been more successful in taking the lead in Europe than it has in settling the question of Britain’s European destiny. It has formulated and promoted new goals for the Union and, in contrast to
168
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
previous administrations of both left and right, has not instinctively sought to block the pro-integrationist initiatives put forward by other member states.3 However, despite its successes, New Labour’s ability to play a leadership role at the EU level has been compromised by a reluctance to argue the European case at home—a third argument. The final argument concerns the nature and source of this failure. The existing literature highlights foreign policy choices, particularly the decision to support US military intervention in Iraq, as the limiting factor on New Labour’s European achievements. This chapter argues that, though the Iraq war did affect the UK’s relations with its European partners, its impact was short-lived and ultimately not as important as domestic institutional factors. Although his premiership was regarded as strongly presidential, Blair’s freedom of action in EU matters was in fact considerably more limited than this view suggests. Its position on the Euro, decided by the chancellor not the prime minister, proved to be the key moment of Blair’s premiership in European policy terms. On the Continent, the decision—indistinguishable from Major’s ‘wait-and-see’—was interpreted as a sign that, despite the new rhetoric since 1997, London’s commitment to Europe remained circumscribed. At home, the announcement of the five tests led first to the Euro, then Europe itself, becoming a taboo subject.
NEW LABOUR’S EUROPEAN POLICY In terms of its stated aims, New Labour has been the most positively proEuropean of British political parties to win office since 1945. It committed itself, foremost, to bringing an end to the troubled nature of Britain’s relationship with Europe. At Aachen in 1999, Blair announced that: ‘I have a bold aim . . . that over the next few years Britain resolves once and for all its ambivalence towards Europe. I want to end the uncertainty, the lack of confidence, the Europhobia’ (quoted in Stephens 2001: 67). Ending Britain’s marginalization within Europe was a second aim. Thus, three months after becoming leader, Tony Blair pledged to the Labour Party Conference that: ‘Under my leadership, I will never allow this country to be isolated or left behind in Europe’ (Rawnsley 2000: 73).4 Blair declared further that, under a New Labour government, the UK would play a leading role in the European Union: ‘For Britain to remain at the edge of Europe, rather than take up a leading role at the centre of Europe, would be ‘to deny our historical role in the world’ (ibid.). Shortly after the 1997 elections, Prime Minister Blair announced to the Party of European Socialists Congress that the British Government ‘shares
New Labour and UK Leadership
169
the goal of a constructive partnership of nations in Europe’ and, six months later declared that ‘we must end the isolation of the last twenty years and be a leading partner in Europe’ (Blair 1997a). These sentiments were repeated in periodic speeches throughout his premiership.5 New Labour’s pro-Europeanism represented the culmination of a process that began a decade previously. For much of the post-war period, the Labour Party had been sceptical about supranational integration.6 It changed tack only after returning to office in 1964. Having opposed Macmillan’s membership application in 1961, Labour submitted Britain’s second application in 1967. It effected a similar shift in the 1970s when, having criticized the terms on which the Heath Government had negotiated entry to the EEC in 1971, it held a referendum on the issue after returning to power in 1974. Though the ‘yes’ campaign won the 1975 poll, the party’s endorsement of Community membership was less than wholehearted. Neither the party leadership, nor the membership more broadly, showed much enthusiasm for the EC. Indeed, back in opposition after 1979, the Labour Party became distinctly hostile to the Community as it drifted leftwards—a factor that contributed to the departure of leading members on the right of the party to form the pro-European SDP.7 The process reached its apogee at the 1983 elections when Labour campaigned on a manifesto that pledged withdrawal.8 Europe was one of a number of areas where Neil Kinnock, elected leader in the wake of Labour’s calamitous defeat, sought to change policy as part of a thoroughgoing modernization designed to make the party electable. The first Labour leader to be passionately convinced of the advantages of membership,9 though a convert to the European cause, Kinnock argued that a more positive approach, including active efforts to influence EC policy, was necessary if Britain were to benefit from Community action—a conclusion that the trade unions had reached almost simultaneously (Rosamond 1998). The Labour Party took positions on European issues, calling, for example, for a social dimension to be included in the single market programme, and for the first time established organizational links with other European parties of the centre left.10 The year 1989 was a milestone for the party: it participated in the campaign of the Confederation of Socialist Parties of the European Community (‘Confeds’) for elections to the European Parliament, withdrew its longstanding opposition to the creation of a European party thereby enabling the formation of the Party of European Socialists, and joined the Socialist Group in the European Parliament (Pappamikail 1998: 209).11 Labour’s pro-European policy continued under its new leader, John Smith. As Paterson, Henson, and Shipley (1995: 26–7) note: ‘Smith’s starting point was quite different from Neil Kinnock’s. He had always been an enthusiastic pro-European and had joined Roy Jenkins in voting with the Conservative
170
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Government in 1971 in favour of entry into the European Community. This pro-Europeanism was shared by most of Labour colleagues from Scotland, where support for European integration was higher than in England’. However, the party was not as united on the issue as it would become under Blair. Indeed, though the negotiation and ratification of the Maastricht Treaty proved tortuous for the government, it has been claimed that ‘Labour was more divided [over the Maastricht Bill] than the Conservatives’ (Stuart 2005: 271). As well as the challenge of managing divisions within his own party, Smith had to balance support for a treaty he favoured with the need of an opposition party to exploit divisions in the government. Ultimately, Labour succeeded in projecting itself as pro-European, while divisions within the Conservatives were a lot more visible. Although Blair, who became Labour leader in 1994, had opposed British membership of the Common Market early in his political career (Young 1998: 481–4), pro-Europeanism was a key element of New Labour’s modernizing project. Action at the EU level was linked to the party’s agenda of economic reform and a vision of a globalized world which recognized the limits on what could be achieved by a single state. Though exposing divisions in the governing party was undoubtedly also a factor, New Labour’s leading figures repeatedly emphasized the importance of the European Union to Britain’s prosperity and the need for Britain to play a constructive role. Frontbench spokesmen also endorsed the idea of economic and monetary union, which promised stability at a time that the British economy appeared unstable. Illustrative of New Labour’s growing commitment was a strengthening of its links with sister parties and, as the 1997 general election approached, a series of European initiatives. The 1994 elections to the European Parliament had produced a larger contingent of Labour Party MEPs within the PES than from any other party. A deal by party leaders in Corfu led to the election as Group leader of Pauline Green, who was ‘seen as an ambassador for a forthcoming Blair government’ (Pappamikail 1998: 211). There were also efforts to strengthen relations between Party HQ and Labour MEPs (Messmer 2003). In addition, in the run-up to the Amsterdam IGC, Blair held a series of highprofile meetings with government and socialist leaders across Europe, ‘selling his vision of the Union and remind[ing] other EU governments that even if Conservatives were at the conference table when it opened, “we will be the ones doing the signing” (Independent, 3 March 1996)’ (Pappamikail 1998: 211). Following the general election, for the first time the party pursued in power the same European policy as it had supported when out of office. ‘When in opposition, up to and including 1963’, observed Hugo Young (1998: 260, see also 474), ‘[Labour] had opposed British entry. When in government,
New Labour and UK Leadership
171
1967–1970, it had favoured and rather desperately sought British entry. When back in opposition, 1970–1974, opposition asserted itself once again’. His conclusion that: ‘Opposition . . . gave control to the instincts of the party, government gave it to the perceived necessities of the country, and between these positions there was an absence of much grey area’ (ibid. 260) suggests that a settled view had been reached. Support for constructive engagement had become a mainstream view within the party and deep divisions over Europe no longer exist. Withdrawalists had all but vanished and although some Eurosceptics remained, they were far fewer in number and had far less influence than in previous decades (Baker and Seawright 1998). The terms in which New Labour expressed its European policy reflected a strategic response to the dominant discourse about Britain in Europe. Historically, the relationship had been framed in terms of sovereignty (see Lord 1992). Eurosceptics had claimed at each stage that Britain’s ability to determine its destiny was under threat, while supporters of membership claiming that its freedom to act was not endangered.12 As Blair recognized, this confronted British governments with a dilemma: ‘co-operate in Europe and you betray Britain; be unreasonable in Europe, be praised back home and be utterly without influence in Europe’ (Blair 2006). By asserting British leadership of Europe and marrying this objective with the aim of constructive engagement with Britain’s European partners, New Labour sought to transcend, or at least to sidestep, the obsession with sovereignty. The language of Britain leading in Europe presented Brussels as an arena in which Britain could pursue its interests. By avoiding the concept of sovereignty, the relationship was no longer cast in zero-sum terms. Though both the content and tone of New Labour’s European policy under Blair differed from parties on both left and right in Britain, the rupture with the past was not absolute. The themes of normalization and leading in Europe were tied to an invocation of national interests. The party’s 1997 manifesto, for example, promised: ‘We will stand up for Britain’s interests in Europe after the shambles of the last six years, but, more than that, we will lead a campaign for reform in Europe. Europe isn’t working in the way this country and Europe need. But to lead means to be involved, to be constructive, to be capable of getting our own way’ (Labour Party 1997). Party spokesmen, including Blair, whose rhetoric since 1994 has been the most pro-European of New Labour frontbenchers, have sought to communicate the same message, often in unapologetically populist terms. Thus, in a speech in 1997 (Blair 1997b), he called for a ‘people’s Europe: free trade, industrial strength, high levels of employment and social justice, democratic’, and condemned EU bureaucracy that was ‘thwarting open trade, unnecessary rules and regulations, the Europe of the CAP and the endless committees leading nowhere’. Essentially, New
172
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Labour presented British membership of the European Union in positive terms, premising its policy of constructive engagement on the postulate that: ‘we cannot shape Europe unless we matter in Europe’ (Blair, cited in the Guardian, 1 October 1997).
NEW LABOUR IN OFFICE: A NEW EUROPEAN STRATEGY New Labour’s European policy ambitions were reiterated in a mission statement issued by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office shortly after the election victory of May 1997 (Hughes and Smith 1998: 93). Contacts were established with other EU member states, and attempts made to mobilize support for its Third Way-inspired programme. Though the language of the Third Way faded, engagement with the UK’s European partners and the promotion of a reform agenda persisted as core policy ambitions.
The First Term: Constructively Engaging After the stridency of the Thatcher era and the isolation of the Major years, the new government’s approach received a warm reception from Britain’s partners. At party-to-party level, Peter Mandelson, minister without portfolio in the Cabinet Office and a close ally of the prime minister, played a key role in establishing connections with parties of the centre left. Roger Liddle, an enthusiastic pro-European and former SDP member, was appointed to the Policy Unit at Number 10, from where he coordinated relations with counterparts in other European capitals. Bilateral relations with France and Germany were a high priority, and seminars involving politicians and policy advisers from Paris and Bonn became regular events at Downing Street. Blair’s address to the French National Assembly in November 1998 and his launch of a Third Way initiative with Gerhard Schröder, soon after his election as German Chancellor, exemplified Labour’s new approach. As well as activities centred on 10 Downing Street, a systematic attempt to upgrade relations between the UK civil service and the administrations in other member states was launched at the prime minister’s initiative in the autumn of 1998. The aim of the ‘step change’ plan was to promote the UK to the status of core insider. By forging alliances with like-minded partners it would be possible to steer EU action in directions that were favourable to British interests (see Smith and Tsatsas 2002). France and Germany were obvious targets on account of their stature, but particular efforts were directed
New Labour and UK Leadership
173
towards Central and Eastern European states, which were considered as future allies due to their commitment to the market economy and preference for intergovernmentalism. Whitehall departments were exhorted to develop dialogues at all levels with their counterparts in other member states. The active pursuit of coalition-building signalled a sharp departure from traditional policy. The decision came after the experience first of the Amsterdam IGC, then the Council presidency, which the UK had held in the first semester of 1998. Although the government’s charm offensive had convinced its partners of the genuineness of its commitment and at Amsterdam it had signed up to an extension of majority voting, some strengthening of cooperation in foreign policy, and to a ‘flexibility clause’—all of which the Conservative Government had sought to block—the IGC and the presidency had revealed real policy differences between the UK and its partners. Though ‘step change’ petered out,13 the belief that British objectives were best advanced through alliances persisted at the highest political level. The prime minister himself sought to promote policies with like-minded partners in areas of common interest. The strategy enjoyed some success. Proposals were launched on European defence with France in 1998 (the St Malo Declaration), economic reform in 2000 with Spain, which fed into the Lisbon summit, on immigration in 2002 with Italy and Spain, and on several issues with various partners at various stages of the Convention on the Future of Europe (Menon 2004). However, as Smith (2005: 711) observes, the strategy threw up some curious bedfellows for a party of the centre left.
The Euro Although New Labour’s first year in office revealed that differences between the UK and its partners had not disappeared with the change of administration, it was the government’s policy on the Euro that caused major disappointment across Europe. In opposition, the party had supported British participation in EMU. Its stance partly reflected its general pro-Europeanism, was partly a policy response to economic instability, and can partly be attributed to the adversarial nature of party competition in Britain. From the time that tensions began to emerge between prime minister, chancellor, and foreign secretary in the third of Margaret Thatcher’s administrations in the late 1980s, through the contentious negotiation and ratification of the Treaty of European Union, and the Major Government’s ‘black Wednesday’ humiliation, Labour’s position on EMU made it appear constructive by comparison. Moreover, unity in its ranks contrasted with the obvious tensions within the Conservative Party. However, Labour’s position on British participation in EMU was not unequivocal. Thus, the party followed suit when John Major committed the
174
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Tories to a referendum on the question. Then, in an increasingly Eurosceptic climate, Labour’s tone on the issue grew more cautious as the 1997 elections approached. Its leading spokesmen talked up the positive aspects of British entry, while emphasizing that the conditions would have to be right—the position stated in the party’s manifesto. Notwithstanding the change in tone, both Blair and Brown were widely seen as supporters.14 In power, however, while the new government took quick and bold decisions in a number of areas, it was silent on the subject of EMU until the chancellor announced in autumn 1997 that British entry would be subject to five tests.15 The decision dismayed both the party’s pro-European members and Britain’s partners. Not only did it put a question mark against the extent to which the UK could really count itself at the heart of Europe but it made it difficult thereafter for the government to pronounce on any EU-related issue. Whenever a spokesman discussed Europe, the question would inevitably be put as to whether or not the five tests were closer to being passed. The result was that ministers avoided talking about Europe unless absolutely necessary, which enabled the arguments of opponents of British entry to the Euro, and anti-Europeans more generally, in politics and the media to go uncountered.16 The decision on the Euro was consequential, but it also demonstrated the limits of Blair’s power as premier. From all accounts, the decision was taken by the chancellor with input from his advisers, without the prime minister’s participation.17 Moreover, it effectively reserved to the Treasury the authority to decide when, and indeed whether, the UK would join, and Gordon Brown’s ownership of the issue made it difficult for other front-bench colleagues to broach the topic publicly. The late Robin Cook, foreign secretary in the first Blair administration, described in his memoirs how he had been discouraged from advocating the benefits of British entry (Cook 2004: 168–71). The government’s refusal to debate the issue publicly or to speak in favour of British membership was serious, since, as time passed, the prospects of a referendum victory receded.18 Nor did the situation change after New Labour’s 2001 victory or in the wake of the Treasury announcement on 9 June 2003 that the tests had not yet been fulfilled. The effect was to push back the possibility of British entry until at least after it had won a third election. While in theory the prime minister could have overridden the chancellor, moved him to another ministerial position, or sacked him, in practice any such move would have been seriously damaging. Brown’s status and role as an architect of New Labour effectively ruled out these possibilities. With the two most powerful individuals in the government taking opposite sides on the issue, moreover, other members of the Cabinet preferred not to take a public position on the issue for fear of alienating one or the other. Thus, though Blair has often been depicted as an all-powerful, presidential prime minister, his hands in this key area of policy were in fact tied by a Cabinet colleague.
New Labour and UK Leadership
175
Saint-Malo That Labour’s policy on the Euro limited, but did not completely inhibit, the UK’s ability to take a leading role in EU developments is demonstrated by the part that the government played in pushing forward cooperation in the area of security and defence. Its Atlanticism to the fore, Britain had historically been reluctant to support moves towards a common European policy in security and defence. At Maastricht, it had resisted the transfer of authority from a strictly intergovernmental framework to the Community system and, although it had been prepared to allow some movement in the direction of more effective arrangements at Amsterdam, the treaty did not reveal any major advances. While the inability of Europe to respond effectively to the break-up of Yugoslavia had played a part in shifting views on both sides of the Atlantic about the benefits of closer cooperation, the crisis in Kosovo had an important impact in London, revealing sharp differences in the ability of US and European governments to mobilize. It followed a strategic defence review conducted by the new government, which showed how few troops Europe could mobilize at short notice and the dependence of European forces on American transport and communications (Wallace 2005: 444). With other Atlanticist states also prepared to accept a European pillar with NATO and, crucially, France looking to strengthen Union cooperation, Britain tabled a number of proposals in late 1998, first at an informal European Council in October and then, with France, in the Saint-Malo Declaration in December. For the first time, the UK sided with those who argued that the Union should have ‘the capacity for autonomous action, backed up by credible military forces’ and that cooperation should take place within the EU framework. The Saint-Malo declaration was, therefore, a landmark in the development of a common defence and security policy. It opened the way for the Union to participate in crisis management and for the rapid creation of decisionmaking structures in Brussels. By advocating independent operational capabilities for the EU and departing from Britain’s long-standing concern to preserve NATO’s centrality, Blair had removed a major obstacle to European efforts to cooperate in defence.
The Second and Third Terms New Labour won a second election victory in 2001 and an unprecedented successive third term in 2005. Although the party’s European policy did not recover the momentum of earlier years, the policy of constructive engagement continued. It survived both the war in Iraq and a prolonged round of treaty reform. While the war damaged the UK’s bilateral relations with France and
176
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Germany, and subsequent efforts at rapprochement created tensions with other member states, it did not reverse the normalization of relations with its European partners that had been achieved during the first term. Its impact on the UK’s standing in Europe was not nearly as far-reaching as some commentators have alleged. In addition, neither the Convention on the Future of Europe nor the IGC that followed produced the stand-off with other governments that tended to characterize the UK’s participation in treaty negotiations. However, the refusal of the Blair Government to highlight the benefits of membership in general and to argue the case for the Constitutional Treaty in particular enabled anti-Europeans to set the terms of the domestic discourse on Europe.
The Iraq War and its Impact Although the EU member states were initially united both in condemning the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 11 September 2001 and in declaring their support for the US war on terror, the consensus began to unravel in late 2002, when it became apparent that Washington was preparing a case to attack Iraq. The UK supported the US call for military intervention, but it believed that it should proceed only on the basis of a UN mandate. Germany and France, however, made clear their total opposition to this course of action. The gap between the two sides grew when hostilities began. It is important, however, to put the disagreement between the three larger member states into context and to recall that US intervention divided not only the three larger member states, but the EU-15—and, after 1 May 2004, the EU-25—and that it was France and Germany, not the UK, that were in the minority (Smith 2005: 715). Under these circumstances, it could not credibly be claimed that the UK had betrayed Europe. Indeed, the cool reception for the call made by France, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg for the creation of a capacity for European military planning that would rival NATO at the socalled ‘chocolate summit’ on the one hand and the fact that other member states sent troops as part of the US-led coalition on the other underlined that the UK was not alone. Still, EU divisions and London’s support for Washington did appear to undermine Blair’s oft-repeated claim that Britain did not need to choose between Europe and America, but could be a bridge between the two, and embittered relations with Blair, Chirac, and Schröder. Despite their differences, however, Berlin, London, and Paris were quick to realize that a prolonged stand-off would be to no one’s advantage, particularly when the Convention on the Future of Europe had begun. Moves towards a rapprochement were initiated by the Elysée. Blair, Chirac, and Schröder met in December 2003 to discuss the Convention and proposed a joint initiative on
New Labour and UK Leadership
177
European defence. A further summit took place in advance of the spring 2004 European Council and resulted in a letter to the Irish presidency proposing also within the context of the Convention that a Commission vice-president be given responsibility for economic reform. The foreign ministers of the three, meanwhile, took the lead in negotiations with Iran in an attempt to persuade the government to end its uranium enrichment programmes. In short, the fallout from the Iraq war was not insignificant, but even as a limiting factor on the UK’s goal to remain constructively engaged with its partners its impact has been exaggerated.
The Convention on the Future of Europe and the Constitutional Treaty New Labour’s constructive approach to the Convention on the Future of Europe and the IGC that followed again distinguished it from previous administrations. While Thatcher had opposed the call by other member states to convene an IGC to negotiate what become the Single European Act, Major’s experience both of the negotiation and ratification of the Maastricht Treaty had been extraordinarily painful. By contrast, the Blair Government decided to engage positively in the Convention on the Future of Europe, despite its reluctance concerning a method of treaty reform that governments could not control (Menon 2004; Kassim 2005). Though it had shared the dissatisfaction widely felt among member states about the IGC system as a result of the way that the negotiations at Nice had been handled, it did not welcome, but could not oppose, the more inclusive method of a convention that many called for at Laeken and after (Dimitrakopoulos 2005). Once the decision had been taken to convene a convention to decide the future shape of the Union, Britain played a full and active part. Unlike other governments that treated it as a ‘talking shop’, the UK took the Convention seriously from the outset.19 Represented by Peter Hain, minister for Europe, who was known to be close to the prime minister, the UK sought in pursuit of British interests to shape the agenda on a series of issues. It set out to persuade other conventionnels, to seek out potential allies and coalition partners, and to launch joint initiatives wherever possible. This was a very different approach from the defensive and veto-wielding actions of the Thatcher and Major Governments, and earned Peter Hain an early reputation as one of the key performers at the Convention. The result was that although it insisted that certain ‘red lines’ should not be crossed in areas including taxation, criminal justice, social security, and defence, it had defined positions on many key institutional issues that were shared with other governments (Menon 2004). Its active approach was rewarded with a text that the French Constitutional expert, Robert Badinter, labelled a ‘British Constitution’ (Menon 2003: 978).
178
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Significantly, however, the most serious problems that the government encountered in regard to the Constitutional Treaty were domestic. During the Convention and the IGC, it did little to explain the reform process or to discuss what was at issue to the public. Nor did it attempt to counter arguments made by the Conservative Party or the Eurosceptic press. As a result, even though it had negotiated a text that reflected British aims and that explicitly addressed its concerns, the government found itself on the defensive. Instead of acclaim for his government’s success, Blair was forced to concede a referendum that few believed he could win.
ASSESSING NEW LABOUR’S STRATEGY An evaluation of New Labour’s European strategy under Blair needs to consider not only whether its goals were realized, but also the extent to which they were appropriately chosen in regard to the historical context and the task facing the government.
New Labour’s European Policy in Context Eighteen years of Conservative Party rule had left Britain marginalized and isolated. As Major sought to impose his authority on a divided Cabinet, the UK had become increasingly peripheralized. Its boycott of EU business following the Union’s decision to ban the export of British beef in the wake of the BSE crisis marked the nadir in Britain’s relations with its partners. The challenge for a pro-EU government in London was to regain their trust. New Labour’s approach after 1997 was well-suited to achieving this ambition. The opening of dialogue with other governments not only ensured that Britain’s views were known, but was a necessary undertaking in order to build confidence in Britain as a partner that took the Union seriously and was committed to full participation. Such a course of action was not easy, however, even for a government committed to better relations with its European partners. Britain’s historic awkwardness had been only partly the result of poor diplomacy. It also reflected Britain’s position as an outlier in respect of economic policy and its Atlanticism—preferences that did not change in 1997. Given these differences, a pro-European government in London had to work harder to explain its views. Unlike France or Germany, which were usually closer to the EU median and therefore pivotal in terms of Council decision-making (Beyers and Dierickx 1998), Britain’s views could simply be discounted. In addition,
New Labour and UK Leadership
179
Britain’s political culture differs considerably from those of other West European states and the EU. A majoritarian political system characterized by single-party government and an adversarial party system does not sustain the values of consensus and compromise that EU decision-making, involving multiple actors, requires. The appropriateness of New Labour’s strategy to the European Union as a decision-making system is also an issue. In much of the literature, including contributions to this volume, it is argued either that the design of the EU makes leadership extremely difficult or that it is possible only when a set of (rare) conditions coincide. However, it is important to distinguish between a heroic conception of leadership, where a single actor is a hegemon, effectively dictating outcomes and imposing solutions across the board, and a more modest notion, according to which a member state or EU institution takes the lead in setting the policy agenda, mobilizing support for a particular system goal, or brokering a deal in a set of negotiations (see e.g. Beach and Mazzucelli 2006). It is in this latter sense that New Labour’s European strategy is best judged and that Britain played a leading role in Europe during the Blair premiership. Its policy was based on a sound appreciation of how a government, in a multiactor system, could best bring about its favoured outcomes. Thus, it invested diplomatic energies in ensuring that lines of communication were open with other governments, looked actively for like-minded allies, and put forward joint initiatives for which it sought to mobilize support (see above).20 The limitations on what New Labour has been able to achieve, therefore, are not the consequence of a misreading or faulty analysis of the Union, or a misplaced strategy. They arise from elsewhere.
The Record: Success Away, Timidity at Home At the EU level, New Labour’s achievements have been significant. The UK is no longer seen as an uncooperative partner, and it has played a key part, the Euro excepted, in furthering integration. However, its failure to take action on the home front and the paralysis that set in after decision on the Euro, limited what it could achieve.
A Positive Record in Europe The main success of New Labour in power has been to normalize Britain’s relations with other EU member states. As well as its pursuit of a new diplomacy, it has made a number of important policy reverses. Though, like its Tory predecessors, New Labour has sought to maintain a national veto in
180
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
areas including immigration, taxation, security, and defence, it has signed up to policies regarded as unacceptable to previous governments. The Social Protocol is the best-known example, but in addition, even though it negotiated an opt-out from many of the provisions of the Treaty of Amsterdam and its protocols relating to freedom, justice, and security elements, the UK subsequently applied (in 2000 and 2001), and was granted permission by the Council, to participate in some Schengen activities. In addition, while its Conservative predecessors sought routinely to veto or block the integrationist inititatives of other member states, New Labour has taken a more constructive approach. While its approach to the Convention on the Future of Europe has already been discussed, a new spirit has also been evident in the way that it has conducted itself when holding the Council presidency. Though they had their problems,21 and, certainly in the case of the latter, certainly did not live up to the expectations created by Blair’s speech to the European Parliament on 23 June 2005, the presidencies of 1998 and 2005 were far more constructive and successful than previous UK presidencies (see Ludlow 1993, 1998; Whitman and Thomas 2005). To take one example, the agreement reached on the Financial Perspective for 2007–13 was a real success for the British Council presidency of 2005. Blair’s preparedness to compromise on the British rebate was widely acknowledged in Europe, if not by the British press, drawing praise even from Jacques Chirac.22 Most significant, perhaps, has been Britain’s active pursuit of goals at EU level that have led to policy breakthroughs or new initiatives. The Saint-Malo agreement is perhaps the most dramatic example. Blair’s preparedness to allow the EU ‘to develop a capacity for autonomous action, backed up by credible military forces’ allowed the EU to take a major step in the area of defence. Its support for the Lisbon Process and the commitment at the Lisbon European Council to make the Union the world’s most competitive knowledge-based economy, though a way of exporting New Labour’s economic reform agenda, was also a successful initiative launched jointly by Britain (see Smith and Tsatsas 2002). The UK’s influence at the Tampere European Council, when Heads of State and Government agreed an action programme to implement the Treaty of Amsterdam commitment to creating an area of freedom, security, and justice, and Britain’s role in enlargement, first in relation to the countries of Central and South-Eastern Europe, and then Turkey, are further examples. This is not to claim, however, that Britain’s action at the EU level since 1997 has been problem-free. The early days of the first Blair administration were marked by a messianism that recalled the lectures given by previous British prime ministers to its partners. Blair’s exhortation to sister parties on the centre-left, for example, to follow the Third Way—in his words, to ‘modernize or die’—was not well received. Although the prime minister’s rhetoric became
New Labour and UK Leadership
181
noticeably less forceful, the same cannot be said of the Chancellor, whose calls for economic reform were viewed as strictures to emulate the British model. Moreover, not all UK initiatives were met with success. Plans for a Downing Street summit involving the French president and the German chancellor raised fears about the emergence of a directoire among smaller member states and were changed after Rome and Madrid expressed alarm. In addition, the UK strategy of multiple alliance-building could be interpreted less as communautaire-minded and more as ‘promiscuous bilateralism’ (Smith 2005: 709).
‘Europe’ at Home The main failing of New Labour’s European strategy, however, lay on the domestic front. The government’s failure to undertake a concerted effort at home proved a serious miscalculation. While its achievements at the EU level were considerable, there was a limit to what could be achieved without carrying the public. Ministers, and certainly not those in the Cabinet, rarely mentioned Europe, and Blair made little showing in this regard. Although opinion polls showed widespread scepticism about Europe, some studies revealed opinion to be negative, but shallow and, therefore, open to persuasion.23 However, at no stage during the Blair premiership did the government attempt to shift public opinion on the issue. Although the impact of an unconvinced public on its conduct of routine business in Brussels was negligible, the fact that the government allowed anti-European arguments to dominate domestic coverage of Europe made it vulnerable when it came to major issues. The difficulties the government experienced in relation to the Constitutional Treaty, where its failure to convince the public of the benefits of integration were laid bare, illustrate the perils of not having previously prepared the ground. Then, although when he announced his decision in the House of Commons, the prime minister declared his determination to lay to rest the Eurosceptic myths once and for all, there was little sign in subsequent months of any meaningful campaign (Kassim 2005). Arguably, the government was saved from a referendum defeat only by the ‘no’ votes in France and the Netherlands.
Explaining the Strategic Flaw Labour’s failure to take action on the domestic front is surprising given the size of its parliamentary majorities, particularly in 1997 and 2001, and the depth of Blair’s personal commitment to Britain in Europe (see Cook 2004: 169). Though fear of the press and how it would respond to a decision in principle
182
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
to take Britain into the Euro played a part,24 Blair’s failure to begin a domestic debate reveals important weaknesses on the part of a prime minister often viewed as presidential (Heffernan and Webb 2005). Blair’s freedom of action on the issue was clearly limited once the Treasury had issued its statement on the terms and conditions of British entry to the Euro. Moreover, though the terms of the ‘Granita accord’ reportedly gave Blair free rein in foreign affairs and Brown a central role in the domestic,25 Europe arguably fell on the cusp. More generally, the British prime minister is more constrained in shaping European policy than other EU leaders. Collegiality imposes very real limits, as it requires that the views of all interested departments are taken into account. Though primus inter pares, the prime minister cannot easily override a department’s expressed interests. The same is not true in France, for example, where the president can overrule ministries or take even the most consequential decisions unilaterally. Blair, like Thatcher before him, had in the area of EU policy to pay regard to senior colleagues, notably, the chancellor. In addition, the UK’s system for coordinating EU policy compounds the prime minister’s dependency. The prime minister does not have the institutional capacity to play a directive role in EU policy-making. An attempt to remedy this weakness was made in 2000, when Sir Stephen Wall, UK permanent representative in Brussels, was recalled to London to become head of the European secretariat in the Cabinet Office and the prime minister’s EU adviser, the first time such a position had been created. This arrangement was intended to enable the prime minister to give a greater steer to European policy. Though it shifted power within the triangle of central coordinators from the FCO and UKREP towards the European secretariat, it did not significantly enhance Blair’s ability to take the lead on EU issues. In the area of EU policy at least, the prime minister is significantly less than an elective dictator. Finally, though it is often argued that the UK’s majoritarian system delivers ‘elective dictatorship’, the adversarial system can impose constraints on the leader of the majority party. In contrast to other European states, the prime minister is denied the freedom of action that bipartisan consensus or even coalition government sometimes allows. The Conservative Party’s transformation into a hard Eurosceptic party since the mid-1990s compelled Labour to strike a more defensive stance, arguing always that it was pursuing British interests, than it otherwise might have adopted.
CONCLUSION Although critics have judged New Labour’s European policy severely, it is important to recognize what has been achieved. The UK is indisputably
New Labour and UK Leadership
183
regarded very differently by its European partners than it was prior to the Labour’s 1997 election victory. The Blair premiership may not have lived up to expectations, but creating working and warm relations with other European states has been a significant accomplishment. Taking a lead role through the launch with allies of several major policy initiatives, most notably in the areas of defence and economic reform, and in shaping the outcome of the Convention on the Future of Europe, has been a genuine achievement. Somewhat remarkably the UK did assume a leadership role in so far as such is possible in a complex, multi-actor institution, and showed its understanding of constructive engagement and the alliance-building necessary to secure favourable results in such a setting. Curiously, however, for a government that gained a reputation for spin, the main failing of the Blair decade was to convince the British public of the benefits of integration. As a consequence, Britain’s achievements at the EU level were less impressive than they might have been and, despite its triumphs away, the government found itself in trouble at home. More generally, the failure to change opinion in a way that may be lasting renders Blair’s considerable accomplishment somewhat precarious. For this reason, the once-ina-generation opportunity finally to resolve Britain’s ambiguous relations with Europe may have been missed.
NOTES I am grateful to the UK officials and others, who very kindly agreed to share their insights and experience on the topics discussed in this chapter in non-attributable interviews conducted since 2005. I should also like to thank participants in the ‘Leaderless Europe’ workshop at the University of Hull, September 2005, and, in particular the convenor of the project Jack Hayward, William Paterson, and an anonymous referee, for their helpful suggestions. I am indebted to Anand Menon, Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos, and Sara Connolly for valuable comments and helpful criticism. All faults are, of course, my own. 1. Hugo Young’s frequent use of the term ‘neuralgic’ vividly communicates this sense (Young 1998). 2. Blair stood down from the premiership on 27 June 2007. 3. I am grateful to Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos for this point. 4. Launching the 1998 UK presidency in December 1997, Blair described it as ‘an opportunity to demonstrate that Britain now has a strong voice in Europe, that the indecision, vacillation and anti-Europeanism of the past have gone’. 5. See e.g. Blair (1996, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2006). 6. For analyses of the Labour Party’s European policy since 1945, see Broad (2001), Featherstone (1988), Newman (1983), Paterson, Henson, and Shipley (1995).
184
7.
8. 9.
10.
11.
12. 13.
14.
15.
16.
17. 18.
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless? Young (1998) discusses Bevin, Gaitskell, and Blair, while Robins (1979) examines the period 1961–75. Although differences over Europe were not the cause of the split, three of the ‘Gang of Four’—Roy Jenkins, Bill Rodgers, and Shirley Williams—were strong pro-Europeans, while David Owen took a more moderate view. See Crewe and King (1997) for discussion. Labour Party (1983). ‘I made it clear that that party policy would have to change . . . It was very clear that the integration of economies by then meant that unilateral action was not going to be enough . . . It was coming home to me, as it was coming home to Trade Unionists, that unless we were calling from the inside, we weren’t calling’ (Kinnock, quoted in Pappamikail 1998: 207). The Labour Party had not joined the Confederation of the Socialist Parties of the European Community (Confed) following UK accession. Even after the 1975 referendum, its involvement was limited to participation in a few working groups (Pappamikail 1998: 207). So important had been his personal role in this rapprochement that Confed approached Kinnock in 1992 after his resignation as leader in the wake of Labour’s general election defeat with a view to his becoming its president (Westlake 2001: 637). See Lord (1992), Patten (2005) for discussions of sovereignty in the UK debate. One argument is that it achieved the unspoken objective of forcing all Whitehall departments finally to adjust to the needs of EU membership and to take a more active approach to European business. The depth of Blair’s commitment to British entry to the Euro has been the subject of much speculation. For three rather differing positions, see Cook (2004: 169); Blair (1996: 278); Peston (2005: 178, 192). On Brown, see Peston (2005: 180). The tests concerned convergence, flexibility, and the impact on investment, financial services, and employment. See the chancellor’s announcement of the five tests at , accessed 8 December 2007. For other official documents, see , accessed 8 December 2007. It is noteworthy, for example, that Blair made several important speeches on Europe during his premiership, but many were delivered abroad, for example, in Aachen in 1999, in Ghent in 2000, and in Warsaw in 2000. For a journalistic account of the decision, see Rawnsley (2000: 72–88). Lamenting Blair’s decision not to hold a referendum in the wake of the election victory of 1997, Roy Jenkins, commented: ‘He is the most European Prime Minister since Edward Heath left office . . . although Blair in my view has been over-cautious about his European timing and is not sufficiently making the political weather on the issue’ (Evening Standard, 27 April 2000).
New Labour and UK Leadership
185
19. Hain recalled how, at the beginning of 2001, the prime minister had ‘quite startled people at an informal Cabinet committee . . . by saying that the outcome of the Convention is absolutely fundamental . . . He said that it was more important than Iraq’ (The Times, 9 September 2003). 20. It recognized the Franco-German alliance as a fixture that could not be replaced or broken up, but that could sometimes be outflanked by an opposing coalition (see Chapter 5 and 8, above). 21. The 2005 presidency, for example, got off to an inauspicious start with summits in Newport and Newcastle, marred by ‘poor logistics, heavy-handed security and disastrous IT’, Independent on-line, 20 September 2005. 22. Chirac praised Blair’s ‘courage, initiative and responsibility’ (Daily Telegraph, 19 December 2005). 23. Studies on referendum winnability. 24. Sir Stephen Wall, former head of the European secretariat and EU adviser to the prime minister, recalled that, ‘I thought then, when I read that Tony Blair was going off to Australia to secure the support of Rupert Murdoch, that this is going to put the kibosh on European policy,’ Daily Telegraph, 25 September 2004. 25. For speculation on the agreement struck between Blair and Brown at the Granita restaurant, see Naughtie (2001: 69–75).
REFERENCES B, D., and S, D. (1998) ‘A “Rosy” Map of Europe? Labour Parliamentarians and European Integration’, in D. Baker and D. Seawright (eds.), Britain For and Against Europe: British Politics and the Question of European Integration. Oxford: Clarendon, 57–87. B, D., and M, C. (2006) ‘Introduction’, in D. Beach and Mazzucelli (eds.), Leadership in the Big Bangs of European Integration. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 1–21. B J., and D, G. (1998) ‘The Working Groups of the Council of the European Union: Supranational or Intergovernmental Negotiations?’ Journal of Common Market Studies 36/3: 289–317. B, T. (1996) New Britain. My Vision of a Young Country. London: Fourth Estate. (1997a) ‘The Principles of a Modern British Foreign Policy’, 1 November, London, Guildhall. (1997b) Speech to the Labour Party Annual Conference, Brighton, 30 September. (2000) Prime Minister’s Speech to the Warsaw Stock Exchange, 6 October. (2001) ‘Britain’s Role in Europe’, Prime Minister’s speech to the European Research Institute, University of Birmingham, 21 November. (2002) ‘A Clear Course for Europe’, Cardiff, 28 November. (2006) ‘Europe Emerging from “Darkened Room” ’, St Antony’s College, Oxford, 2 February.
186
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
B, R. (2001) Labour’s European Dilemmas. From Bevin to Blair. Basingstoke: Palgrave. C, R. (2004) Point of Departure. London: Pocket Books. C, I., and K, A. (1997) SDP. The Birth, Life and Death of the Social Democratic Party. Oxford: Oxford University Press. D, D. G. (2005) ‘Norms, Interests and Institutional Change’, Political Studies 53/4: 676–93. F, K. (1988) ‘Britain’ in K. Featherstone (ed.), Socialist Parties and European Integration: A Comparative History. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 41–75. G, A. (2003) Between Europe and America. Basingstoke: Palgrave, ch. 6. G, S. (1994) An Awkward Parter. Britain in the European Community. Oxford: Oxford University Press. H, R., and W, P. (2005) ‘The British Prime Minister: Much More Than “First Among Equals” ’, in T. Poguntke and P. Webb (eds.), The Presidentialization of Politics. A Comparative Study of Modern Democracies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. H, K., and S, E. (1998) ‘New Labour—New Europe?’ International Affairs 74/1: 93–104. K, H. (2005) ‘Le Royaume-Uni et le Traité constitutionnel européen’, in H. Kassim and D. G. Dimitrakopoulos (eds.), ‘Quel avenir pour Europe? Les préférences des États membres et de la Commission européenne’, Critique Internationale 29: 113–33. L P (1983) The New Hope for Britain. Manifesto. (1997) Because Britain Deserves Better. Manifesto. L, C. (1992) ‘Sovereign or Confused? The “Great Debate” about British Entry to the European Community Twenty Years on’, Journal of Common Market Studies 30/4: 419–36. L, P. (1993) ‘The UK Presidency. A View from Brussels’, Journal of Common Market Studies 31/2: 246–60. (1998) ‘The 1998 UK Presidency: A View from Brussels’, Journal of Common Market Studies 36/4: 573–83. M, P., and L, R. (1996) The Blair Revolution. London: Faber & Faber. M, A. (2003) ‘Leading from Behind: Britain and the EU’s Constitutional Treaty’. Paris: Notre Europe, Étude 31- en 2 , accessed 14 December 2007. (2004) ‘Britain and the Convention on the Future of Europe’, International Affairs 79/5: 963–78. M, W. B. (2003) ‘Taming Labour’s MEPs’, Party Politics 9/2: 201–18. N, J. (2001) Rivals. Blair and Brown: The Intimate Story of a Political Marriage. London: Fourth Estate. N, N. (1983) Socialism and European Unity: The Dilemma of the Left in Britain and France. London: Junction.
New Labour and UK Leadership
187
P, P. B. (1998) ‘Britain Viewed from Europe’, in D. Baker and D. Seawright (eds.), Britain For and Against Europe: British Politics and the Question of European Integration. Oxford: Clarendon, 206–21. P, W. E., H, P., and S, P. (1995) The European Policies of Labour and Conservative Party in Great Britain, Sankt Augustin: Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Interne Studien 109. P, C. (2005) Not Quite the Diplomat. Home Truths about World Affairs. London: Penguin, ch. 3. P, R. (2005) Brown’s Britain. London: Short Books. R, A. (2000) Servants of the People. The Inside Story of New Labour. London: Hamish Hamilton. R, L. J. (1979) The Reluctant Party: Labour and the EEC 1961–75. Ormskirk: G. W. & A. Hesketh. R, B. (1998) ‘The Integration of Labour? British Trade Union Attitudes to European Integration’, in D. Baker and D. Seawright (eds.), Britain For and Against Europe: British Politics and the Question of European Integration. Oxford: Clarendon, 130–47. S, J., and T, M. (2002) The New Bilateralism: The UK’s Relations Within the EU. London: The Royal Institute of International Affairs. S, J J. (2005) ‘A Missed Opportunity? New Labour’s European Policy 1997– 2005’, International Affairs 81/4: 703–21. S, P. (2001) ‘The Blair Government and Europe’, The Political Quarterly 72/1: 67–75. (2005) ‘Britain and Europe: An Unforgettable Past and an Unavailable Future’, The Political Quarterly 76/1: 12–21. S, M. (2005) John Smith: A Life. London: Politico’s. W, W. (2005) ‘Foreign and Security Policy’ in H. Wallace, W. Wallace, and M. A. Pollack (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 429–56. W, M. (2001) Kinnock. London: Little, Brown and Co. W, R., and T, G. (2005) ‘Two Cheers for the UK’s EU Presidency’, Chatham House, Briefing Paper EP BP 05/05. Y, H. (1998) This Blessed Plot: Britain and Europe from Churchill to Blair. Basingstoke: Macmillan.
10 Leaderless Enlargement? The Difficult Reform of the New Pan-European Political System José M. Magone
THE QUESTION OF THE EUROPEAN UNION BORDERS The unification of the European continent on 1 May 2004 has to be regarded as a milestone of European history. The accession of Bulgaria and Romania in January 2007 and of present candidate countries Croatia, Macedonia, and Turkey in the future further extend the position of the European Union on the world stage. It is expected that eventually all Balkan countries will join in the European Union. At the moment, all of them have signed Stabilization and Association Agreements (SAA). It is hoped that at some stage they will become functioning economies and stronger democracies and work together within the European Union. Afterwards, it will be necessary to settle the borders of the European Union, including the special cases of Turkey, Ukraine, Moldavia, and Belarus. The most sensitive question will be about the eventual accession of Turkey by 2014 or later. The two negative referendums in France and the Netherlands were not only reactions towards the Constitutional Treaty, but about the borders of the European Union as well, in particular the question about the possible membership of Turkey. This was particularly instrumentalized by the Front National of Jean Marie Le Pen in France and most recently by Nicolas Sarkozy during his presidential campaign in April–May 2007. In fact, the French population has the strongest opposition against enlargement among European countries since the 1990s. Similar opposition can be found in the Netherlands, Germany, the United Kingdom, Finland, Luxembourg, and Austria. One registers a growing gap between the political elites of these countries, which were very supportive of enlargement, and their populations (Rupnik 2004: 28–31). The strongest support came from the new member states, southern Europe, and Sweden (Eurobarometer 65, March–May 2006: 159).
Leaderless Enlargement?
189
First, we must deal with the difficulties of collective leadership in relation to the enlarging versus deepening dichotomy. Quite crucial is the fact that collective leadership is characterized by ‘drivers’ and ‘brakemen’ countries in relation to the issue of enlargement (Schimmelpfennig 2001: 50). It is also important to make the distinction from the outset between political leadership of the Council of Ministers in issues of ‘high politics’, such as institutional adjustment to enlargement, and technocratic leadership of the European Commission supported by the European Parliament in ‘low politics’, which is geared to pushing the implementation of the enlargement project. The next section reviews the discussion of the institutional reform sparked by the enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe. Then the discussion of the financial perpectives of 2007–13 and the implications for community solidarity are examined. The final section considers the next steps of enlargement and beyond and the implications for collective leadership, before returning in conclusion to the problems of collective leadership posed by enlargement.
ENLARGING V. DEEPENING: TWO INTERTWINED PROCESSES? After more than thirty years of enlargement of the European Union, it becomes clear that the enlargement v. deepening dichotomy is not mutually exclusive, but part of a dynamic process of further European integration (Schimmelpfenning and Sedelmeier 2002; Wallace 2002: 660). Enlargement has been used as a strategy by the European Union to overcome periods of stagnation. In some cases, it also allowed for the introduction of new policies that became quite central to the European integration process. The best example was the integration of Greece, Spain, and Portugal into the European Community in the 1980s. Jacques Delors’s European Commission had to develop a more generous European regional policy in order to secure the support of the three southern European countries under the leadership of Spain for the single European market (Magone 2003: 246–7). For decades the three countries were able to profit from generous structural funds, which will slowly be phased out after 2007. It is envisaged that by 2013 Spain will be a net contributor and lose most of the structural funds to which it has been entitled (El Pais, 12 June 2005: 3; 19 June 2005: 3). In spite of many criticisms related to enlargement as preventing deepening of integration between existing member states, the reality is that deepening has been more dynamic because of the pressures of enlargement. The intergovernmental nature of decision-making that gives countries the possibility to opt
190
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
out temporarily from certain policies, such as the UK, Sweden, and Denmark from Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and the UK and Ireland from Schengenland, makes it clear that some of the deepening is dependent on the leadership of national political elites (Grabbe and Hughes 1998: 2) and not so much on the European ones. Enlargement is therefore the best strategy that the supranational European Commission has to strengthen its support base in relation to the Council of the European Union and more Eurosceptic countries. Indeed, the difficulties around the whole enterprise allow the European Commission to produce the leadership discourse needed to structure the integration of the new member states. This is reinforced by asymmetrical awareness of the whole process by the individual member states (Bellier 2004: 140–5). There was a qualitative change in the way enlargement was dealt with in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. In the 1970s, enlargement and deepening were still two different processes. The main reason was that the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Denmark were joining a group of countries that were quite similar economically. The ambitions towards deepening arose in a period of considerable economic crisis due to the oil crises of 1973 and 1979. All deepening efforts such as the Werner Plan could not be implemented due to the difficult economic situation. The nature of enlargement changes qualitatively with the integration of the southern European countries. The new democracies of Portugal, Spain, and Greece were economically peripheral to the European Community. All of them had major economic problems and were engaged in a process of democratic transition and consolidation. One of the main reasons for enlargement was the fact that these countries had moved from right-wing authoritarian dictatorships towards democracy. Last but not least, the geopolitical strategic position of these three countries, all of them members of NATO, made it imperative that these countries should join the community of democratic states as soon as possible. Their weak economies required from the European Community the first elements of a screening and monitoring process, which became formalized and even more complex in the Central and Eastern European enlargement (Magone 1996: 463–93; Whitehead 2004b: 418–21). The reform of the structural funds in 1988 created the first parallel redistributive policies in order to counteract asymmetrical economic effects between the centre and the periphery, leading to a growing impact of European regional policy on the main recipients of structural funds, the so called cohesion countries, Portugal, Spain, Greece, and Ireland. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez they were able to achieve a doubling of the funds in the Edinburgh European Council of 1992, which included the establishment of an additional new fund for the cohesion
Leaderless Enlargement?
191
countries (Falkner 1996: 234). This is important, because European regional policy became the second largest item in the Jacques Delors package I and package II, only surpassed by the anachronistic Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Although the rationale of the EMS and EMU led to further deepening and incrementalism of policy, the European Commission gained strong supporters of the community method based on solidarity from the southern European countries. The enlargement to Sweden, Finland, and Austria was quite important for the consolidation of the budgetary situation, but also allowed for a deepening of certain policy areas such as environmental, social, and employment policy that were central to these countries. They strengthened the position of the EU in relation to the European model of capitalism which is based on the inclusion of the principle of sustainable growth and advanced social policy. In this sense, enlargement was also a deepening of certain policies that were neglected or avoided in the EMS and EMU project. The Central and Eastern European enlargement was and is the greatest challenge for the European Union. In this case, the overall technocratic process was based on lessons learned from the accumulated experience of previous enlargements (Magone 2006: 106–13). This enlargement has similar characteristics to those of the unification of Italy in the late nineteenth century, the absorption of the southern mezzogiorno into the northern part led by the Kingdom of Piedmont. The panEuropean unification was less a negotiation between the two halves of the continent than an absorption of one into the other. The model of European integration was devised by West European elites and imposed technocratically on the Central and Eastern European countries, which had to fulfil the Copenhagen criteria in order to become part of the European Union. This mezzogiorno was preceded by the unification of Germany. Similarly to that of Italy, unification was undertaken without any renegotiation of the constitutional settlement between the two parts. Instead the Grundgesetz was extended to the Eastern Länder (de Weck and Perron 2004: 68–70). In sum, the discussion of enlarging versus deepening, which was regarded as a dichotomy back in the 1970s, became less so since the Southern European enlargement. Indeed, after some voluntaristic leadership thrusts by Jacques Delors between 1985 and 1995, enlargement and deepening became intertwined processes, not always in positive terms. Subsequent events show that stagnation in widening may create problems for deepening and vice versa. The use of strategies such as the ‘flexibility clause’ or possibility of ‘reinforced cooperations’ in order to achieve minimalist compromise such as in the Amsterdam Treaty further undermine the clarity of purpose and leadership necessary in such a project (Curzon-Price and Landau 1999: 21).
192
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
At some stage the European Union has to define the territorial borders of this new political system. If not, the whole European integration may implode. Further enlargement to the east and south may result in a fragmentation of the European Union into different groups.
THE DIFFICULT ROAD TOWARDS CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPEAN ENLARGEMENT The European Union is a ‘community of democratic states’, so new members are requested to fulfil many criteria in order to qualify for membership. One of the crucial aspects of such democratic status is that it should not be just formal democracy, but must have advanced substantially towards a qualitatively sustainable one (Whitehead 2004a: 395). The crucial variable in achieving democratization is time. The European Union has developed over time a technology of democratization which was applied first in relation to Southern Europe and since the early 1990s in Central and Eastern Europe. This technology of democratization includes a time frame which allows candidate countries to achieve a successful transition to, and consolidation of, democracy. In the case of the Iberian countries it took over eight years from their application in 1977 until membership on 1 January 1986. In between there was a long period of negotiations in relation to the implementation of the acquis communautaire (Magone 1996: 484–6). Similarly, the Central and Eastern European countries—here the special case of the Mediterranean islands is excluded—had to wait fifteen years since their transition to democracy to become members of the European Union. Central to the overall strategy of the European Union were the Copenhagen criteria of 1993 which comprised political, economic, and administrative criteria of democracy to be achieved before countries could qualify for membership. It allowed these countries to enter an international socialization process into the new Europe (Schimmelpfennig 2000). It established Europe Agreements with all candidate countries and a structured dialogue which envisaged a socialization into the EU structures and processes. The Europe agreements included democratic conditionality clauses, which were introduced for the first time into enlargement processes (Smith 2004: 97–8). Originally, the Europe Agreements were equal to association status and excluded mentioning the possibility of accession. Such a strategy was necessary due to the fact that the European Commission was not able to count on the support of all key member states, in particular France. Throughout the enlargement process the Council of Ministers was divided into countries that were ‘drivers’ and ‘brakemen’ of enlargement. Even among
Leaderless Enlargement?
193
these groups there were different views on how inclusive enlargement should be. One could identify four groups which advocated either a limited or a wider enlargement. On the one hand, among the driver countries that advocated a limited enlargement were Austria, Finland, and Germany and those that pleaded for an inclusive approach were Britain, Denmark, and Sweden. On the other hand, the brakemen countries with a limited version of enlargement were Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg, while those with an inclusive view were France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Spain, and Portugal (Schimmelpfenning 2001: 50). Through an incremental policy, the European Commission was able to steer member states towards acceptance of a longterm central and eastern enlargement. This was supported particularly by Germany. The whole approach has been labelled ‘rhetorical entrapment’. The European Commission, European Parliament, and driver countries would create an alliance appealing to the brakemen countries not to jeopardize the credibility of the European Union by refusing the candidate countries membership of the European Union. Such a ‘rhetorical entrapment’ would even include strategies of naming and shaming to silence potential concerns over enlargement (Schimmelpfenning 2001: 72–3). The European Council in Madrid in December 1995 led finally to the acceptance of the beginning of negotiations with at least the more advanced countries in terms of adjustment to the European Union (Sedelmeier 2005: 416–17). The European Commission was in charge of developing an accession strategy which became known as Agenda 2000. This document specified that some reforms, notably of institutions, agriculture, and structural funds would be necessary to make the whole process a successful enterprise (European Commission 1997). Nevertheless, the costs of enlargement were kept within the existing budgetary ceiling, so that the net payers could endorse the enlargement package. After difficult years of political and economic transition (Pridham 2000), the European Union finally started negotiations with five countries in 1998: Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Estonia, and Slovenia. The Luxembourg Extraordinary European Council of 1997 and Helsinki European Councils of 1999 allowed for a more inclusive strategy which also accepted Turkey as a candidate country (Sedelmeier 2005: 184–94). Soon negotiations with Slovakia, Latvia, and Lithuania were opened. Furthermore, negotiations were also undertaken with Malta and Cyprus. The whole process became quite interactive and more flexible. A process of annual screening and monitoring for each country was used to measure the progress made in relation to the benchmarks defined by the criteria. Although the European Union considerably expanded their representative offices in all candidate countries by sending experts in the different areas related to the acquis communautaire,
194
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
it became clear that the screening process became very dependent on the national reports and lacked any independent critical assessment. Indeed, the policy of independent evaluations made a timid start in the 1990s and is still being implemented across all areas in which the European Commission is engaged. The small Brussels administration had to depend on the good will of these candidate countries in order to get accurate information. It showed how overstretched the European Commission was (Smith 2004: 72–3). Finally, in the Copenhagen European Council of December 2002, the decision was made to accept the accession of ten candidate countries. Only Bulgaria and Romania had to wait until 2007 at the earliest. Much progress was achieved during the Spanish and Danish presidency in both semesters of 2002 (Lippert 2003). The signature of the accession treaties in the Athens European Council in April 2003 and the positive referendums in all candidate countries, in spite of a low participation rate in most Central and Eastern European countries, provided for accession on 1 May 2004. One of the characteriztics of enlargement is that it was an elite-led and elite-dominated project. There was a lack of debate about the consequences of membership for these countries. Most populations expected long-term gains over a period of five to fifteen years by joining the European Union. In some countries such as Poland and Slovakia there was a general feeling that European integration could be regarded as positive in order to modernize the country and overcome the deficits of the national institutions. In this sense, the low referendum turnout in certain countries is related to a growing gap between the elites and the populations. The high level of political corruption in most Central and Eastern European countries can be regarded as one of the factors for low esteem of institutions in spite of over fifteen years of democratic consolidation. In the global corruption perception index of 2006 the ten member states and Bulgaria and Romania had an average score of 5, which is lower than most West European countries, apart from Italy (4.8) (10 = corrupt-free, 0 = very corrupt). While Estonia, Malta, and Slovenia had a middle-ranking value of 6.4 or above, at the bottom were Bulgaria (4), Poland (3.7), and Romania (3.1). This contrasts with the Scandinavian countries which have values between 8.8 (Norway) and 9.6 (Finland). (Transparency International 2006: 5–7; for an excellent qualitative study see Miller, Grodeland, and Koshechkina 2001). In spring 2006, the average trust/distrust of the new member states in national government was 29/65 per cent, in national parliament was 22/72 per cent, in the legal system 34/59 per cent, and last but not least, in political parties was 14/80 per cent. The lowest figures could be found in Poland, where political cynicism has become a permanent feature of the political culture
Leaderless Enlargement?
195
Similarly, Bulgaria and Romania also displayed very low figures (Eurobarometer 65, spring 2006: QA 10.1–4). Although most Central and Eastern European economies had high growth rates, many of them, such as Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, and Latvia, are struggling with high budget deficits. This will delay their adoption of the Euro. Moreover, some of the reforms undertaken before accession have been partly reversed by subsequent governments. In some countries, such as Slovakia and Poland, Eurosceptic and nationalist parties became part of coalitions, something which is viewed with apprehension by the European Commission and most West European governments (The Economist, 14 October 2006, 42–3; 10 March 2007, 40). The difficult democratic transition and consolidation of these countries, which was paralleled also by a move from a planned to a liberal market economy, prevented a more proactive engagement of the Central and Eastern European elites. The European integration process was regarded as an external link (Dyson and Featherstone 1996) similar to what was—and is still—felt in Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Greece. The European Union thereby is seen as a way to modernize and transform national political institutions, economies, and societies. A dilution of the acquis communautaire as feared by parts of the political elite in western Europe was also prevented.
THE EUROPEAN CONSTITUTIONAL PROCESS AND ENLARGEMENT: INSTITUTIONAL ISSUES AND THE NEW FINANCIAL PERSPECTIVES (2007–2013) The Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) of 1996 was supposed to lead to institutional reform in order to accommodate the forthcoming central and eastern enlargement. A successful 1996 institutional reform based on the principles of Agenda 2000 would then be linked to the financial perspectives 2000–6, as had previously occurred thanks to Jacques Delors (Laffan and Lindner 2005: 199–201), who had transformed the budgetary politics of the European Union by introducing the principle of financial perspectives. Jacques Santer and his successors were supposed to achieve deepening of the incrementalist policies of the previous European Commission. However, this did not envisage an increase of the budget as in the previous financial perspectives but just a consolidation of the present budget with reforms to the different policies. Both the Amsterdam Treaty and the financial perspectives
196
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
2000–6 agreed in the European Council of 1999 led only to a consolidation of the whole process of European integration. In contrast to the Delors packages I and II, which could count on the generous support of Germany, its unification costs led to an alliance of the net payers against an increase of the budget. The European Commission kept the costs of enlargement within the existing budget, in order to accommodate their wishes. The Berlin European Council of June 1999 allowed for agreement on the status quo, satisfying almost all member states. Nevertheless, it became clear that the ‘club of net contributors’—Germany, France, UK, Netherlands, Sweden and Austria—would remain strong opponents of budget increases in the future (Grabbe and Hughes 1998: 90–2). As Attila Ágh put it, ‘the Berlin Summit led in fact to a “cheap enlargement” ’ (Ágh 2006: 33). The failed institutional adjustment to Central and Eastern Europe in the Amsterdam Treaty necessitated a further IGC in the year 2000 which led to the Treaty of Nice. The final negotiations in the European Council of Nice showed that there was a growing cleavage between larger and smaller countries as well. The G-16 should integrate all smaller countries of Central and Eastern Europe and become a strong group to preserve the rights of the small member states. Indeed, a revolt of the smaller countries under the leadership of the Portuguese and Belgian representatives forced the larger countries to make concessions (Seixas da Costa 2001). The Treaty of Nice also introduced the double majority of votes based on population and number of states. In many ways, France and the UK were major winners, but Poland and Spain also received almost the same number of votes. The number of MEPs was capped at 700. Further agreement was reached on the number of commissioners which should be limited to twenty after 2007. The larger countries would lose their second commissioner. Nevertheless, further adjustments had to be made and it was subsequently agreed that after 1 November 2004 the number of MEPs should be capped at 732, the number of commissioners would be less than the number of member states after 2007 but remain at twenty-five until then, and the number of votes in the Council would be set at 321 with 232 (72.27 per cent, at least 62 per cent of EU population) required for a qualified majority (Phinnemore 2004: 120–5). In spite of the agreement reached, the collective leadership by IGC gained a bad name and could be regarded as an exhausted method of integration (Neunreither 2001; Wessels 2000). After the successful Convention on the Charter of Fundamental Citizens’ Rights, the Belgian presidency proposed a European Convention on the Constitutional Treaty at the Laeken European Council in December 2001 (Göler 2002). The Central and Eastern European countries and Turkey were invited to take part in the European Convention, but their impact was weak. In the case of Poland, the consensus was to support
Leaderless Enlargement?
197
the status quo but also to aim for a better ‘European institutional balance’. The Polish elite is more or less committed to a community method which protects their country against the renationalization of policies such as the structural funds and Common Agricultural Policy as proposed by some of the net payers such as the United Kingdom and Sweden. Access to community funds is regarded as one of the most important priorities. The Polish representatives were against the division between old and new members and attempts to build a two-tier Europe through reinforced cooperation or a dominance of core countries such as the Franco-German alliance. Poland wants to belong to any hard core that may emerge in the European Union and not left behind (Kolarska-Bobinska 2004: 169–72). An exception to this approach was the position of former prime minister Leszek Miller which gained considerable prominence in the Brussels European Council in December 2003 during the Italian presidency. He clearly was supportive of a more intergovernmental approach and blocked the approval of the draft constitution at that stage along with the Spanish prime minister José Maria Aznar (El Pais, 18 December 2003, 15–16). Eventually, in March 2004, Leszek Miller was forced to resign over his economic programme which envisaged cuts in social benefits. His successor Marek Belka then followed a more compromising approach in the IGC of June 2004. This was also reinforced by the fact that also in Spain intransigent Aznar was replaced by a more flexible socialist José Luis Zapatero. In the end, a compromise was reached about the qualified double majorities issue with the formula of 55 per cent of member states, but at least fifteen member states, and 65 per cent of the population (Constitutional Treaty, I-25, Paragraph 1; El Pais, 27 April 2004, 5; 27 April 2004, 4; 22 May 2004, 7; 23 May 2004, 11; 19 June 2004, 2). In the Constitutional Treaty, the big winners were Germany and the other larger states. The medium-sized countries Spain and Poland lost a little, but the big losers were the countries with about ten million population, such as Greece, Hungary, Portugal, Czech Republic, and Belgium. The powershift was of 4.3 per cent to Germany, 1.1 per cent to the UK and France, 0.9 to Italy, but −0.2 per cent to Spain and Poland. Greece and Czech Republic lost −1.3 per cent and Hungary, Portugal, and Belgium −1.4 per cent each. All other countries had losses of voting power below 1 per cent (Wessels 2004: 171). Furthermore, the new position of president of the European Union, the reinforced position of the president of the European Commission, and the creation of a European foreign minister will lead to a personalization of politics at supranational level, which gives more visibility to the European Union (ibid. 174–5). Indeed, it may be a response to Kissinger’s rhetorical request for a telephone number for Europe. It means also that a European political elite consisting of the presidency, the foreign ministry, the European Commission,
198
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
and the Members of the European Parliament could emerge, which would provide leadership at supranational level and overcome the existing deficit of communication (Schmidt 2002: 246–50). Also the institutional question related to the number of commissioners is far from resolved. Until 2014, all member states will have a commissioner, afterwards it is envisaged to cap their number at two-thirds of the number of states and allow for an equitable rotation. It is possible that member states will not give up on this patronage right and continue to advocate one commissioner per country after 2014 (Wessels 2004: 171–2). The constitutionalization process will still last for some time to come (Wessels 2002: 84). The negative referendums in France and the Netherlands might not be a setback for the constitutionalization process, but eventually quite positive. In fact, rejection of the present Constitutional Treaty means different things to different people. The passionate involvement of both French and Dutch populations must be regarded as good for democracy within the European Union, even if the result turned out to be negative. Political leadership has skilfully to convince the demoi of the European Union that future constitutionalization processes are done in order to ensure a better quality of life in economic, social, environmental, and political terms. During the German presidency of the first half of 2007, Angela Merkel revived the idea of a new treaty which led again to divisions within the European Council. Although opposition to the most recent enlargement has been more pronounced in France, Germany, Austria, and the United Kingdom, it has also been growing in other countries. Netherlands, along with the Scandinavian and the southern European countries, is supportive of enlargement, although such support has been declining considerably in recent years. The main fears of the French are related to the aspects of firm relocation from France to the Central and Eastern European countries, undercutting of wages through the mobility of workers coming from Central and Eastern Europe, and the fear that Central and Eastern European criminal gangs will be able to use the freedoms of the internal market to expand their businesses. Some parts of the Europhile elite feel that enlargement may lead to a dilution of the acquis communautaire (Grunberg and Lequesne 2004: 60–1). The socalled ‘Bolkestein’ directive on the liberalization of services which account for 50 per cent of all economic activities and 60 per cent of employment has been portrayed by the opponents as a danger to the West European welfare states. This has been fiercely opposed by trade union confederations across the European Union due to its principle of country of origin. Trade unions fear that firms and employment agencies located in Central and Eastern Europe can send lower-paid workers to countries with higher social and
Leaderless Enlargement?
199
employment standards. This would erode labour market protection in more advanced economies. Also in the United Kingdom, the increase in the number of people of Central and Eastern Europe, mainly from Poland, who moved there after 2004 led to a reconsideration of this liberal policy in relation to Bulgaria and Romania. Although immigration led to growth of the gross domestic product and filled many jobs that nobody wanted to do, it led also to strains on certain communities, particularly in the school sector. It is estimated that between 2004 and 2006 about 600,000 Central and Eastern Europeans immigrated to the United Kingdom (The Times, 28 August 2006, 31). Similar to the problems encountered in the negotiations of the financial perspectives 2000–6, the recent negotiations for 2007–13 showed many problems of collective leadership. The enlargement requires the richer member states to be supportive of Central and Eastern European countries which still have a GDP per capita below the EU average and whose infrastructures need considerable funding to be upgraded. The big challenge is to overcome the growing reluctance of the net payer countries to pay more and more into the EU budget. The negotiations on the financial perspectives during the Luxembourg presidency and the British presidency in 2005 showed the consolidation of a growing cleavage between the rich countries, some of them, such as France and Germany, under budgetary pressure; others, such as the Netherlands, Sweden, and the poor Southern, Central, and Eastern European peripheral countries, due to public opinion. The growing opposition to the dominance of a Franco-German alliance in an expanded European Union contributed to a general leaderlessness. The discussion about the British rebate and Tony Blair’s budget proposals linking it to reform either of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) or reduction of transfers to the Central and Eastern European countries did harm considerably its position in the European Union. President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso accused Tony Blair of being the Sheriff of Nottingham by taking from the poor to give to the rich, before praising him for securing budget agreement in extremis. After long meetings in the European Council of 15–16 December 2005, Chancellor Angela Merkel was able to achieve a compromise by increasing the contribution of Germany and so cover the difference between the British proposal and that of the European Commission. However, the whole experience showed a quite divided European Union, in which the net payers resisted paying more and the net receivers were not pleased with the outcome. Because there is no consensus supporting largesse towards the Central and Eastern European countries, this means that in contrast to the southern European case, we have here ‘enlargement lite’ with the danger of creating a second-class European citizenship in Central and Eastern Europe. The spirit of
200
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
solidarity that existed in the late 1980s and 1990s is gone. German leadership and generosity in this respect disappeared after fifteen years of an expensive reunification, although Angela Merkel may represent a turning point in this respect. She has emerged as an important supporter of further European integration and as a negotiator of groundbreaking compromises. Transfers of structural funds continue to be capped at 4 per cent of national GDP, so that new member states which have a lower national GDP than the southern European countries will receive substantially less. One of the main reasons is that otherwise the budget would have to be increased, but there is not enough support in the Council to achieve this. The second reason is that a large amount of funding may create problems of absorption and implementation, as happened in southern Europe in the 1980s and early 1990s. It was estimated that for the period 2004–6 Poland would receive C67 per person, Hungary C49, and Czech Republic C29; in contrast, in 2000 Greece received C437 and Portugal C211 (Rupnik 2004: 38). Moreover, the direct payments from the Common Agricultural Policy was capped at 25 per cent of the value that West European farmers including Greece are receiving. The payments will increase to up to 100 per cent over a decade in the hope that by then Central and Eastern European agricultural sectors will be more productive and modernized. This mainly entails considerably fewer small-sized farms (Rieger 2005: 186). A particular problem will remain. Poland has about 1.9 million farms, which corresponds to 56 per cent of all farms (ibid. 184). The growing difficulty of agreement creates problems for any attempt at further enlargement. The outcome is that the convergence of societies towards a single European market may be delayed by the asymmetrical development between West, Central, and Eastern Europe. Indeed, this may lead to a vast majority of the population being excluded from the benefits of the internal market in Central and Eastern Europe. On the one hand, the 2004 enlargement led to an increase of the difference between the average 10 per cent with highest income and 10 per cent with the lowest income from 3.9 to 4.7 times in terms of purchasing power parity. In nominal terms it has increased from 4.2 to 7.4 times. This is 5.5 times higher than the American one. Further enlargement to twenty-eight members—with Bulgaria, Romania, and Turkey—would increase the difference to 16.9 times in nominal terms or 7.6 times in terms of purchasing power parity. This will put substantial strain on the socio-economic cohesion of the European Union (Fitoussi and Le Cacheux 2005: 136–7; Die Zeit, 18 August 2005, 18). On the other hand, a study of the European Commission undertaken after two years of enlargement shows that so far it has been quite successful. There is growing economic integration of east and west which led to a boost of the European economy overall. Moreover, Central and Eastern European immigration to the United
Leaderless Enlargement?
201
Kingdom, Ireland, and Sweden contribute substantially to the growth of these economies (European Commission 2006a, Financial Times, 2 May 2006, 10).
THE NEXT STEPS If we look at the 2006 Autumn Eurobarometer, support for further enlargement in the EU25 is 46 per cent, while 42 per cent are against. Support of over 61 per cent could be registered among the new member states including the then candidate countries Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, and the western Balkans. A second tier of support of between 51 and 60 per cent can be found among the other southern European countries and Sweden. In contrast, the highest reluctance comes from Germany, Austria, France, and Luxembourg. What one can register here is a growing cleavage between core Western Europe and the Southern, Central, and Eastern European periphery. During 2006, there was a growing pressure from the brakemen member states on the European Commission to come up with clear rules for further enlargement after the accession of Bulgaria and Romania. The European Council of 16 June 2006 instructed the commissioner for enlargement Olli Rehn to develop a new enlargement strategy (Financial Times, 17 June 2006, 8). This enlargement strategy was discussed throughout the second half of the year leading to the inclusion of a new criterion called ‘absorption capacity’ of the European Union. Some brakemen member states wanted to make it part of the Copenhagen criterion, but Olli Rehn resisted a rigid definition and advocated a flexible approach on this (European Commission 2006b; The Economist, 11 November 2006, 44). The European Council of 14–15 December 2006 during the Finnish presidency approved a new workable strategy towards enlargement. However, the European Council was once again split down the middle with the traditional brakemen countries, France, Netherlands, and Austria taking the lead in advocating non-accession of Turkey, while the driver countries, United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Sweden, and Poland advocated a continuation of the process to include Turkey and other neighbours. In the end, the enlargement strategy was made dependent on the need to reform first the institutions through a smaller treaty which would take on some of the proposals of the Constitutional Treaty and was pushed forward during the German presidency in the first half of 2007. The main opponent was Poland, which would lose in terms of votes in the European Council. In the end, Chancellor Angela Merkel was able to strike a deal agreed by all member states (The Times, 25 April 2007, 16, BBC News, 14 June 2007).
202
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
Attila Ágh has forecast that the last wave of enlargement will be the Balkans. The European Council in December 2006 discussed the borders of the European Union, in which the scenario for non-integration of Turkey began to be considered. Indeed, he regarded the membership of Croatia as very likely to create a EU-28, but afterwards a post-enlargement discussion on the borders of the EU will become more important, based on the principles of the ability to finance and govern it (Ágh 2006: 33). Bulgaria and Romania signed treaties of accession and joined the European Union on 1 January 2007. In spite of many problems, both countries have made big efforts to comply with the Copenhagen criteria. In Romania problems are still outstanding in relation to the high level of political corruption in the country and manipulation in the judicial system. The problem of child protection continues to be something the government has to tackle. In Bulgaria most problems are related to political corruption and the fight against organized crime. Moreover, there are still outstanding issues related to the judicial system and concerns about the administrative capability of the country in the management of incoming funds (European Commission 2004a: 9–12, 13–17; Financial Times, 16 May 2006, 15). Croatia is already conducting negotiations towards full membership, and Macedonia was declared a candidate country. In the case of Croatia, outstanding problems seem to concern the Serb minority and measures to integrate all refugees. Moreover, cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is regarded as a sine qua non for membership (European Commission 2004a). The lack of advance in the latter led to suspension of accession negotiations, which were resumed only after strong lobbying by Austria in the European Council of October 2005 and when renewed cooperation of Croatia with the ICTY was confirmed. The Croatian Government hopes to join the European Union by 2009, but the European Council in December 2006 wanted to postpone any further enlargement until after a reform of the institutions (European Commission 2006b; Financial Times, 9 October 2006, 4). Macedonia was accorded candidate country status in the European Council of 17 December 2005, but there is still a long way to go before it can join the European Union. Apart from high levels of corruption and patronage, the still fragile relationship between the Albanianspeaking minority and the main Macedonian population is a major reason for delay. Moreover, the Macedonian economy is stagnating (The Economist, 21 October 2006; European Commission 2006b). All other countries in the western Balkans have signed Stabilization and Association agreements which lead to Accession partnership if they are able to meet the Copenhagen criteria. It is expected that all these countries will join the European Union at some
Leaderless Enlargement?
203
stage in the more distant future. Although even Serbia has improved relations with the European Union, there are still major problems to be solved, among them the future of Kosovo. Last but not least, the confirmation of Turkey as a candidate country in the Helsinki European Council of December 1999, the positive opinion of the European Commission, and the endorsement to open negotiations in the European Council in December 2004 created a major split among the member states. The final decision to open negotiations with Turkey in the European Council of October 2005, showed again the growing cleavage between brakemen and driver countries. Austria became the most exposed brakeman country in this respect, securing additional tough conditions before Turkey can be allowed into the European Union. To appease public opposition in France, President Chirac promised that a referendum would be held in ten to fifteen years prior to accepting Turkish membership. Such a referendum will also be conducted in Austria (El Pais, 4 October 2005, 2). Turkish membership will lead to substantial transfers to modernize agriculture and the other sectors of the economy. Moreover, the European Union will have to step up its common and foreign security policy, because it will be bordering crisis regions such as the Middle East, Iraq, and Iran. Furthermore, it will have to play an important role in stabilizing the Caucasus. Although substantial progress was made in political terms, there is still a long way to go until the political and administrative institutions conform to EU standards. In terms of immigration fears, the EU proposes a permanent clause in order to avoid a destabilization of national labour markets (European Commission 2004b, 5). At the same time, Turkey could be the solution to the problem of declining European populations (Rifkin 2004: 252–7). At the European Council of December 2006, it became clear that relations between the EU and Turkey remained tense, particularly over opening up its ports and airports to GreekCypriot ships and aircraft by mid-December 2006. The failure to do so led to a suspension of the negotiations of some of the chapters. The new French president Nicolas Sarkozy, who already expressed his opposition to Turkey’s membership, adds to similar doubts expressed by in Germany, Netherlands, and Austria. Moreover, the situation in Turkey became more unstable when the military intervened through its website (the so-called ‘e-coup’) to condemn any election by Parliament of the Islamist Fatherland Party (AK) candidate Abdullah Gul, supported by street demonstrations. There is a general fear that the growing tension between Islamists and Secularists may lead to further problems in EU–Turkish relations. There is also the issue of a growing nationalist backlash due to this stagnating relationship.
204
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
CONCLUSIONS: THE PERIL OF LEADERLESS ENLARGEMENT Enlargement has led to new challenges to the collective leadership of the European Union. The growing intertwinedment of widening and deepening, far from becoming mutually reinforcing, has led to a growing stagnation of both widening and deepening. The negative referendums in France and the Netherlands were also a response to the growing preoccupation with the borders of the European Union. This question will become increasingly salient the more the European Union expands eastwards. The lack of consensual collective leadership on the issue of enlargement has been bypassed by a strategy of ‘rhetorical entrapment’, ‘flexibility clauses’, or ‘reinforced cooperations’. Such strategies may work in the short- to mid-term, but long-term it may contribute to a loss of clarity of purpose and leadership. The technocratic leadership provided by the European Commission in the ‘low politics’ of the enlargement process was only reluctantly accompanied by a ‘high politics’ collective leadership. This tension has become one of the principal problems of further integration. Without a proper budgetary allocation and continuing enlargement, it will be very difficult for the European Union to create an even playing field in the emerging single European market. Indeed, the whole Lisbon agenda on competitiveness may become even less realistic than it is now.
NOTE I want to thank Jack Hayward and the participants of the research group for insightful comments that were in part incorporated in this chapter.
REFERENCES Á, A (2006) Eastern Enlargement and the Future of the EU27: EU Foreign Policy in a Global World. Budapest: ‘Together Europe’ Research Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. B, I. (2004) ‘The European Commission between the acquis communautaire and Enlargement’, in Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos (ed.), The Changing European Commission. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 138–50. B B C (BBC) (2007) News, website , accessed 18 June 2007. C-P, V., and L, A. (1999) ‘Introduction: The Enlargement of the European Union: Dealing with Complexity’, in V. Curzon-Price, A. Landau,
Leaderless Enlargement?
205
R. G. Whitman (eds.), The Enlargement of the European Union. Issues and Strategies. London: Routledge, 10–21. D, K., and F, K. (1996) ‘Italy and EMU as a “Vincolo Esterno”: Empowering the Technocrats, Transforming the State’, South European Society and Politics 1/2 (Autumn): 272–99. E C (1997) ‘Agenda 2000: For a Stronger and Wider Union’, Bulletin of the European Union, suppl. 5/97. (2004a) Opinion on the Application of Croatia for Membership of the European Union. Brussels, 20 April 2004. COM (2004), 257 final. (2004b) Issues Arising from Turkey’s Membership Perspective. Brussels, 6 April 2004, SEC (2004), 1202, COM (2004), 656 final, Commission Staff working document. (2006a) ‘Enlargement, Two Years After: An Economic Evaluation’, in European Economy, Occasional Papers 24, May. (2006b) Enlargement Strategy and the Main Challenges 2006–2007. Including annexed special report on the EU’s capacity to integrate new members. Communication from the European Commission to the European Parliament and the Council. COM (2006), 649, 8 November 2006. F, G. (1996) ‘Enlarging the European Union’, in Jeremy Richardson (ed.), European Union, Power and Policy-Making. London: Routledge, 233–45. F, J. P., and L C, J. (eds.) (2005) L’État de l’Union Européenne: Constitution, Élargissement, Turquie. Paris: Fayard/Presses de Sciences Po. G, D. (2002) ‘Der Gipfel von Laeken: Erste Etappe auf dem Weg zu einer europäischen Verfassung?’ in Integration 25/2: 99–109. G, H., and H, K. (1998) Enlarging the EU Eastwards. London: RIIA. G, G., and L, C. (2004) ‘France: Une societé méfiante, des élites sceptiques’, in J. Rupnik (ed.), Les Européens face á l’élargissement: Perceptions, acteurs, enjeux. Paris: Presses de Sciences Po, 49–63. K-B, L. (2004) ‘Pologne: L’integration européenne comme aboutissement de la transformation’, in J. Rupnik (ed.), Les Européens face á l’élargissement: Perceptions, acteurs, enjeux. Paris: Presses de Sciences Po. L, B., and L, J. (2005) ‘The Budget. Who Gets What, When and How?’ in: H. Wallace, W. Wallace, and M. A. Pollack (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 191–212. L, B. (2003) ‘Von Kopenhagen bis Kopenhagen: Eine erste Bilanz der EUErweiterungs-perspektive’, in Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, B1-2: 7–15. M, J. M. (1996) The Changing Architecture of Iberian Politics. An Investigation on the Structuring of Democratic Political Systemic Culture in Semiperipheral European Societies. Lewiston, NY: Mellen University Press. (2003) The Politics of Southern Europe. Integration into the European Union. Westport, Conn.: Praeger. (2006) The New World Architecture. The Role of the European Union in the Making of Global Governance. New Brunswick: Transaction.
206
Why is Europe Currently Leaderless?
M, W. L., G, A. B., and K, T. Y. (2001) A Culture of Corruption: Coping with Government in Post-Communist Europe. Budapest: Central European University Press. N, K. H. (2001) ‘The European Union in Nice: A Minimalist Approach to a Historic Challenge’, in Government and Opposition 36/2: 184–207. P, D. (2004) ‘Institutions and Governance’, in Neill Nugent (ed.), European Union Enlargement. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 118–31. P, G. (2000) The Dynamics of Democratization: A Comparative Approach. London: Continuum. R, E. (2005) ‘Agricultural Policy: Constrained Reforms’, in Helen Wallace, William Wallace, and Mark Pollack (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 161–90. R, J. (2004) The European Dream. How Europe’s Vision of the Future is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream. Cambridge: Polity. R, J. (2004) ‘Élites et opinions publiques Europeénnes face à un moment historique pour l’ Europe’, in J. Rupnik (ed.), Les Européens face à l’élargissement. Perceptions, acteurs, enjeux. Paris: Presses de Sciences Po, 11–45. S, F. (2000) ‘International Socialization in the New Europe: Rational Action in an Institutional Environment’, in European Journal of International Relations 6/1: 109–39. (2001) ‘The Community Trap: Liberal Norms, Rhetorical Action, and the Eastern Enlargement of the European Union’, in International Organization 55/1 (Winter): 47–80. S, U. (2002) ‘Theoretizing EU Enlargement: Research Focus, Hypotheses, and the State of Research’, in Journal of European Public Policy 9/4 (August), 500–28. S, V. (2002) The Futures of European Capitalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. S, U. (2005) ‘Eastern Enlargement: Towards a European EU?’ in H. Wallace, W. Wallace, and M. A. Pollack (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 402–48. S C, F. (2001) ‘Portugal e o Tratado de Nice. Notas sobre a estratégia negocial portuguesa’, in Negócios Estrangeiros 1 (March), 40–70. S, K. E. (2004) The Making of EU Foreign Policy: The Case of Eastern Europe. 2nd edn. Basingstoke: Palgrave-Macmillan. T I (2006) Corruption Perception Index 2006 , accessed 14 June 2007. W, H. (2002) ‘Enlarging the European Union: Reflections on the Challenge of Analysis’, in Journal of European Public Policy 9/4 (August), 658–65. W, R. , and P, C. (2004) ‘Allemagne: La Dérive à L’Ouest’, in J. Rupnik, Les Européens face à l’élargissement. Perceptions, acteurs, enjeux. Paris: Presses de Sciences Po, 11–45. W, W. (2000) ‘Nice Results: The Millenium IGC in the EU’s Evolution’, in Journal of Common Market Studies 39/2: 197–219.
Leaderless Enlargement?
207
(2002) ‘Der Konvent: Modelle für eine innovative Integrationsmethode’, in Integration, 25/2: 83–98. (2004) ‘Die institutionelle Architektur der EU nach der Europäischen Verfassung: Höhere Entscheidungsdynamik-neue Koalitionen?’ in Integration 3: 161–75. W, L. (2004a) ‘Democratic Regions, Ostracism, and Pariahs’, in Laurence Whitehead (ed.), The International Dimensions of Democratization: Europe and the Americas. Expanded edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 395–412. (2004b) ‘The Enlargement of the European Union: A “Risky” Form of Democracy Promotion’, in Laurence Whitehead (ed.), The International Dimensions of Democratization: Europe and the Americas. Expanded edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 415–42.
This page intentionally left blank
Part III Where Can Political Leadership Come From?
This page intentionally left blank
11 Legal Leadership in the European Union John Bell
Lawyers usually talk about leadership in a hierarchical sense. Hierarchical leadership depends on the authority of the author’s position to confer legitimacy and status on what he or she requires of another. Clearly a political institution or supreme court could use hierarchy in order to make its views prevail either on governmental institutions or on lower courts. In such a setting, the pyramidal structure naturally explains the relationships of the leader to other bodies. But leadership operates differently in a professional setting such as politics or law. Leadership may involve taking initiative to start or discontinue discussion of reforms to legal rules or practices, even if it does not necessarily require the leader to come up with the answers. Bensimmon (Middlehurst 1993: 25–6) and her colleagues comment, ‘While organizational leadership is important, it may be a mistake to believe that all leadership must come from leaders. In many organizations—and it would seem particularly true in professional organizations—much of the guidance and support may be provided by the participants, the nature of the task, or the characteriztics of the organization itself.’ Something similar can be said in relation to legal leadership in the EU, which comes from a number of quarters. The law contributes to leadership in two principal ways. First, its enacted texts make available opportunities for leadership to be exercised or constrained. The stillborn Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe (TEC) offers an example. Leadership opportunities thus created can take various forms: defining the agenda, getting others to give a particular issue priority, proposing solutions, or in adopting a solution, getting others to agree on or to accept a particular outcome. Furthermore, leadership can be exercised through inspiration. The law can define who is involved and by what processes. Secondly, legal leadership is exercised specifically through legal professional institutions, especially the European Court of Justice. It will be argued that the leadership the law provides in these ways is useful but limited. It cannot make up for a lack of political leadership.
212
Where Can Leadership Come From?
THE LIMITED CONTRIBUTION OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL TREATY TO LEADERSHIP A constitution is not merely a set of norms; it is a way of behaving. That concept underpins what Loughlin (1992, and 2000: 192–5, 229–33) calls the LSE view of the British Constitution, but also other views. The difference between mere practice and constitutional standards is that the latter are normative. But among normative standards, some are political morality (what we typically call conventions) and some standards that are legal (constitutional law). Of these elements, the Treaty establishing a European Constitution (TEC) was only really aiming to change the latter, legal standards in limited ways. As a constitutional lawyer, the missing link in the debate was the issue of whether the standards of political morality would change. These are the underpinning values that have a major impact on how texts are interpreted by politicians and judges and on how they will operate in a properly constitutional fashion. It is in this area that we get some idea of what might be the ways in which the enactment of a constitution might be rebalancing the spheres of influence. For the most part, the key answers are political and not legal. My overall argument is twofold. First, changing the legal text has only a limited impact on how the constitution will operate. The essential task of the Convention and then the various referenda campaigns was supposed to be to create a climate of constitutional opinion within Europe in favour of a particular way of working (MacCormick 2005). In the end, it produced a text, but not a climate of political morality to give life to the constitution, and so, in that sense, the process failed miserably. Secondly, from a legal point of view, the TEC really would not have contributed much new to the issue of leadership and could not have been expected to do so. Whether we look at the legal text or at political morality, a constitution has four elements: (1) rules on the allocation of institutional competence, (2) procedures for basic governmental and legislative acts, (3) fundamental values, and (4) remedies when something goes wrong in relation to the other three. For the most part, to use Closa’s terminology (Closa 2005: 149–51), these provisions are predominantly about setting the limits on power, rather than setting out a programme of action. Although fundamental values are frequently programmatic in nature, the essential direction of a potentially permanent organization needs to remain flexible and any statement of purposes has to be of limited constraining effect.
Legal Leadership in the EU
213
Institutional Competences Competences provide opportunities for initiating and controlling development, including legal development. If one institution has a competence in the field, it controls how the field develops, even if it is subjected to influences from others. As one might expect, the TEC spent much time on defining competences, especially in Part I, chapter 4. As Dashwood (2005) explains, this was a streamlining of existing competences between the EU and its member states, which had the primary function of emphasizing the powers retained by the member states. Previously the various treaties had given the Union competence, and, by elimination, left the rest within the competences of the member states. The new structure aimed at being clearer about the boundaries of competence, and thus provides a greater ability of member states to resist encroachment and to insist that they take initiatives through the open method of coordination. Now this has advantages, because it makes clear where leadership is to be exercised by taking initiative at Union level and where member states retain the initiative and may act, for example through the open method of coordination. (Weatherill (2004: 55) comments that this may give rise to an executive-led ‘competence creep’ where few member states see reason to object to non-binding initiatives beyond the scope of EU competences.) Despite this modest achievement, the very consolidation of the different competences in one place made more transparent the extent of the transfer of sovereignty that had taken place, and was reinforced by an explicit statement of the supremacy of EU law in article I-10. As a result, rather than reassuring the publics of the member states, it alarmed them, especially as the size and range of powers in Part III brought home the full panoply of Union powers. Definition of competence identifies the procedure for making decisions and sets out who is to take the final decision (and so what the politics of that decision-making will be), but it does not settle much about leadership. Take higher education. This has always been a retained competence of member states. Yet the Commission used the moneys for training to create a ‘carrot’ of ERASMUS funding to encourage significant changes in the way European higher education works, without using the ‘stick’ of a binding measure. Similarly, the Bologna-Bergen process is proceeding well beyond the EU boundaries through the open method of coordination, but with Commission leadership. But many of the Commission proposals have been suggested by outside bodies, often from the private sector. Thus, the formal attribution of competences does not say much about the sources of leadership.
214
Where Can Leadership Come From?
The creation of new institutions can serve to affect leadership. In this sense, the intended changes to the presidency of the Council and the Union minister of foreign affairs (UMFA) can be seen as institutional changes to create leadership. They put an individual in a position so as to be able to influence the agenda and to be able to represent the Union in a way that predecessors could not. In the case of the semi-permanent presidency of the Council, the individual or group would be provided with an opportunity for longer-term vision and planning, a chance to undertake continuing leadership. In the case of the UMFA, it would have been a matter of giving a sense of direction. Both of these institutional changes would have changed the way in which leadership is exercised. The institutional change in the presidency might have created a platform for a longer-term strategy. The UMFA would have been given greater authority in the deliberations on foreign policy and in representing the Union abroad (see Chapter 7, above). Such reforms are important, but they would have needed to be expanded upon by a set of conventions on how the powers of initiative and representation were to be used. But, for the most part, the competences defined in the Constitution exist already in the treaties. It is the ethic of how these are used, rather than the formal powers to use them that are important.
Procedures From what I have just said, it is clear that competence is closely connected to procedure. Competence is about who gets involved and in what way, if things have to be done. Within the TEC, we can identify three ways in which this is done. First, involvement in decision-making has been changed by bringing most matters into the ‘ordinary legislative procedure’ of article III-396 (codecision), and this would change the dynamics of decision-making. Overall, we are witnessing an enhanced role for the Parliament, and a slowing of the role of the Council. Secondly, the way decisions are taken would have been changed through changes to the mathematics of Qualified Majority Voting. Different coalitions have to be established, and the Poles and the Spaniards do less well than at present. Thirdly, information is transmitted to those who might then be able to exercise influence and even leadership. The Protocol on subsidiarity (Protocol 2) envisages greater participation by national parliaments in the sense that they are informed about what is proposed by way of legislation by the Commission. These steps bring issues to the attention of relevant individuals.1 Procedures change the rules of the game, and thus how
Legal Leadership in the EU
215
one goes about the conduct of leadership—whom you have to lead and to what end. If one is concerned about procedures, then one is concerned about how they are used—in what spirit. The conventions and political morality matter more than the text. In a sense, this is shown by the number of the protocols attached to the procedural provisions of the Treaty. These indicated that the bland wording will not lead to practical actions that undermine the way the Union works, but there is also the need for lower-level political instruments.
Values Values are contained in all three parts of the TEC. Part I offers procedural values, Part II fundamental rights, and Part III Community objectives and rights. The Constitution has the biggest formal impact through Part II. The values set out in Part II are those of the Charter of Fundamental Rights agreed by the Treaty of Nice, but only then having non-legal effect. By giving them legal effect, these fundamental values would have been used as an interpretative framework for decisions, as well as standards to which the acts of the Union have to comply. Given that the EU institutions, though not the member states, had agreed to abide by these in making their decisions, very little real change was to be introduced in the principles which they were expected to follow (Arnull 2003). The enactment of Part II would create a form of encouragement for judicial review based on fundamental values, but these values were largely included in ‘general principles of EC law’ in any case (see Tridimas 1999, esp. ch. 6; Usher 1998, chs. 1 and 8). Similarly, the accession of the EU to the European Convention on Human Rights would have been more of symbolic impact, rather than making a significant substantive difference in the way the EU operated. In the area of principles of good administration (included as part of art. II-101), this was something that the European Ombudsman had already created as part of his guidance in 1999, and has become part of European administrative law in any case (see Schwarze 2006: pp. cxxxv–cliv) on the influence of the ECJ on national remedies). To that extent, the change was formal and motivational—encouraging a climate of respect for fundamental rights, including social rights, rather than actually generating new rights. But, as we discovered in the UK in relation to the Human Rights Act 1998, the key to making a difference lies not in enacting the text, but in the programme of re-educating administrators and judges that goes alongside the process of bringing the legislation into force. At the EU level, this need for creating a new climate has been seen in
216
Where Can Leadership Come From?
relation to the implementation of the governance principles (EU Commission 2001). These illustrations of existing ways in which standards of conduct have been set in formal and informal ways, shows the importance of political manners and morality. To a great extent, the protocols and Part II are different ways of ensuring that the spirit of the Constitution is adopted, not the letter alone. The emphasis is on a European co-operative spirit (a Verfassungstreue as the Germans would have it) that can only be realized by the way in which people are prepared to act. A duty of co-operation has already been laid down in article 10 of the EC Treaty, but this has mainly been an instrument justifying an obligation of national courts to work with the ECJ in securing effective implementation of EC law, rather than a more general spirit in which member states exercise their powers under the treaties (Hartley 1998: 192). Such a spirit can only be achieved on a political level.
Remedies I will deal at length with the Court, but I do not believe that the creation of a Constitution would have transformed the ECJ into a serious constitutional court. A very minor change under article III-365 in expanding the circumstances in which individuals could challenge EU legislation (regulatory acts) before the ECJ would not have affected the major role of the Court as the enforcer of European law at the instance of the Commission. The individual enforces Community law at national level before the national court, which then brings in the ECJ by way of a reference under article 234 to resolve difficult issues of interpretation. As will be seen, any leadership from the Court would come in terms of the discretion on remedies. Where it provides for a prospective annulment of a national or community measure, as in Case C-262/88, Barber v. Guardian Royal Exchange Assurance Group [1990] ECR I-1889, it is able to manage individual expectations and a timetable for compliance. But it is the discretion exercised by the Commission—its ‘bargaining in the shadow of the Court’ with either enterprises or member states— which allows most leadership (Mastoianni 1995). In any ongoing relationship, as is shown by studies of pollution inspectorates and other enforcement agencies, the prosecutor is the leader in nudging people towards compliance, and that is a more important leadership role than simply the action of the Court. Once we consider the Commission, then it becomes more important to look at the issues of political morality that will shape the exercise of the Commission’s form of prosecutorial discretion, rather than just the legal rules themselves.
Legal Leadership in the EU
217
THE EUROPEAN COURT OF JUSTICE: POLITICAL ACTOR OR PROFESSIONAL LEADER? My basic argument is that the European Court of Justice has only had a limited leadership role on policy areas within the EU. This is predominantly because its institutional position and its ambitions have limited its scope of action. Rather, its principal contribution is as the leader of the legal community, ensuring the effective implementation of Union-wide norms. The leadership role of the ECJ is not simply based on hierarchy. National judiciaries have their own sense of vocation to serve justice independently and without fear or favour. Such a sense of professional vocation places clear neutralizing limits on the effect of external hierarchical dictation. So national courts will need persuasion, as will politicians and administrators. Persuasion, rather than command, has to be the major tool of leadership. A potent illustration is the way in which, in nearly all the systems of the Union, lower courts retain the authority to decide cases contrary to the precedents of higher courts, where they consider the precedent to be wrong. In the EU, national courts may be constrained to follow ECJ rulings on particular cases, but there still exists scope for resistance. The dynamics of leadership will therefore go beyond formal decisions and look also at influences on the courts. Within the Court, the group dynamics will often depend on an individual person taking a lead, such as the reporter preparing the draft decision or the Advocate General delivering a written opinion. The plurality of individuals with different national legal backgrounds provides a diversity of inputs into the decision, but is also tempered by the need to reach a common position on a single judgment. Such internal dynamics help to foster the kind of collective leadership required in the wider European legal community.
The General Leadership Role of the ECJ To what extent is the ECJ capable of being a general leader within the EU? There are significant problems arising from its institutional position. It is not a supreme court. It does not really filter cases coming through. It has a European tradition of being a court of reference (concrete jurisdiction) and a court of vires (abstract jurisdiction), as well as having traditionally some matters as a court of original jurisdiction in competition and staffing (the work now sent off to the Court of First Instance). It has two parents: the German Constitutional Court for the first two and the Conseil d’État of France for the third area. These roles provide scope for different types of leadership.
218
Where Can Leadership Come From?
As a court ruling on competence, it is the arbitrator between institutions, but with a strong integrationist bent. As a court of reference, it is the unifier of case-law, but in response to the references from national courts. Its greatest scope for leadership has actually been in its administrative, staffing, and economic work. Here, there was less by way of legislation and the main body to be controlled is the Commission itself. Creating an administrative law without a set of principles has been a major achievement (Schwarze 2006: pp. clxii–clxv). The creation of a staffing law in support of sets of rules laid down within the Commission has enabled principles of fair treatment to be developed. But the leadership here is within the Union bureaucratic institutions, rather than in the wider politics of the EU. In economic law, it has declared treaty provisions on the free movement of goods and on competition to be fundamental provisions for the functioning of the free market (see C-112/00 Schmidberger [2003] ECR I-5659; Case C-126/97 Eco-Swiss China Time Ltd v. Benetton International NV [1999] ECR I-3055). By constitutionalizing such principles, it has reduced the freedom of manoeuvre of member states. Leadership through interpreting the rules of EU law is a significant power. The scope for leadership is limited by the range and amount of work that the Court has to undertake. To take the caseload of the ECJ in 2006: of 546 completed cases, 266 were references from national courts for a preliminary ruling, 212 were direct actions for infringement against member states or for quashing community measures, and 63 were appeals from the CFI. The CFI dealt with 436 cases of which 71 were staff cases, and 90 were intellectual property. This caseload is more substantial than that of the House of Lords with about seventy cases a year and the US Supreme Court deciding about ninety full decisions. A closer comparison would be the German Constitutional Court deciding 155 major cases, and the higher formations of the French Conseil d’État deciding eighty cases a year, but each with a much larger number of less important cases. The nearest equivalent of these high-level decisions of national courts is the Full Court and Small Plenary of the ECJ, which take up about eighty cases a year. There is a chance of leadership both in the highlevel decisions, and in rare instances of the more routine cases that the Court has to plough through each year. But the organizational effort required to get through that burden of cases does sap capacity and effort. In addition, there are operational difficulties that slow the process of the Court in being a leading institution within the EU. The need to decide in the language of the parties reduces the effort of the institution to focus on substantive matters. The court is thus exercising leadership in a reactive way, and amidst a large number of routine cases. Only strong internal processes would enable it to take strong policy decisions (Brown and Jacobs 2002: ch. 12). Only when seised of an issue can it move to take a policy position. Stone Sweet and Brunnell
Legal Leadership in the EU
219
(Shapiro and Stone Sweet 2002: 269–77) reinforce this reactive character of the ECJ by suggesting that the rate at which national courts refer cases to the ECJ is related to levels of intra-EC trade, rather than because of any effort by the Court to expand its remit. The Court is therefore largely an organ that responds to issues as they emerge, rather than setting the agenda.
The Court as a Forum for European Debate The scope for the European Court of Justice to be a policy leader is constrained by the nature of adjudication procedure, the character of the justification offered, and the Court’s perception of the appropriateness of its intervention in policy issues. One of the important features of the Court’s procedure is that no decision is entirely confined to the parties. Thus there is scope for some leadership of an area of law, and this is recognized by the process of decision-making. In every case, all the member states are informed in their own language about the proceedings and are sent the papers, so that they can choose to intervene. This procedure acknowledges the potential lawmaking power of the Court. Its decision will have an effect in interpreting the law that goes beyond one member state. For instance, in Case C 209/03, Bidar v. Ealing LBC [2005] ECR I-2119, the question was whether a French student studying at University College London should have his fees paid by a London local education authority, because he had been resident with a member of his family for schooling in England before going to university. A total of seven member states intervened, seeing the potential liability to pay financial support to migrant students. Thus there is a debate that encompasses a range of actors beyond the parties. All the same, adjudication offers governance through a particular form of procedure that is distinct from the political process. It creates an essentially dyadic relationship between competing parties and issues with a neutral umpire to decide upon them (Shapiro and Stone Sweet 2002: 63–4). Even if the debate is widened to representatives of national governments, it is not an appropriate forum for handling complex and multifaceted issues. The framework of adjudication reduces complexity and suggests a level of rightness about the outcome that is less accepted in the political process. The justification of decisions also reflects this claim to rightness and the reduction of complexity. Lasser’s (2004) uses of literary analysis identify two discourses of justification within a number of courts, including the European Court of Justice. These discourses show the kind of leadership that the Court is undertaking. He argues that there is a bifurcation between the formal
220
Where Can Leadership Come From?
discourse of the Court and the policy-oriented argument of the Advocate General. The Court is offering a justification based on a ‘correct’ interpretation of the law, whilst the Advocate General is more prepared to admit the scope for interpretative choice available to the Court, and the policy reasons justifying particular interpretations. Lasser has tried to explain the form of justification used and the character of the judicial lawmaking. Whereas political scientists have focused on the institutional position of the European Court of Justice as an organ driving the integration of the European Union (Alter 2001), Lasser is looking more at the legitimacy of the judicial creativity expressed in a dialogue with the legal professions and the wider public. The ECJ offers brief and often cryptic justifications for decisions and is seen as having to engage in both meta-teleological and systematic arguments about the purpose of legal provisions and where the decision fits into the legal order as a whole, as well as in micro-teleological issues of where the decision on a specific point of law fits into the doctrine on a particular topic. By contrast, the Advocate General summarizes the range of interpretative options available to the Court, the range of arguments from the parties and in doctrinal legal writing. He offers more personal opinions about the right course for the law, but again within the same meta-teleological framework as the Court, one which takes for granted the desirability of the effectiveness of the European legal order and values such as legal certainty. The Advocate General is more engaged with policy issues and this does engage the public more than the Court. For Lasser, the ECJ is an undoubted lawmaker. There is no administrative hierarchy sitting above the European judiciary. The Court is a self-governing institution. As in the US Supreme Court, there is a collegial court which operates to offer mutual checks. Somewhat less than in the US, judicial decisions carry significant authority in relation to lower courts. As a result, Lasser argues that there is much avowed judicial lawmaking with a consequent need for justification through the decisions. But in this respect, he finds the justifications offered by the Court lacking. He argues that it is not really justifying itself to the wider community, merely to the Court itself or lower courts. Lasser’s analysis has some deficiencies. To begin with, the potential parties to any case before the Court are more numerous than he discusses. As I have said, each member state is notified of a case submitted and can intervene in writing or orally. As a result, there is a much greater multiplicity of interlocutors than Lasser presents, and thus there is a greater form of accountability. The constrained character of the argumentation even of the Advocate General responds in part to this need to account to the member states for the decisions that are taken. Secondly, the Advocate General presents his arguments at a different point in the litigation than the French avocat général. The French avocat général speaks at the end of the arguments of the parties, to initiate
Legal Leadership in the EU
221
the judicial deliberation. The Advocate General delivers an opinion months before the decision of the Court, so there is a real chance for the parties to respond. To that extent, the argument about the way to resolve a case is more public and open to scrutiny, both from the parties and the member states, and from doctrinal legal writing. The saga of Case C50/00 UPA v. Council [2002] 3 CMLR 1 is a good example of where the opinion of the Advocate General was debated publicly before the Court decided Case C263/02P Jégo Quere on 1 March 2004 (see Albors-Llorens 2003 and Usher 2003). This dimension of the legal debate surrounding the ECJ is missing from Lasser’s account. All the same, the character of the Court’s justification and the way this engages with essentially the legal audience set limits on the institution as a policy forum. Of course, the Court has major issues to be decided, and its decisions will set out new starting points for political debate, but the Court’s approach to issues is somewhat limited. The debate focuses on what is consistent within the provisions of the treaty, rather than broad general policy. It is all about keeping the faith of promises made, rather than exploring new directions that the Court has chosen. There has been scope in the past for leadership by taking decisions that break new ground in policy areas, such as in free movement of persons or goods. For example, the Court’s decision in Cassis de Dijon [1979] ECR 649 led to Commission Practice Note OJ 1980 C256/2. More recently, ideas of Union citizenship have been developed by the Court to give a wider range of rights to non-workers by drawing out principles from a range of disparate provisions.2 Although Weatherill (2003: 278) is right to point out that the constitutional situation has changed significantly since the 1970s and 1980s, the need for the Court to be active in many policy areas has diminished, and its focus is particularly on remedies and, to some extent, on constitutional issues. In his study of the ECJ, Stone Sweet (2000: 193) argued that European legal integration was ‘provoked by the European Court and sustained by litigants and national judges’. He argues that ‘With constitutionalization, the judiciary has gradually evolved into a kind of central nervous system for the EU, regulating integration, supra-national governance, and Europeanization in multidimensional ways’ (Börzel and Cichowski 2003: 47). His view emphasizes the way in which the doctrines of European sovereignty have undermined the authority of national legislatures, both by giving a European role to national judges to quash contradictory national legislation and decisions, and by subjecting such decisions to the rulings of a supranational court. This puts a premium on a few important, but rare decisions that have established the supremacy of European law (within some limits that the national courts have not fully agreed). Alter too has stressed the important role of the Court as a constitution maker. For her the Court made an important contribution by
222
Where Can Leadership Come From?
enlisting the national courts as agents for enforcing the supremacy of EC law against national governments, thereby reducing their freedom of action (see Alter 2001: 219–25) In this way, the enforcement of EU law is secured through respect for the rule of law by the national government: it obeys the requirements of the national court, which in its turn is enforcing EU law. The constitutional turn makes the national government concerned with the validity of its legislation in terms of EU law. The strength of these analyses is enhanced because the main issue is not what national governments and courts should do when faced with contradictory legal norms coming from Europe and from the national legal order. There are tensions between national courts and the ECJ in the way supremacy is interpreted. (See Claes 2006: ch. 18.) The real problem is how far the courts should strain to avoid a conflict by aligning the two sets of norms. Rather than just telling judges how to choose between the conflicting norms, the Court has been involved in nudging the national judges to be more creative. In Case C-106/89, Marleasing SA v. La Comercial Internacional de Alimentación SA [1990] ECR I-4135 and subsequent case-law, the Court was saying that national law should be interpreted, as far as possible, in line with European law. The object is to create a harmonious legal order. Again, this was not as radical in some countries, used to teleological interpretation, as in other countries such as Britain used to a more literal interpretation of legislation. The Court has made it clear in decisions such as Case 397/01 Pfeiffer et al. v. Deutsches Rotes Kreuz [2004] ECR I-8835, paras 75–102, that there are limits, especially where clear political choices have been made. The leadership role here is one of bringing the judges of the different national courts into some form of common position, given that they start with different legislative techniques (see MacCormick and Summers 1987 on various national courts and also the ECJ). What we see is the Court exercising leadership among the group with which it feels most at home—the national judges. This is not surprising since the Court acts in response to the submissions of others: those of the member states, the Commission, or the national courts. This constrains its leadership role, since, as has been said, its agenda is not fully determined by itself. It does have control over the formation of its own Court that takes decisions, and this means that it can give different weights to different decisions. But the responsive character of the Court makes it a very limited kind of leadership organization. The leadership of the Court, especially in recent years, has been focused on creating a legal order that is consistent and implemented, respecting the commitments of the member states in the treaties. Sometimes, both on constitutional issues such as supremacy and remedies, and in substantive areas, this drive for principled consistency pursues the integrationist agenda
Legal Leadership in the EU
223
well beyond the patchwork of decisions and measures produced by political compromise. This is an important aspect of leadership, but it is a constrained leadership. Since the Court confines its justification to the need to obtain the adherence of the legal community, in both the national and European legal services, it is less able to build a consensus in the area of substantive policy.
Team-Building as Leadership In my view, the principal role of the ECJ in exercising leadership has been in building a team among the national judges. Much more than the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, the ECJ has deliberately undertaken a series of strategic steps to develop a team sentiment between national and European judges. This is undertaken in three informal ways. First, there are visits by ECJ members (judges and Advocates General). The ECJ members are typically judges already in their home countries. This gives them an existing standing to go back and talk to their judges. In addition, the ECJ judges are invited as leading legal figures to attend meetings in other countries. ‘Dialogue’ is a popular word to describe the relationship between these different national judges and the judges of Strasbourg and Luxembourg, but the principal mechanisms highlighted by the judges themselves are judicial decisions made affecting France and their reception (see e.g. Lichère, Potvin-Solis, and Raynouard (2004: 96, 98, 124); cf. Claes (2006: p. 2), which uses the term ‘war between judges’). The other suggested routes include invitations to the European judges to speak at conferences, sometimes organized by the higher national French courts. The second connected route of team-building comes in the form of visits made by national judges to the ECJ, typically with some form of ECJ sponsorship, e.g. from the national judges and Advocates General. Seminars can last a couple of days or just a day. But care is taken to explain the way the Court operates and its expectations, for example about when it is appropriate to make a reference. Such informal contacts provide a platform for more formal dialogues, when the Court may wish to suggest that a particular reference does not actually need a decision (e.g. because it is clear) and would the national court like to withdraw it. The third route is secondment. In addition to the full-time members of the Court, there are référendaires and those on shorter forms of secondment to the cabinets of a judge or an Advocate General. Increasingly, these positions are occupied by younger judges in much the same way as Spanish, German, or French judges would serve as clerks in supreme courts, rather than spending all their time as judges at first instance. That national route is a classic ‘royal route’ to promotion and the European route has been added in. This route has been of particular importance to
224
Where Can Leadership Come From?
accession countries, since they can develop a range of expertise through this route, which can be transferred back into national courts. If some of the key decisions, such as Case 26/62, Van Gend en Loos [1963] ECR 1 and Marleasing can be seen as ways of producing a common outlook among judges from different traditions, so the informal mechanisms can also be seen as even more integration through building a team. The difficulty has been that the key relationships remain vertical rather than horizontal. There are problems with the effectiveness of team-building. The first is the means of communication. If all national judges are meant to be European judges, much of their experience of the ECJ is going to be through its decisions. Given that the interpretative traditions differ between countries, then there will be different levels of comprehension. Interviews I have undertaken with English and Swedish judges suggest that the Court, despite its efforts, does not necessarily succeed in making itself understood. Secondly, any teambuilding is a two-way process, and so the team leader has to listen to the team members and change practices. For example, Kilpatrick shows how the Court’s policy comes under pressure both from national governments and from the national courts (De Búrca and Weiler 2000: ch. 5). In gender equality cases, the Court’s preferred approach has been to ensure the effectiveness of remedies in giving compensation. But this has had to be tempered by more general considerations of deference to national remedy structures, especially when these threaten national budgets in areas such as social security and pensions. So the Court has had to adopt a complex and rather nuanced case-law in this specific area. But, in response, the national courts took the principle of effectiveness to be generally applicable to all remedies. There should be a proper remedy, whatever the peculiarities of national procedural rules, and this has caused the Court to re-examine further its case-law.
CONCLUSION: EXERCISING LEADERSHIP The Court has been the generator of ideas that others have followed at certain times. For example in the case of free movement of goods and in citizenship, the Court has made decisions and then the law has been consolidated to reflect the Court’s approach. But MacCormick and Bengoetxea (De Búrca and Weiler 2000: ch. 2) suggest its interpretative approach to Community law reflects a preoccupation with coherence and consistency in its overall integration philosophy. The leadership the Court offers lies in the continuity of existing lines of development that favour integration of the market for goods or in the treatment of individuals, making the policies more coherent
Legal Leadership in the EU
225
one with another. There is not a great generation of new ideas. In areas of discrimination, the Court has brought some member states into line, such as the UK in ways that would not have happened simply through the political process (Fredman 2001: 24–5, 31–2, 69). In that sense, the decisions of the Court change the agenda of member states and of the Union. That is a limited form of leadership, since the approach is not to develop new policies, but to ensure uniform application of the policies that have already been agreed. That is an important distinction with the political process. It is why Lasser is right in identifying the style of argument that prevails in the Court, and the limited attention to policy issues. As others have noted, self-limitation has been part of the Court’s response to the greater activism of the Community legislator and the member states as masters of the treaties. Indeed Rasmussen (1998: ch. 12) has argued for some greater political control over the Court to reduce its opportunity for independent leadership. Concerns of this kind from outside the Court have reinforced its own tendency to engage in self-limitation. In such a context, the policy of building successfully a professional legal community capable of implementing EU law effectively may well be an important contribution to the overall pattern of leadership within the Union.
NOTES 1. This form of drafting—having a text and then lots of protocols—is deeply flawed, since it reduces the coherence of the text. Enacting a text plus commentary does not seem very satisfactory. 2. These have now been consolidated in Directive 2004/38 on the Free Movement of Persons, consolidating many interpretations of the Court in relation to citizenship, member of the family, etc.
REFERENCES A-L, A. (2003) ‘The Standing of Private Parties to Challenge Community Measures: Has the European Court Missed the Boat? [2003]’ Cambridge Law Journal 72. A, K. J. (2001) Establishing the Supremacy of European Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press. A, A. (2003) ‘From Charter to Constitution and Beyond: Fundamental Rights in the New Europe’ [2003] Public Law 774. B, T. A., and C, R. A. (eds.) (2003) The State of the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
226
Where Can Leadership Come From?
B L. N., and J, F. (2002) The Court of Justice of the European Communities. 5th edn., L. N. Brown and T. Kennedy. London: Sweet & Maxwell. C, M. (2006) The National Courts’ Mandate in the European Constitution. Oxford Hart. C, C. (2005) ‘Constitution and Democracy in the Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe’, 11 European Public Law 145. D, A. (2005) ‘What Really has the Constitution Changed?’, 7 Cambridge Yearbook of European Legal Studies 31. D B, G., and W, J. H. H. (eds.) (2000) The European Court of Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. EU C (2001) Governance in the European Union, COM (2001) 428 final. F, S. (2001) Discrimination Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press. H, T. (1998) The Foundations of European Community Law. 4th edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press. L, M. (2004) Judicial Deliberations: A Comparative Analysis of Judicial Transparency and Legitimacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. L, F., P-S L., and R, A. (eds.) (2004) Le Dialogue entre les juges européens et nationaux: incantation ou réalité. Brussels: Bruylant. L, M. (1992) Public Law and Political Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (2000) Sword and Scales. Oxford: Oxford University Press. MC, N. (2005) ‘The Health of Nations and the Health of Europe’, 7 Cambridge Yearbook of European Legal Studies 1. S, R. (1987) Interpreting Statutes. Aldershot: Dartmouth. M, M. (1995) ‘The Enforcement Procedure under art. 169 of the EC Treaty’, 1 European Public Law 535. M, R. (1993) Leading Academics. Buckingham: Open University Press. R, H. (1998) European Court of Justice. Leiden: Martinus Nihoff. S, J. (2006) Administrative Law under European Influence. 2nd edn. London: Sweet & Maxwell. S, M., and S S, A. (2002) On Law, Politics, and Judicialization. Oxford: Oxford University Press. S S, A. (2000) Governing with Judges. Oxford: Oxford University Press. T, T. (1999) The General Principles of EC Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press. U, J. (1998) General Principles of EC Law. London: Longman. (2003) ‘Direct and Individual Concern—an Effective Remedy or a Conventional Solution?’ European Law Review 575. W, S. (2003) ‘Activism and Restraint in the European Court of Justice’, in P. Capps, M. Evans, and S. Konstadinis (eds.), Asserting Jurisdiction: International and European Perspectives. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (2004) ‘Competence Creep and Competence Control’, 23 Yearbook of European Law 1.
12 Commission Leadership and the Internet: Dragging the Net through Choppy Waters Jamal Shahin
INTRODUCTION In attempting to support its position in administrative reform of the EU, and aiming to provide better governance, the European Commission has tried to use the Internet as a tool to improve its own public administration. A focus on the Internet allows us to ask the question whether the European Commission has been able to take advantage of new (direct) channels of communication to mobilize public support for, or at least greater public understanding of, the EU. The Commission has had to overcome several weaknesses attributed to it (see Cini, this volume; also Dimitrakopolous 2004), which have, traditionally, referred to the lack of connection to the citizens and other public administrations at the national level in Europe (thereby leading to a democratic deficit), an overwhelming bureaucracy (which becomes an easy, if somewhat misinformed, target for the press), and an inability to communicate their activities to the media, and therefore to broadcast the European Commission’s message beyond the European institutions. The European Commission has taken a leading role in developing panEuropean networks that use Internet-based technologies; it has a good motivation to make use of such tools. These tools enable networking between administrations and, at the level of the individual administrator, help to flatten out hierarchies that promote inertia and limit flexibility in any organization. New Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) can also provide another channel of communication between governments and citizens. How the opportunities for greater communication between citizen and government are to be developed through new technology is still contested, but many public administrations have been attempting to create new ways of involving citizens in participatory processes through use of the Internet. The European Commission is no exception to this rule. It has a clear and stated desire to bring
228
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Europe ‘closer to the citizen’ but as will be shown, there are many challenges to achieving the desired goal of reducing the perceived ‘democratic deficit’ at the European level. This chapter will show how the European Commission uses the Internet to attempt to improve its own relationship with both national public administrations and citizens in terms of the European policy-making process. This highlights the ‘dual use’ of ICTs in trying to create a public space where dialogue and debate can take place in a democratic setting (European Commission 2005). Two aspects of the Commission’s approach will be highlighted: (1) the move towards efficient and effective policy-making, or internal management affairs, and (2) the efforts towards building what could be called ‘public value’, which concerns more outward-facing issues, such as democracy (Millard et al. 2005). It will be shown that the Commission has been highly successful in dealing with the former, while plenty of opportunities and challenges still face the latter. The Commission’s own White Paper on Governance (European Commission 2001) presented five underlying principles towards this aim, and these will be used as a benchmark for the following analysis.1 First, a description of Commission strategy and policy is outlined. This is followed by a description of various aspects of this policy, including initiatives that have been taken to follow the strategy. The final section will link current activity and policy to the White Paper’s objectives for good governance, and thereby show that the Commission has been highly successful in building systems to develop better governance, but has been weak in implementation. Some of the reasons for this will be postulated in the conclusions.
COMMISSION STRATEGY AND POLICY A strategy to deal with improving governance in the EU through use of ICTs has emerged over the years, although to refer to the early years of Internet use by the European Commission as being based upon a strategy is perhaps misleading; to say that a vision was apparent would be far more accurate. This vision, which has subsequently emerged as a strategy, is based upon three driving principles that emerge from the general discussion on use of the Internet in public administration and government. These are information, interaction, and institutional impact (Shahin 2006). These three principles affect the role of the Commission in its activities with different actors including individuals, civil society, businesses, and other public administrations.
Commission Leadership and the Internet
229
The major motivating factor for improving (and rethinking) EU governance emerges from the lack of understanding between European citizens and the EU’s institutions. In the early 1990s, the crisis surrounding ratification of the Treaty of Maastricht, particularly in Denmark and France, caused the Commission to look to its information strategy (Sheehy 1997). The Commission was convinced that the lack of support for the EU was the result of a lack of impartial and balanced understanding of the role that the EU’s institutions play in governing Europe, notably in the lives of citizens. Therefore it was difficult to bring Europe ‘closer to the citizen’. At the same time, it was recognized that the Commission and the other institutions would have to evolve to be able to cope with the increased amount of responsibility that each treaty amendment brought upon them. The subsequent European White Paper on Governance, launched after the collapse of the Santer Commission, and the reform programme of the EU institutions—ongoing since the mid-1990s—have converged on the three principles described above. This reinforces the Commission’s opinion that the ‘democratic deficit’ is due to a lack of information. More recently, efforts by the Barroso Commission to improve dialogue and debate in Europe have recognized the need to communicate European affairs more effectively (European Commission 2005). The current strategy of the Commission is to embed the ‘e’ into the institutions and the processes that make up the EU. How this has been carried out so far reveals the limits of the Commission’s ability to lead the EU in its relations with citizens. These activities are not unique or novel or even revolutionary: the idea for a digital presence was first proposed in 1979 when it was suggested that the Commission develop ‘databases of general interest and make them accessible to the outside world via EURONET’ (European Commission 1979: p. viii). However, the growth of the Internet has dramatically expanded the possibilities for access to and use of the digitally available information. In that 1979 document, reference was made to the profound effects on private and public decision-making processes: ‘access to a consistent set of data . . . and to computer models for decisions will be capable, according to how they are used, of increasing centralisation or of providing important social openings’ (European Commission 1979: 6). Since the period of the Delors White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness, and Employment (European Commission 1993) and the Bangemann Report on the Global Information Society (Bangemann et al. 1994), there has been a shift in understanding the role of governments and public administrations in many countries across the world. This inevitably has an impact upon the strategies and policies that are undertaken within these countries, and leads to calls for changes in the way in which governance takes place: public
230
Where Can Leadership Come From?
administrations are now expected to cut costs, and yet deliver the same or better levels of service. This requires a wholesale rethink of how and what we expect public administrations to look like in the future, and puts the combined efforts towards efficiency and public value at odds. Here, the European Commission has a role to play in linking together the efforts of the member states to try to make these ends meet.
COMMISSION INVOLVEMENT IN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION REFORM The European Commission is involved in the debate concerning public administration reform in three ways: 1. through its funding of research and development into eGovernment, 2. by ensuring the Lisbon Agenda is achieved, and 3. through its activities in reforming and modernizing the Commission itself and its relationship with other political institutions. In all three areas, the implications of these activities and their use of ICTs can have profound consequences for EU governance. Not only do political considerations of the ‘leaderless leadership’ of the European Commission (through the Open Method of Coordination) ring bells, but also the idea that ICTs can help bring about change in the development of a European public space. Table 12.1 shows key areas in the Commission’s strategy; some will be described in the following sections. It shows a focus on the core competences of the Commission: from networking the public administrations of member states, to initiating proposals for European legislation, the Internet’s role has not been to exclude the member states. Table 12.1. Activity areas in eGovernance in the European Commission Information Public administration (institutional governance) Engagement in policy-making Democratic activity (democratic governance) Engagement in politics
PRELEX and CELEX Europa (II) CONECCS
Interaction
Institutional impact
Email
IDA(BC)
CIRCA Your Voice in Europe Futurum / Chats
e-Commission IPM—feedback mechanism European Business Test Panel
Commission Leadership and the Internet
231
Information At the European Union level, where much is made of the role of the ‘information deficit’ as a central problem that subsequently causes the perceived democratic deficit, use can be derived from this characteristic of the Internet to promote an enhanced standing of the European Union. At a basic level, this is carried out by the development of a website that contains information. In more advanced stages, this involves the creation of databases that can be used by individuals and organizations to find out more information about a particular issue. The first step was undertaken by the European Commission in 1995, with the development of the website. The Commission’s DG Press and Communication, which acts as a common body for all web-based information, uses an emailing service to distribute its press releases, which can also be viewed on their website. Users can input a preference for the news they wish to receive, and then they are sent an email on a daily basis containing the relevant newsbriefs from all EU institutions. DG Press is also responsible for Frequently Asked Questions and information resources regarding EU policies and the EU’s institutions. This is referred to as the SCAD database (from the French ‘système communautaire d’accès à la documentation’). Many EU legislative documents are made available through the CELEX and PRELEX databases. The Council of Ministers agreed upon a Regulation ‘regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents’ in 2001 (Council and European Parliament 2001), which explicitly highlighted the role of electronic tools in the dissemination of public sector information; it has been emphasized further through the eEurope initiative, where benchmarks and targets have been set for efficient dissemination of information by public administrations. The provision of data on the EU by the Commission and other institutions exemplifies the top-down approach to using the Internet to enhance transparency and openness. However, they must have a purpose: just as with the establishment of a website, there must be an area in which openness and transparency can have an impact upon politics and policy-making in the EU. This is perhaps most clearly seen through interaction with the ‘grassroots’ of society. This bottom-up approach would also see governments providing public spaces for individuals to interact, not necessarily with intervention from politicians and other public servants (Coleman 2001: 121). A good example of application of networked technologies to dissemination of political discourse would be a website developed by the Belgian Government (which held the presidency of the European Council in the second half of 2001), called Expedition Europe.2 This, in contrast to the Futurum website3 is specifically targeted towards 17–25-year-olds living in the European Union. Although the
232
Where Can Leadership Come From?
subject matter is similar to Futurum, the approach is different, attempting to encourage a different sector of society to become involved in the debate on the EU. This is an example of providing multiple information channels, an activity made much easier by the Internet. The ability to use different channels to enable full dissemination of information to various groups of actors in society will also allow interested persons to provide commentary on issues of interest to their interest groups through debates. This links information provision with interaction. Yet again, although the technology provides assistance, the drive must come from civil servants and politicians to ensure that information is readily available, and from citizens to ensure that the agora is used. One of the few possibilities that the European Commission itself has for exercise of the bottom-up approach to information provision is provided by the CONECCS initiative. The Commission, as a ‘coordinator’ in EU governance, must provide as many opportunities as possible to ensure all parties participate in useful and timely dialogue: in 2000, the European Commission placed their CONECCS4 database online. CONECCS can be found in the Commission’s pages on civil society. It contains two elements; one is to improve transparency, the other to improve the consultation process: both are central to the better governance ambitions of the European Commission. The use of the database, however, is limited to information provision. By using the database for information provision alone, the Commission is not taking advantage of the possibilities for greater interaction with a range of actors. But there is a second motivation in using the Internet as the basis for an open repository of names in the field: it enables individuals to get involved with the major players in the consultation process, rather than voicing their opinion to the Commission directly. Here, the Commission is not wishing to interact directly with individuals, but rather providing a list of intermediaries who can communicate with the Commission. This would reduce the opportunities for information overload in the Commission itself, and ensure that filtering of opinion takes place prior to contact with the Commission.
Interaction Debates, such as those that take place in the pages of the Commission’s sub-site Futurum, are only moderated to ensure that illegal and defamatory content is not posted on the site. The Secretariat-General DG is responsible for the collating of information and submission of initial information written to provoke debate amongst European citizens. The result could be considered quite strange: participants are able to talk in various languages with no translation
Commission Leadership and the Internet
233
and very little intervention from Commission officials. The space is not used as a forum for the Commission to collect information or opinions. The European Commission has also organized Internet chats. Between 1997 and 2001, some twenty of these Internet chat sessions between the general public and various commissioners had been organized by a collective consisting of DG Press, SCIC (now called DG Interpretation), the Informatics Directorate of DG Administration, and the DG of the respective commissioner. This process was streamlined in 2001, to give individual DGs more responsibility over the procedures. The Europa website contained, as of January 2004, transcripts of twelve chats that had been carried out since the change in procedures. This shows that the Commission still finds this a useful tool. The streamlining of procedures in 2001 led to the provision of a set of guidelines and the decentralization of responsibility for the chats to the respective DGs. This is one of many examples of the Commission’s development of networks and coordination activity, only this time it is an internal exercise rather than one carried out with external parties. Provision of information is one side of the coin for the eGovernance agenda in the Commission. The ability for citizens and businesses to search for information is a crucial element of building ‘better governance’ in the European institutions. However, the ability of citizens to interact with policymakers and decision-makers is also of major importance. The first step is to provide information about how citizens and interest groups can get involved in the policy-making process: CONECCS goes some way in this direction. Your Voice in Europe presents the pinnacle of this approach to opening up the EU’s institutions in terms of ICT-usage. It was an initiative established in the framework of the Interactive Policy Making initiative (described below), and was intended to work towards the objectives in both the governance and reform programmes of the European Commission. Your Voice in Europe is, essentially, a portal that shows citizens how they can interact with various EU institutions. From the home page of the subsite,5 one can participate in consultations, enter various discussion fora, or provide feedback to the EU institutions on different issues (complaints to the Ombudsman etc.). Your Voice in Europe attempts to bring together various activities that were being undertaken in the Commission. It has also added and improved various tools used by the Commission in the consultation process, one of which—IPM—will be described below. The target audience is more likely to be individual citizens and the site in designed with this in mind: it shows individuals the number of different ways they can interact with the European Commission. As well as providing citizens with information about how they can interact with the EU institutions, the European Commission is also carrying out
234
Where Can Leadership Come From?
activities that involve direct interaction through use of the Internet; one of these tools is known as the Interactive Policy Making initiative. The notion of interactive feedback again highlights one of the central characteriztics of the Internet, which has been promoted through the eGovernment agenda. Encouraging debate at grass-roots level and providing information are seen as necessary requirements towards a Europe based upon a new form of governance but these actions only provide partial solutions. When debates are centred upon specific issues, the actors involved at policy level must be willing and able to provide responses to interested bodies. There must be a purpose in activity from the citizen; she must feel that her voice is being acted upon (Coleman 2001). Interaction, through consultation, must take place. Similarly, when information is provided, public administrations and governments must be able to provide response to further questions that emerge. Given the complexity of much of this information, they must also be able to provide this information easily. This often requires human interaction. Consultation on proposals is one of the standard activities of the European Commission. The secretariat-general has a unit that deals with the Commission’s relationship with civil society, and it is here where the consultation procedure is centrally managed. This unit was responsible for outlining the minimum standards for consultation, which were published (after much internal consultation) in a Communication at the end of 2002 (European Commission 2002). In this document, the role of the Commission in the field of consultation was further emphasized: ‘Wide consultation is not a new phenomenon. In fact, the Commission has a long tradition of consulting interested parties from outside when formulating its policies. It incorporates external consultation into the development of almost all its policy areas’ (ibid. 3). They came into force at the beginning of 2003, and a unit in the secretariat general is responsible for the monitoring of high-priority consultations to ensure adherence to the standards. Commission activity on consultation was linked to both administrative reform and EU governance. In contrast to the ‘expert-type’ opinions requested in the CONECCS consultation process described above, Your Voice in Europe provides a more flexible framework for consultation. The central piece of the initiative is the IPM tool, an initiative by DG Internal Market. IPM was born out of the administrative reform process, but its role soon changed to a far more politically visible one. This was due to the innovative nature of the tool, and the Commission’s desire to be seen as leading the way in using new methods to enhance policy-making. IPM was initially given the mandate to use the Internet to involve more stakeholders in the policy-making process. It had two main elements: the
Commission Leadership and the Internet
235
outward-facing consultation tool and the feedback mechanism. The first part will be discussed here. The consultation element of the IPM tool has been supported by most DGs and other Commission services, and is used as the primary manner for execution of most public (and restricted) consultations. This is due to its ease of use, and its added value. It is capable of providing realtime analysis of consultation responses to policy-makers, and can be targeted towards citizens, businesses, and civil society groups in any of the official languages (along with scalability for new languages). It is flexible, in the sense that consultations can either be open to the public or closed to a predetermined group. For all these reasons, the Commission is keen to encourage this tool to show how citizens can get involved in consultations which help inform policy-making, create better regulation, and show citizens that their input is considered important (i.e. better governance). Crucial to the operation of this tool has been the increased use of the Internet: it has been used as the gateway to this service. The coupling of databases and interactive forms, which are filled in online, has enabled the Commission to create a system of interaction with interested parties from all areas of the EU (and beyond) to contribute to consultations. The practical problems of receiving comments on consultations prior to the development of such a system have been avoided by the development of a tool that poses structured questions, rather than requesting general feedback on long documents, which few people would read. In a couple of unpublicized consultations carried out in the pilot phase of the IPM tool, between 100 and 200 replies were received per consultation; this was still more than the average consultation carried out using traditional means. In July 2002, a consultation on Data Protection issues was launched publicly; within ten days 7,500 replies were received. The total figure for that consultation later finished as 9,500. A list of consultations and the number of responses that took place in the first two years of operation are in Table 12.2. As well as open and closed consultations using the IPM tool, DG Internal Market has also established a so-called Feedback Mechanism—the second part of the tool, which aims to get ‘spontaneous feedback’ from citizens, businesses, and civil society groups on specific European policy issues. It was first established as a pilot project in April 2000 for use by forty-one Euro Info Centres. Since that time, it has grown: between October 2001 and June 2002 the initiative grew to include around 300 citizen and business contact points that included Euro Info Centres, European Consumer Centres, Chambers of Commerce, and the Citizens Signpost Service. These organizations are contracted by the European Commission to enter requests for information and comments on existing legislation into an online database which
236
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Table 12.2. Consultations using the IPM tool between 2001 and 2003 Date June 2001 September 2001 December 2001 January 2002 April 2002 June 2002 July 2002 September 2002 October 2002 December 2002 January 2003 February 2003 June 2003 September 2003 November 2003
Subject Modernizing the Internal Market for industrial goods Governance Review of the New Approach Trust barriers for B2B e-marketplaces Pan-European government e-services Data protection Cybersquatting Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities Pack sizes in the EU Animal protection during transport Give us your opinion on Your Voice in Europe European Action Plan for organic food and farming Draft Chemicals Legislation Legal problems in e-business Public procurement
Number of responses 253 224 135 103 (limited to certain organizations) 67 9,500 1,137 Closed 691 4,141 Ongoing 1,136 Closed 651 Closed
is then referred to by each DG when designing new legislation or reviewing existing legislation. The whole database was operating for DGs Internal Market and Enterprise, and would be available to all DGs by the beginning of 2003. A recent evaluation of the feedback mechanism, carried out in early 2005, has questioned the efficacy of this mechanism. This particularly focused on the use made of such a tool by policy-makers (European Evaluation Consortium 2005). The number of individuals working in the European Commission that actually made use of the feedback mechanism was almost negligible; the impact of this usage was also debated by policy-makers. Once again, this shows that perceived benefits of eGovernment are not necessarily converted into material or social value without a greater understanding of how policymaking processes must evolve to take this into consideration. This may be an issue that requires gradual encouragement of change, rather than expectancy of immediate impact. Other initiatives have been more recently developed, such as a YouTube page created by the European Commission.6 This video-sharing website provides video-clips provided by the European Commission, containing information about European issues.
Commission Leadership and the Internet
237
Institutional Impact Despite the possibilities for reinvention of government through new ICTbased forms of governance, an EU strategy in the area is closely limited by the institutional structure of the EU. eEurope, a policy initiative intended to bring Europe ‘online’ was established by the European Commission in 1999, at around the same time as the Lisbon Agenda. It has successfully managed to become an important mechanism for implementing change in the field of eGovernment, particularly at the national and local level. This has been done without revolutionizing government and public administration at the national level. The implications of developing such policies have been broad, and have not just been related to the subject under discussion but other areas such as employment and environment policy. The Commission has clearly defined areas of concern in public administration at the EU level that need to be rectified in order for the institutions of the EU to (re)gain public confidence. In fact, since 1995 the European Commission has consistently mentioned reform of the institution in its annual work programmes (1995: ch. 7; 1996: introduction; 1997a: last section; 1998: 12–13). More specifically, the Commission’s White Paper on Reform stated that ‘[Administrative Reform] is thus a political project of central importance for the European Union’ (European Commission 2000a: 5). Part II of the White Paper was more explicit in the role of the Internet, proposing a set of action points ‘towards the e-Commission’ (European Commission 2000b: 8–10). Building upon the eEurope Action Plan (European Commission 1999), the Commission states ‘Technological development holds out the potential of modernising the administration and improving its communication and working methods both internally and with its partner organizations and interlocutors’ (European Commission 2000b: 8). This again seems to emphasize the role that the Internet plays in enforcing current structures and institutions in the EU. Furthermore, the Commission sees the development of its e-strategy as something that helps promote business: ‘easy access to public sector statistics and data and electronic public procurement can also give a strong stimulus for new private sector value-added services’ (ibid.). Reform of the Commission, through ICT-based means or any other, is limited to boundaries cast in the Treaties on European Union, which are inevitably slow (and perhaps even unwilling) to react to institutional demands (from the Commission) for greater democratic accountability for the Commission, along with all the side effects that would emerge from this, including a greater role in governance of the EU. Therefore, as in eEurope, the Commission has found ways to work within these boundaries.
238
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Given that the Commission has a large number of buildings around Brussels alone, offices in Luxembourg, research centres around Europe, and delegations around the world, digital communication techniques are quite useful in disseminating information. The Commission’s intranet, IntraComm, recently replaced the Internal Commission Server, Europa Plus, established by DG X (which dealt with information and communication) in 1995. Other applications have been developed by the Commission for internal purposes, including in the area of planning and resource management. However, the emphasis is not on redefining the role of the Commission, but simply on making the Commission more efficient. This is reflected in the Reform White Paper, which laments the fact that ‘almost half of the Commission officials are fully occupied in executive tasks, notably in managing programmes and projects’ (European Commission 2000a: 5). The emergence of new methods of working within the Commission has not just been limited to the internal administration. The European Commission has managed internally to restructure the processes of information dissemination beyond the Commission to cater for the new opportunities afforded by the technology. This has been a long and challenging task, especially regarding the internal coordination of production of public documents. The change in administrative culture has been in response to a desire to make the Commission more responsive to the external environment. The joint creation of documents for both internal and external consumption has become necessary in order to communicate effectively to the outside world; the internal processes of the Commission are becoming more ‘output-aware’, which is crucial for better governance. Attempts have been started to establish a ‘new inter-institutional relationship’ between the institutions of the EU (European Commission: Informatics Directorate 2001: 3). Doubtless, this follows on from the INSIS initiative, proposed in 1979. The advantage of such a relationship was also for the other institutions at Community (and national) level: the suggestion to create an inter-institutional information system shows an ambition on the part of the Commission to use new technologies to develop the Community (and then the EU) as a dynamic and efficient political institution, interacting with other actors in Europe in order to protect the vital European high technology markets. The Council had been interested in such an initiative in the early stages, and had produced a decision to prepare proposals for such a system (Council 1982). This could be one of the biggest consequences of a new ICT-based approach to governance for the future construction of the EU. Acceptance of this kind of policy network approach in public administrations is clearly difficult to achieve in practice, particularly when looking at the EU, which is made more complex by the role of the member states. However, there have been steps taken and progress
Commission Leadership and the Internet
239
achieved: a large majority of documents are distributed between institutions electronically. Internal discussion takes place not just around the issues concerning internal or inter-institutional administration. Although the EU’s official website is designed for its public audience, the process behind developing the site has been part of the internal development of the Commission into an e-Commission. The idea of an e-Commission has been promoted by the development of a strategic framework towards the goal of creating a ‘first class e-administration’, in line with the goals of the i2010 initiative, the follow up to eEurope. This has been accompanied by the emergence of a Directorate General for IT in the European Commission (DIGIT), and the positioning of this DG under the responsibility of the vice-president of the European Commission for Administrative Affairs, Audit, and Anti-Fraud. One of the central activities in this sphere of communicating with external partners is the relationship between the Commission and public administrations in the member states. DG Enterprise is responsible for the Interchange of Data between Administrations (IDA) programme. IDA has a clear legal basis, and was given a clear mandate. It was given to DG Enterprise due to the fact that it was initially a standardization exercise, and for the purely pragmatic reason that the commissioner responsible for DG Enterprise was also the commissioner responsible for DG Information Society. Although in its current status it is an example of an eGovernment activity, analysis of its history reveals that it is more concerned with the modernization of the European Commission to member-state administrations. This has now become part of the Commission’s eGovernment goal, which is now focused upon coordination and not government in the traditional sense. The system connects national administrations’ computer networks together through the EuroDomain, a private network based on Internet technology. National entry points are supplied by the Trans-European Services for Telematics between Administrations (TESTA) Project, which is part of IDA. The Commission provides support for several types of projects through this service, to which member states are required to connect as a result of European legislation (Council and European Parliament 1999). The consequences of this, however, are not seen as creating a nascent European Information System, but just enabling national governments to coordinate information and communication in common areas. The aim is interoperability and not harmonization; the ability to communicate but not necessarily to use the same hardware and software to do so. The focus was to encourage interaction between the Commission and member states, and also between the various member states. It was originally established to make exchange of information in the SEM easier to carry out. In latter stages of the IDA programme, content became the driving issue.
240
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Closely related to the development of the IDA programme was the creation of an intranet for various committees dealing with EU policy areas. Named the Communication and Resource Centre for Administrations (CIRCA), this intranet is a place for papers, agendas, and discussion to ameliorate the policymaking process by the European Commission. Access is granted depending upon the status of the committee; some are completely closed and others are open. This harmonized web-based application should overcome some of the problems experienced by policy networks in making policy; the technological network approach (Winn 1998) is in evidence here. Subsequently, in the IDABC programme (Interoperable Delivery of European eGovernment services to public Administrations, Businesses, and Citizens), this has been further developed with a series of services available across Europe for administrations, businesses, and citizens. The IDABC programme was established to bring together national administrations to work towards delivery of common services to citizens. IDABC has been, thus far, a relative success in getting member states of the EU (and members of the EEA) together to coordinate their electronic systems in different sectors. The Commission plays a wide-ranging role, managing the underlying technical infrastructure for interaction between member-state administrations, supervising budgets, and coordinating meetings of the representatives of, and experts from, the member states.
COMMISSION LEADERSHIP, BUT IN CHOPPY WATERS Use of the Internet and web-based applications by the Commission to improve and evolve into an e-Commission are crucial elements of the governance debate in the EU. There are many ways in which these changes reveal insights into the leading role of the European Commission in attempting to improve EU governance. The Commission is implementing its e-Commission programme within the framework of eEurope. The IDA programme became a part of the OMCinspired eEurope initiative and is clearly not intended to create a European superstate: willingness to cooperate between national public administrations and the European Commission has increased dramatically in recent years. Its basis in Council legislation has clearly shown this. The Commission merely provides a coordinating role for national administrations to ensure the smooth running of the SEM. This is in itself a break from traditional models of governance, with the commission acting as an ‘Activator’ (Eising and Kohler-Koch 1999). Indeed, the Internet’s infrastructure, when used for public administration, is well applied as a metaphor for EU governance.
Commission Leadership and the Internet
241
However, eEurope has not been the only motivation for developing use of ICTs in the EU’s institutions. The Governance White Paper and the Commission’s efforts towards institutional reform have played roles: these are not technologically determined but more political. However, they have taken the opportunities provided by technology to start the processes that may implement change in the future. By using the Internet and web-based applications to create interaction amongst all levels of the body politic, disseminate information, and enable and encourage change in their own institutional approach to policy-making, the Commission is attempting to improve EU governance. It has taken a leading role in this venture, attempting to work with other EU institutions to ensure success and sustainability of the moves. However, institutional limitations have made this a slow process. Although the White Paper on Governance does not directly mention eGovernment at all and makes little mention of the role of ICTs in improving governance, there are parallels to be found regarding better governance in the debate on EU governance and the goals and expectations of eGovernment. However, in the latter stages of the document’s preparation, legal and political concerns of the acceptance and direct utility of the paper eclipsed the connection between the White Paper and the debate on Information Society. As a result of the Governance White Paper, and the efforts towards administrative reform, however, moves have been made to improve certain aspects of the Commission’s relationship with citizens, businesses, civil society groups, and other public administrations that do take account of new possibilities afforded by ICTs. The five guiding principles of governance described in the Governance White Paper have been dealt with above by several of the examples. Openness, and to a certain extent, accountability, is dealt with through provision of information about the EU legislative process; participation is encouraged through such activities as the IPM consultation tool, the CONECCS database, and the various chat sessions used by commissioners; effectiveness in policymaking is covered by the eEurope initiative and the IDABC programme; and coherence in policy-making can be said to be shown through the Your Voice in Europe portal, which gives citizens one virtual portal to the EU institutions.
CONCLUSIONS: DRAGGING THE NET This chapter has revealed that there is a large amount of activity executed within the Commission using ICT-based solutions to further reform, with the intention of building better governance that is based not on hierarchies but on networks and inclusivity. An effective leadership in this domain at the EU
242
Where Can Leadership Come From?
level requires a shift in assumptions to be made about the role of different actors in social, political, and administrative spheres; indeed, it requires a new vision of governance in the EU. EU governance in this context is about a more democratic and accountable set of European institutions, and one way of encouraging this would be to bring the citizen closer to the multiple levels of decision-making institutions. Whilst the Commission has attempted this in such arenas as the Feedback Mechanism, this has not been entirely accepted as a positive move by all actors involved. The examples provided are all representative of activity taking place in the European Commission. They show that the focus in the Commission is not on reinventing government, but reinventing governance through a rejuvenation of existing political institutions, and not through attempting dramatically to change governance in the EU. In internal reform, the Commission has been remarkably successful, given the limited parameters in which the Commission can work: the promotion of IT usage in the Commission to a DG of its own, under the mandate of a vicepresident is a telling sign of the importance of the issue. Until now, working processes have not been radically altered, but have been amended: the changes that have occurred have helped develop the Commission into an e-aware institution that has not simply applied a predefined model of eGovernment, but has created applications that take its particular circumstances into account as shown above. In the outward-facing aspects of political reform, the technology has enabled the Commission to play a useful part in altering its role in the European policy-making process, increasing the legitimacy of its output by involving more, and appropriate, actors in its activities. Although this is by no means an easy task, and there is still a long way to go, this has started to occur both in the public administration and democratic activity areas, as the examples given have shown. However, bottom-up, citizen input has taken second place to improving internal elite coordination, so the Internet has so far not been successful in mobilizing public support for either the Commission or of the EU more generally. In showing the various attempts that the Commission has made towards effective and efficient internal management, and the impacts these have had on European policy-makers, we can see that the Commission has had relative leadership success in the creation of outputs in two main areas: 1. Developing coordination mechanisms within the Commission itself, with other institutions of the EU, and with and between member states. 2. Developing a relationship with citizens and civil society groups in the EU, through their own media outlets (i.e. Internet).
Commission Leadership and the Internet
243
However, these outputs are not necessarily immediately translated into positive impacts for the European Commission. A successful evaluation of the impact of these measures will only be possible when these have been used for a longer period of time.
NOTES 1. The five principles were: Openness, Participation, Accountability, Effectiveness, and Coherence (European Commission 2001: 10) 2. , accessed 18 November 2001. 3. , accessed 18 November 2001. 4. CONECCS is an acronym for CONsultation, the European Commission, and civil society. 5. , accessed 13 June 2004. 6. , accessed 1 July 2007.
REFERENCES B, M, F, E, et al. (1994) Europe And The Global Information Society—Recommendations To The European Council. Luxembourg: Commission of the European Communities. C, S (2001) ‘The Transformation of Citizenship’, in B. Axford and R. Huggins (eds.), New Media and Politics. London: Sage, 109–26. C (1982) Council Decision of 13 December 1982 relating to the coordination of the activities of the Member States and Community institutions with a view to assessing the need for, and preparing proposals for setting up, a Community inter-institutional information system. C E P (1999) Decision of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 1999, adopting a series of actions and measures in order to ensure interoperability of and access to trans-European networks for the electronic interchange of data between administrations (IDA). 1999/1720/EC. (2001) Regulation 1049/2001/EC regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents. D, D G. (ed.) (2004) The Changing European Commission. Manchester: Manchester University Press. E C (1979) European Society Faced with the Challenge of New Information Technologies: A Community Response. Brussels: COM (1979) 650. (1993) White Paper On Growth, Competitiveness and Employment: The Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21st Century. Brussels: COM (1993) 700. (1995) The Commission’s Work Programme for 1996. Brussels: COM (95) 512 final, , accessed 12 December 2007.
244
Where Can Leadership Come From?
E C (1996) The Commission’s Work Programme for 1997. Brussels: COM (96) 507 final, , accessed 12 December 2007. (1997a) The Commission’s Work Programme for 1997. Brussels: COM (97) 517, , accessed 12 December 2007. (1997b) Concerning the Evaluation of the IDA Programme and a Second Phase of the IDA Programme. Brussels: COM (1997) 661. (1998) The Commission’s Work Programme for 1999. Brussels: COM (98) 604, , accessed 12 December 2007. (1999) e-Europe: An Information Society for All—Communication on a Commission Initiative for the Special European Council of Lisbon, 23 and 24 March 2000. Brussels: COM. (2000a) Reforming the Commission: A White Paper—Part I. Brussels: COM (2000) 200. (2000b) Reforming the Commission: A White Paper—Part II: Action Plan. Brussels: COM (2000) 200. (2001) European Governance: A White Paper. Brussels: COM (2001) 0428. (2002) Towards a Reinforced Culture of Consultation and Dialogue—General Principles and Minimum Standards for Consultation of Interested Parties by the Commission. Brussels. COM (2002) 704 final. (2005) The Commission’s Contribution to the Period of Reflection and Beyond: Plan-D for Democracy, Dialogue, and Debate. Brussels: COM (2005) 494 final. I D (2001) Towards the e-Commission: Implementation Strategy 2001–2005. Luxembourg: European Commission. E E C (2005) Mid-term Evaluation of the Interactive Policy-Making Programme: Final Report. Twickenham, TEEC. , accessed 10 December 2005. K-K, B., and E, R. (eds.) (1999) The Transformation of Governance in the European Union. London: Routledge. M, J, S, J, W, R, and L, C (2005) Towards the eGovernment Vision: Research Policy Challenges. Seville: Institute of Prospective Technological Studies, DG JRC, European Commission. S, J (2006) ‘The EU’s Use of the Internet’, in A. Ari-Veikko and M. Mattia (eds.), Encyclopedia of Digital Government. Hershey, Pa.: Idea Group, 774–83. S, H (1997) ‘A Community Closer to Its Citizens: The European Union’s Use of the Internet’. Government Information Quarterly 14/2: 117–42. W, N. (1998) ‘Who Gets What, When and How? The Contested Conceptual and Disciplinary Nature of Governance and Policy-Making in the European Union’, Politics 18/2: 119–32.
13 The European Parliament: Leadership and ‘Followership’ David Judge and David Earnshaw
Leadership requires ‘followership’. This simple truism has often been ignored in discussions of the EU polity and its development, or, even when it has not been ignored, it has often been replaced by an assumption, which has proved increasingly pathological, that where EU leaders will lead EU citizens will follow. Not surprisingly, the tremors occasioned by the French and Dutch referendums in 2005 highlighted the geological fault lines inherent in current notions of democratic leadership in the EU, and illuminated a fundamental ‘disconnect’ between ‘leaders’ and ‘followers’ in these (and other) EU nation states. What this chapter seeks to examine, therefore, are notions of ‘democratic leadership’ or ‘leader democracy’ and the extent to which such notions provide an analytical frame within which the European Parliament’s contribution to ‘leadership’, or more specifically to a failure of leadership in the EU, can be examined. Such an examination may, however, prove to be a daunting task— particularly as the European Parliament does not appear even in the peripheral vision of most commentators when they scan the horizons of leadership in the EU. Indeed, the most notable feature of the EP in discussions of EU leadership tends to be its absence. Generally, there is a prevailing and negative assumption that the EP is not the institution to provide leadership in the EU. The starting point for this chapter, therefore, is to raise the question: can the EP be expected to provide leadership in the EU? The answer appears already to be: no. But if this is so, then why would it be so? Alternatively, if the answer is yes, then what are the conceptual bases and practical dimensions of EP leadership?
246
Where Can Leadership Come From? CAN THE EP BE EXPECTED TO PROVIDE LEADERSHIP?
Conceptions of Leader Democracy The connection between leadership and democracy is an elemental and universal problem at the centre of modern theories of democracy, delegation, and representation. As Saward (2003: 66) notes: ‘each of the classic writers [on representative democracy] is quite clear . . . that democracy is about leadership and leadership selection and election, not popular politics or popular participation’. The fundamental issue in any polity that wishes to sustain its ‘democratic’ credentials is to ensure that where leaders lead followers will follow. In other words a minimum normative requirement in a ‘democracy’ is a linkage of accountability between leaders and led. This linkage historically has been founded upon processes of delegation ‘in which those authorized to make political decisions conditionally designate others to make decisions in their name and place’ (Müller, Bergman, and Strøm 2003: 19). This is the essence of political representation (see Pitkin 1967; Judge 1999). In the more contemporary language of agency theory the primary challenge facing representative systems of government is to minimize ‘agency loss’—that is the difference between what the principal (elector) wants and what the agent (decision-maker) delivers (see Lupia 2003: 35–6). Effective leadership would normally assume a substantial degree of congruence of policy preferences with its followership, and, where a lack of policy consensus occurred, some mechanism for restoring policy congruity should be available. These basic requirements are reflected in Körösényi’s (2005) characterization of ‘leader democracy’. This provides a ‘minimalist conception of democracy’ (ibid. 360), in which leaders are selected by competitive elections; where the aspirations and ambitions of politicians guide public policy-making rather than the preferences of the electorate; and where politicians seek to shape and produce political preferences in order to gain support. In this sense, the meaning of political representation ‘is not deliberation or mirroring, but rather leadership, i.e. acting and supplying new policies, creating a new quality’ (ibid. 364). Ideas of delegation, as featured in principal-agent notions of representation, are thus inverted to mean that ‘the primary actors . . . are not the voters, but the political leaders for whom the citizens have the potential to vote’ (ibid. 367). In this statement two essential characteristics of leader democracy are revealed: first that the system may be deemed ‘democratic’ in so far as leaders are authorized and controlled through the process of elections; and, second, that, within the parameters defined by the electoral process, leaders are granted a realm of independent action. In which case leader democracy is a form of ‘representative government with democratic elements’ (ibid. 377).
European Parliament
247
It privileges executive action and government institutions, whether prime ministers and cabinets derived from and responsible to an elected parliament, or presidents with a direct mandate and responsibility to the electorate. In a ‘leader democracy’ electors are essentially conceived as reactive ‘followers’. They react to a political agenda set, and policy preferences articulated, by elected leaders. Leaders become policy entrepreneurs creating new demand by supplying new policies (Schumpeter [1943] 1976: 276–7; Körösényi 2005: 367). The role of representative legislatures is, therefore, to authorize and hold to account executive ‘leaders’, ‘the subject of representation is the chief executive and not the assembly’ (Körösényi 2005: 375). ‘A leader . . . represents; the leader as a person is authorized to act, and he himself is responsible for the performance of government and accountable to the electorate’ (ibid.). This approximates to Schumpeter’s notion of democracy as selection between competitive elites (see Schumpeter [1943] 1976: 269–73). What is clear from this discussion is that representative parliamentary institutions would not of themselves be expected to provide ‘leadership’ but merely provide the legitimating frame (of authorization and responsiveness) within which executive leadership could be exercised. This is a model of representative government (see Judge 1999: 13–20). It is a model that links leaders and followers by mechanisms of choice rather than imposition (see Pitkin 1967: 107–11; Saward 2003: 40). Authentic, contested electoral choice over the tenure of leadership positions thus serves as a basic and fundamental distinction between democratic and authoritarian regimes. If political leadership can be accommodated to and justified by notions of representative government—as it is at the level of the nation state—the question then arises of whether leadership in the EU can be justified in a similar manner. The short answer is that, in the absence of an identifiable government or an executive directly authorized by and accountable to the EP, the EU does not conform to the ‘leader democracy’ model. Executive leadership in the EU cannot be legitimated in terms of its inter-institutional relationship with a directly elected assembly and, hence, is not analogous to representative government at the level of the nation state. Other forms of legitimation of leadership thus have to be modelled in the case of the EU. These alternative sources of leadership—most importantly the Commission, the European Council, presidencies of the Council, and coalitions of member states—are all examined elsewhere in this volume (see also Cini 1996: 19–22; Nugent 2001: 202–34; Westlake and Galloway 2005; Janning 2005: 822–5; de Schoutheete 2006: 49). So what remains to be considered in this chapter is the contribution of the EP to leadership in the EU—both actual and potential.
248
Where Can Leadership Come From?
The following discussion is structured in three parts. The first examines the circumstances under which the EP has exerted direct leadership (the ‘vision thing’). The second examines attempts by the EP to control the activities and policy preferences of identified leaders (most particularly the Commission) and so exert ‘indirect leadership’ through accountability (the ‘accountability thing’). The third examines the attempts by the EP to politicize technical decision-making and so exert ‘policy leadership’ (the ‘policy thing’).
THE VISION THING ‘Three individuals, all French, have contributed most to shaping the EU’ (Dinan 1999: 37). The three visionaries are Monnet, Delors, and de Gaulle. Even if the impact of individual agency may be questioned in Dinan’s assessment, nonetheless, the positions occupied by these individuals point to the institutional resources available to such individuals: Monnet as the guiding force behind the Schuman Declaration, as first president of the ECSC’s High Authority, and generally as an ‘entrepreneur in the public interest’ (Dûchene 1994: 61); Jacques Delors as proactive Commission president between 1985 and 1995, and Charles de Gaulle as French Head of State and arch-champion of intergovernmentalism. Each in their own way underlined the simple fact that a conception of leadership entails institutional resources and opportunity structures (see Beach 2005: 26–34). Historically in the EU, these resources and structures have been associated with the Commission, the Council of Ministers and, increasingly, the European Council. In terms of ‘history-making decisions’ concerned with changing the EU—its size, membership, competences, financing, institutional balance, and decision-making procedures— these institutions dominate the discussion of leadership (see Peterson and Bomberg 1999: 34). It might seem perverse, therefore, to claim that the EP has a right to be considered as providing leadership in history-making decisions. Nonetheless, a case can be made that the EP has contributed leadership in the sense of constitutional entrepreneurship, and in providing a broad political vision for the development of the EU. If we start with the Constitutional Treaty that proved too visionary to be adopted, Beach (2005: 207) observes that the ‘fingerprints of the EP are scattered throughout the Constitutional Treaty, and in many ways it reads like an updated and lengthened version of the EP’s draft treaty establishing the European Union from 1984’. One possibility, of course, is that this is merely coincidence, and that the nature and intent of the Constitutional Treaty would have taken its present form independently of the vision sketched by the EP in
European Parliament
249
1984. However, there is enough circumstantial evidence for the constitutional DNA of the Constitutional Treaty to be traced back to the Draft Treaty of 1984, and, hence, for the EP to be credited post-hoc with ‘visionary leadership’ since direct elections. Certainly the EP’s Constitutional Affairs Committee was willing to accept such credit: By adopting, on 14 February 1984, the first draft Treaty establishing the European Union . . . Parliament initiated a reform process which was to continue for the following 20 years and lead to the drafting of the Single European Act, the Maastricht Treaty, the Treaty of Amsterdam, the Treaty of Nice, and, now, the Treaty establishing a constitution for Europe. (PE 347.119 2004: 12)
Leadership Lineage 1984–2004 The fact that the EU does not have a government analogous to political executives in member states means that leadership has been conceived in terms different to the model of ‘leader democracy’. At one level this has reduced the capacity of the EP to exert influence through holding EU leaders directly accountable. At another level, however, it has also increased the capacity of the EP to interject its vision of EU development on those occasions when other modes of leadership in the EU have been debilitated—either through internal disjunctures in the Commission or changing constellations of member-state coalitions in the Council. ‘Euro sclerosis’ of the early 1980s and the changing intergovernmental coalitions in the early 2000s provide such occasions. At such times the EP was able to provide ‘opportunistic political leadership’ in accordance with Dinan’s view that the ‘history of European integration demonstrates the importance of (such) leadership at a time of fluctuating economic and political fortunes’ (Dinan 2003: 37). Moreover, as part of an evolving institutional structure with clear incentives to influence the EU’s developing institutional design (see Corbett, Jacobs, and Shackleton 2005), these interjections have been conceived as a normal part of the EP’s role. As much was recognized by Haas (1958) in his observations that parliamentarians at the European level would be ‘crucial actors on the stage of integration’ (ibid. 390). This was because they had incentives to ‘deliberately and self consciously seek to create a federal Europe by prescribing appropriate policy for the High Authority’ (ibid. 390); and also to stimulate ‘the conclusion of new treaties looking toward integration’. Moreover, in their daily conduct MEPs would have the ‘facility of furthering the growth of practices and codes of behaviour typical of federations’ (ibid. 390). Proponents of direct elections maintained at the time that the dynamic towards an integrationist leadership role would be enhanced further in a
250
Where Can Leadership Come From?
directly elected parliament (see Corbett 1998: 51–2). Significantly, from the outset, the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) Treaty conferred upon the Common Assembly, in article 21(3), the right to ‘draw up proposals for elections by direct universal suffrage in accordance with a uniform procedure in all member states’. Moreover, the predisposition in favour of enhanced integration found almost immediate institutionalization in an invitation from the Council to the Common Assembly to convene a special committee to consider the feasibility of establishing a European Political Community (EPC). As a result, on only its second day of existence (11 September 1952), the Assembly created a working party to draft proposals for radical constitutional change. From the outset, therefore, the EP was conferred with a legitimate leadership role—the ‘vision thing’—in advancing further political integration. While the Assembly’s draft Treaty Establishing a Political Community (accepted on 10 March 1953) was lost in the maelstrom of the rejection of the EDC Treaty by the French National Assembly on 30 August 1954, nonetheless, the experience of drafting a new constitutional settlement was ‘inculcated in the European Parliament’s collective memory’ (Westlake 1994: 13). This experience of being in the vanguard of constitutional cogitation was enhanced under the EEC Treaty which, like the ECSC Treaty before it, provided for the introduction of direct elections. The Assembly itself was to draw up proposals for direct elections which were to be conducted under a ‘uniform procedure in all member states’. This right of initiative, in the drafting of a legislative proposal on direct elections, was unique; in all other areas of Community law it was the Commission that enjoyed the formal right of initiative. In conferring this right upon the Assembly the Treaties recognized a legitimate role for the EP in the formulation of constitutional arrangements for the Community. What the initial commitment to direct elections provided, furthermore, was an inherent institutional dynamic within the Assembly for a perpetual normative questioning of the constitutional construct of the EC/EU itself. In the absence of direct elections, or in the absence of popular engagement with the ‘European project’, the legitimacy of that project and the institutional construct of ‘Europe’ would remain open to question.
Draft Treaty on European Union Once direct elections were effected, the EP sought to assert its constitutional leadership role. Initially the majority of newly elected MEPs in 1979 were predisposed in favour of taking ‘small steps’ and of developing the role assigned to them by the existing treaties. Within a very short period, however, the
European Parliament
251
inability of existing European institutions to deal with the problems arising from ‘euro sclerosis’ led to demands for comprehensive constitutional reform both from within and outside of the EP (see Capotorti et al. 1986: 9–10). In these circumstances, in the vacuum left by other leadership institutions and a debilitating constellation of national interests, the EP was able to map out a distinctive constitutional future for Europe. The creation of a subcommittee of the EP’s Political Affairs Committee in 1979 to deal with institutional issues, and the production of eight reports and seven resolutions by July 1981 (see Corbett 1998: 130–3), prompted the German-Italian initiative—the Genscher-Colombo Proposals—in November 1981. Emilio Colombo, the Italian foreign minister, in fact, had chaired the EP’s Committee when it started to examine these institutional issues and his joint initiative reflected significant proposals made in the EP’s earlier resolutions. These proposals constituted a draft European Act and sought to identify the principles and institutional reforms that would enhance European integration without a formal revision of the Treaty of Rome. In parallel to the Genscher-Colombo initiative, to which the EP offered its strongest support, 170 MEPs signed a motion in July 1981 calling for fundamental reform of the EC. In the same month a new Committee on Institutional Affairs was created. The sole task assigned to this Committee was to draft a new constitutional framework for the EC (Lodge 1984: 378). Altiero Spinelli, one of the founders of the post-war federalist movement, was appointed general rapporteur of the Committee and, along with six corapporteurs, produced general guidelines for the reform of the Treaties. These guidelines were accepted by Parliament in a resolution of 6 July 1982. At their centre was support for the principle of subsidiarity, and for a new institutional balance which would lead to greater equality between the Council and the EP, and which would further acknowledge the democratic legitimacy of the Parliament. These guidelines were eventually translated into the Draft Treaty on European Union which was adopted by the EP on 14 February 1984 by a vote of 237 to 31. The first line of the preamble to the Draft Treaty indicated that its purpose was ‘continuing and reviving the democratic unification of Europe’. The Draft Treaty aimed to provide a single and comprehensive constitutional text for a new political entity to replace the existing Communities. In fact, many of the specific provisions of the 1984 Draft Treaty were eventually incorporated into the Constitutional Treaty of 2004 (see European Parliament 1994; European Union 2004). If the Draft Treaty provided a constitutional architectural blueprint, it took twenty years for the ‘builders’ and ‘project managers’ of the EU—member states and Commission—to agree that the design was feasible and of practical utility. This is not the place to provide a detailed explanation
252
Where Can Leadership Come From?
of why this acceptance came about, other than to identify some general points about the EP’s leadership role during the intervening period. In the case of the Constitutional Treaty of 2004, a compelling argument can be made that the EP acted as a policy entrepreneur in formulating and promoting an institutional mode of treaty reform which would break with the established IGC method, and hence alter the negotiating dynamic after the disappointments of the Nice Treaty. In the Constitutional Affairs Committee’s Report on the Treaty of Nice and the Future of Europe the proposal was made, for the first time, for the creation of a Convention to prepare for treaty reform (PE 303.546 2001; European Parliament 2001: para 38; see also Dinan 2004: 35; Corbett, Jacobs, and Shackleton 2005: 344). Although few governments were initially supportive of this proposal, extensive lobbying by the EP (see Corbett et al. 2005: 344) and eventually the Belgian Council presidency, culminated in the Laeken Declaration of December 2001 and the creation of the Convention on the Future of Europe in February 2002. Even though not all Parliament’s demands concerning democracy, transparency, and efficiency in the European Union were met by the Convention, nonetheless, the EP believed that: ‘the quality of the Convention’s work on the preparation of the draft Constitution and the reform of the Treaties fully vindicates the decision of the Laeken European Council to move away from the intergovernmental method by adopting Parliament’s proposal for the setting up of a constitutional Convention’ (PE 323.600 2003: 6; for a more sanguine view see Magnette and Nicolaïdis 2004). If the argument is that the EP displayed leadership both in terms of the grand vision of the Draft Treaty of 1984 and in the tactical vision of a novel institutional means of considering treaty reform in 2002–3, then what happened to EP leadership in between times? One answer is that such leadership was non-existent (for example the EP is largely absent from McCormick’s review (2005: 52–78) of the evolution of the EU). A second answer is that it was limited and often peripheral on the evidence of successive IGCs (see Beach 2005: 252), but a third answer is that it was persistent, if low key, and ultimately decisive. This third option is characterized in the dual strategy of small steps and qualitative leaps (see Judge and Earnshaw 2003: 40–65). This strategy has long been recognized by close observers of the EP, but more recently some have sought to portray this as a ‘new theory’ of ‘agenda setting through discretion in rule interpretation’ (Hix 2002: 259; see also Farrell and Héritier 2003). In fact, there is little that is novel other than the terminology. The essence of the new theory remains that: ‘[W]hen parliamentary powers are initially established . . . these are usually limited. However, parliaments invariably utilize these powers to the maximum extent possible, and far beyond anything
European Parliament
253
that was originally intended in the initial transfer of authority. When it comes to changing the constitution, these de facto interpretations are codified and so on’. (Hix 2002: 280). The important point is that the EP has ‘exercised independent discretion in interpreting . . . rules’ and has been able through ‘new institutional rules and strategic behaviour’ (ibid. 273,) to lead memberstate governments to concede more powers to the EP. Even if the overall vision was not subscribed to as a comprehensive package by other EU leaders, the EP still managed to secure specific, limited—but ultimately cumulative—changes to institutional structures. As a catalyst for change the EP provided remorseless ideational leadership (vision) but often limited, direct practical capacity (practical leadership) through contributions to IGCs to effect constitutional change in the intervening decades between Draft Treaty and Constitutional Treaty. (For a less visionary approach to constitutional innovation, see Chapter 11, above.)
THE ‘ACCOUNTABILITY THING’ Without a government (or opposition), the Union often seems unable to steer the European project in a decisive, committed way. (Peterson and Shackleton 2006: 12)
The Commission was envisaged in the original treaties as the steering institution, being conferred with the sole right of legislative initiative. This agendasetting role has marked out the Commission as a prime candidate to fulfil a strong leadership role in the EU. The actual extent to which it has performed this role in practice is the source of heated and prolonged disputation. There is, however, a forceful argument which maintains that the leadership role of the Commission would be enhanced by transforming it into an institution more akin to a national government, and attuning the EU to the precepts of representative government. As Coussens and Crum (2003: 5) note, ‘there [has been] a clear pressure to have any strengthening of leadership in the Union combined with effective mechanisms of electoral choice’. Implicit within this statement is the idea that leaders should be connected to ‘followers’ through the process of elections. The conundrum of strengthening the leadership potential of the Commission through election, however, is how to maintain the institutional balance of the EU. ‘Democratizing the appointment of the Commission president is bound to have repercussions on the whole institutional system’ (Coussens and Crum 2003: 6). The logic of this position is that a more democratically
254
Where Can Leadership Come From?
accountable Commission would be more legitimate in the eyes of electors and hence more ‘authorized’ in its leadership role. Commentators are divided, however, as to exactly how the Commission as a whole, or simply its president, would be elected. Nonetheless, there is a recognition that ‘the Brussels executive cannot continue indefinitely to have a purely technocratic role’ and that there is a need (through politicization) ‘to get the adhesion of our citizens to the process’ (David O’Sullivan, secretary general of the Commission, quoted in Smith 2004: 49). In other words, ‘followers’ have to be more closely bound to ‘leaders’ and vice versa. Significantly, the electoral dimension featured prominently in the appointment procedure outlined in article 1–27 of the Constitutional Treaty—both in the implied linkage between the outcomes of EP elections and the ‘election’ of the president (the word ‘election’ was already used in the EP’s Rules of Procedure (2004: Rule 98)). The linkage between the ‘election’ of the president and EP elections was clearly seen by some commentators as having the potential to ‘make European elections more interesting, mitigate concerns about the accountability of the European Commission and enhance its legitimacy’ (Smith 2004: 33). In turn it has been maintained that enhanced legitimacy and electoral accountability would increase the Commission’s leadership capacity. A variety of alternative methods of electing the Commission and/or its president have been canvassed (for a summary see ibid. 39–52), but a common feature is the expectation that the accountability of the Commission would be increased (see Bogdanor 2007). It is not the intention here, however, to review the debate about authorization through appointment; other than to note that, without a seismic shift in the balance between national and EU party politics, without the linkage of the presidency appointment process to the partisan composition of the EP, and without the development of European-wide ‘mandates’ and ‘manifestos’— such authorization, in the sense of the electoral connection of the presidency of the Commission to a parliamentary majority, is likely to remain an aspiration rather than a practical reality (see Judge and Earnshaw 2003: 313). What should also be noted about the notion of prior authorization is the idea that the responsibility of the Commission to the EP extends beyond the simple ‘control’ of executive personnel—through formal powers of dismissal and appointment—to include the capacity to influence and legitimize the Commission’s policy agenda. Of particular significance to the discussion at this point is the fact that the Maastricht Treaty synchronized the Commission’s term of office with that of Parliament. After Maastricht the appointment of the president, and of the Commission as a whole, now coincided with that of a new parliament. The intention was that the coterminous periods of office of the EP and the Commission would facilitate not only parliamentary
European Parliament
255
scrutiny and control and increase the Commission’s accountability to Parliament, but would also encourage the ‘prior authorization’ of the Commission’s programme. ‘Prior authorization’ takes several forms. The first stems from the logic of ‘control through selection’. The reasoning is simple in that it was believed that the post-Maastricht selection process would increase not only the EP’s influence over who was appointed as president (and subsequently as commissioners, and to which specific portfolios) but also that it would enhance Parliament’s impact on the Commission’s policy agenda by securing the ‘prior authorization’ of the executive’s programme. Paradoxically, the logic of maximized parliamentary control over the Commission’s agenda rested in a further ‘presidentialization’ of the Commission itself under the Amsterdam Treaty. Article 219 states that the ‘Commission shall work under the political guidance of its President’. In effect there are both positive and negative dimensions to such ‘political guidance’. Perhaps not surprisingly, given the events surrounding the resignation of the Santer Commission, the negative dimension of individual resignations and the individual responsibility of commissioners preoccupied much of the subsequent debate (see Judge and Earnshaw 2002). However, the positive dimension of presidential ‘political guidance’ was incorporated in a new right conferred by the Amsterdam Treaty on the president to agree or disagree by ‘common accord’ [article 214] on member states’ nominees for Commission posts. Furthermore, Declaration 32 to the Treaty also recorded that ‘the President of the Commission must enjoy broad discretion in the allocation of tasks within the College, as well as in any reshuffling of those tasks during a Commission’s term of office’. From the EP’s perspective, such enhanced presidential authority contributed to a further incremental increase of parliamentary influence over the Commission (see Spence 2000: 5–6). A second dimension of ‘prior authorization’ is the acceptance of the Commission’s policy programme by a parliamentary majority. While the importance of the annual programme should not be exaggerated, it does provide the Commission with ‘some manoeuvrability . . . to prioritise and bring forward new initiatives and give impetus to existing ones’ (Nugent 2001: 224). The significant point for the present discussion, therefore, is that the Commission has agreed with the EP, in successive Framework Documents, procedures for cooperation over legislative planning. Thus, for example, Article IV of the 2005 Framework Agreement stated that: ‘An incoming Commission shall present, as soon as possible, its political and legislative programme’; and that the two institutions would agree a timetable for its preparation, and that ultimately ‘The Commission shall take into account the priorities expressed by Parliament’ (PE 355.690 2005: 16). In this manner Parliament sought to assist
256
Where Can Leadership Come From?
the Commission to identify ‘its’ priorities and so frame the broader policy agenda. Significantly, the new Agreement brought into stark relief the conundrum, identified above, of maintaining the EU’s institutional balance while strengthening the leadership potential of a more ‘parliamentarized’ Commission. Indeed, so great was the concern of COREPER about the nature of the Agreement that it made the immediate, and unprecedented, recommendation that Council should state publicly that: several provisions of the new framework agreement seek to bring about, even more markedly than the framework agreement of 2000, a shift in the institutional balance resulting from the Treaties in force . . . The Council stresses that the undertakings entered into by these institutions cannot be enforced against it in any circumstances. It reserves its rights and in particular the right to take any measure appropriate should the application of the provisions of the framework agreement impinge upon the Treaties’ allocation of powers to the institutions or upon the institutional equilibrium that they create. (European Union 2005: 1)
THE ‘POLICY THING’ Implicit within the preceding discussion is the fact that leadership in the EU is often plural rather than singular. It is invariably about one or more institutions forming ‘leadership coalitions’ or ‘entrepreneurial coalitions’ (Zito 2000: 39– 45), or transgovernmental bargaining among member states (Janning 2005: 821–33), or ‘managing networks’ (Schout and Jordan 2005: 210) or combinations of these modes, to generate new policy initiatives or to prompt a realignment of interinstitutional interactions. This is in contrast to ‘autonomous policy leadership’ and the ‘passionate commitment to a . . . policy quest’ (Wallis and Dollery 1997: 19). When it comes to ‘policy leadership’, therefore, it is unrealistic to expect a singular EU institution to offer or provide undifferentiated, unmediated leadership across the range of EU policies. This is certainly the case with the European Parliament. Generally, the contribution of the EP to the EU’s policy process is variegated (see Judge, Earnshaw, and Cowan 1994; Burns 2005). The Parliament’s capacity to influence EU policy outputs is contingent on, amongst other things, policy type; the extent of intergovernmentalism (determined by treaty base and decisional rules); the nature of inter-institutional relations; institutional resources; the variability of legislative coalitions within
European Parliament
257
the EP; and the coherence of its legitimation strategy (see respectively Burns 2005: 485–503; Shackleton 2000: 338; Hix, Noury, and Roland 2004: 209– 34; Rittberger 2005: 184). Specifically, the capacity to exert policy leadership, in the form of policy entrepreneurship, depends upon the EP ‘steering’ broader networks/coalitions in directions in which they would not necessarily have ventured or at a pace they would not necessarily have chosen for themselves. If policy entrepreneurship is limited to the formative stages of EU policy, then several commentators are less than convinced that the EP is capable of providing sustained leadership (for a typical example see McCormick 2001: 114–16). However, if policy entrepreneurship is the ability to ‘sell ideas’ and so generate a new agenda, on the one hand, or, to repackage and reconstitute existing ideas and policies, on the other, into something qualitatively different and, hence, ‘new’, then the EP has a claim to have exerted policy leadership in environmental policy (just as it has in other policy areas; see, for one apparently unlikely example, Roederer-Rynning (2003) ). But the ‘first puzzle’ is to explain ‘the substantial policy influence’ of a number of actors (of which the EP is one) normally not accorded much importance in (integrationist) accounts’ (Zito 2000: 4). While the EP has been treated traditionally as a ‘lesser actor’ (along with smaller member states) it has, nonetheless, ‘performed the important leadership role’ in certain areas of environmental policy (ibid.). This view finds corroboration in Lenschow’s (2005: 315–16) statement that: ‘Traditionally the EP has been the “greenest” of the three main policy-making bodies. . . . Even prior to its direct election it had pushed the Commission to propose environmental policy.’ In part, this has been due to ‘agency’—to the commitment of environmentally minded MEPs, acting both individually and collectively in the institutional form of the Commission’s Environment Committee (see Judge 1993: 209). In part, in the early days, this was because of the nature of environmental issues and the policy space open to EU interventions. In part, also, it was because of the linkage between the promotion of environmental initiatives and the institutional status of the EP at any given time. Indeed, Jordan (2002: 111) makes this connection in his observation that there is ‘no distinction between “high” politics of treaty negotiation and “low” politics of daily policy-making; the two are reciprocally and recursively interconnected’ (ibid.). This point is reinforced in Jordan’s statement that: ‘As the most environmentally ambitious institution’ the EP has used ‘new institutional rules to strengthen EU environmental policy’ (ibid. 24). Yet there remains the puzzle that, despite the leadership role of the EP in certain areas of environmental policy and at certain times, in other policy areas and at other times, its capacity to influence the direction of policy has been
258
Where Can Leadership Come From?
limited (see Chapter 4, above). One explanation is that in ‘heavily technical subjects’ Parliament is limited to a more reactive role simply because it ‘lacks sufficient expertise and policy-making resources to innovate in the technical areas and, therefore, takes a reactive role’ (Zito 2000: 133–4). This loops back to McCormick’s (2001: 114) belief that on highly technical issues the EP will be confined to the role of follower rather than leader. In this respect Parliament’s capacity to ‘set’ policy is constrained by the decision processes and nature of inter-institutional bargaining associated with particular legislative proposals (see Peterson and Bomberg 1999: 16–24). In many technical areas (classification of hazardous waste etc.), Parliament is constrained to examining tightly bound legislative packages after technical solutions have been defined by experts in the Commission and in working groups of national experts. In other areas, however, the EP helps to ‘shape’ the broader contours of policy. One instance of this capacity to shape policy is provided by the development of the 2000 Water Framework Directive (WFD).
Shaping Policy: The Case of Water Policy Concern about the tendency of EU environment policy to develop in an ad hoc and disjointed fashion was articulated by the Commission in its 2005 proposal to pursue ‘thematic strategies’ on air pollution, the marine environment, the sustainable use of resources, waste and recycling, pesticides, soil, and the urban environment. As Environment Commissioner Dimas (2005: 1) admitted to his Commission colleagues, the thematic strategies were intended, rather belatedly, to move EU environment policy ‘from a complex array of individual pieces of legislation to policy and legal frameworks which can be adjusted flexibly in response to the changing state of the environment, technological progress and the geographic diversity of the enlarged Union’. Dimas added that the thematic strategies were intended to be the over-arching policy framework. Such a thematic approach is not, however, new to EU environment policy. The Commission claims, for example, that the groundbreaking 2000 Water Framework Directive (WFD) modernized water policy and encapsulated the imperative to streamline and update environment law, taking an integrated approach to water management. Indeed, the WFD has been used by the Commission to justify its move towards a thematic approach for other environmental programmes. The WFD came into force in 2000 and was transposed into law in EU member states in 2003. It is widely accepted by member states to be ‘the most substantial piece of EC water legislation to date’ (, accessed 10
European Parliament
259
December 2007). It established a new, integrated approach to the protection, improvement and sustainable use of Europe’s rivers, lakes, estuaries, coastal waters, and groundwater; and as such constituted ‘a substantial restructuring of EU water policy and legislation’ (, accessed 10 December 2007). What is notable for the purposes of the present argument, however, is that the WFD provides an example of sustained policy leadership by the EP and reflects the EP’s assumption of ‘leadership’ in EU water policy dating back to the early 1990s. In this decade Parliament’s leadership helped not only to ‘shape’ but also to ‘steer’ the direction of policy. Notably, it did so despite the Commission’s predilection at the time for developing water policy on the basis of incremental, separate, and, ultimately, disjointed legislative proposals. Evidence to support this claim can be found in the 1996 report from the EP’s Environment Committee on the Commission’s proposal to amend an existing directive on bathing water quality. The Committee’s rapporteur, Doeke Eisma (Liberal/ Netherlands), in presenting his report, noted how the EP had used its powers to delay scrutiny of the legislative proposal for over two years in order to press the Commission to establish a coherent legislative framework for water. With little exaggeration, he maintained that: ‘in these two and a half years we have completely revised the whole of the European policy on water’ (EP Debates, 11 December 1996). Indeed, the EP had outlined its ultimate objective—of securing recognition by the Commission of the need for a framework directive on water policy— in a further report in November 1996 which called for: ‘consolidation, simplification and standardisation of water legislation on the basis of a global approach . . . designed principally to eliminate the fragmentation, disaccord and contradictions in the existing and proposed directives on the subject’ (PE 218.545 1996; on the failings of extant legislation see Haigh 2003: 9/4.15). In fact, Parliament’s activism on the need for coherence in water policy had its roots even earlier. In 1988 the EP passed a resolution on the implementation of water legislation, which set out much of the logic to be found in the WFD. As the Parliament’s rapporteur Karl Heinz Florenz (EPP/ Germany) reminded the Commission in 1996: We realized a long time ago that water policy in Europe is a rather hit-and-miss affair, and there is no point in continuing to draw up reports on groundwater, surface water or bathing water if we do not have at least a basic water policy at Union level . . . we need some kind of framework programme to form the basis of our future water policy. . . . we reached a sort of agreement with the Commission that you would provide a written assurance that you will include this new combined approach of emission standards and quality objectives in the framework directive to be drafted over the next
260
Where Can Leadership Come From?
few months. We are delighted that you are prepared to do so, since these are the very building-blocks on which our water policy needs to be based. (EP Debates, 22 October 1996)
Environment Commissioner Bjerregaard’s response to Parliament acknowledged that an integrated approach to water policy was needed, including a fundamental review of the instruments used by the EU to protect and maintain water quality (EP Debates, 22 October 1996). In early 1997 the Commission eventually submitted its WFD proposal. While the processing of the proposal led to significant inter-institutional conflicts—both substantive and procedural—Commissioner Bjerregaard confirmed, nonetheless, the leadership contribution of the EP on this issue: ‘Parliament has taken the reform of water policy very seriously, and I would like to take this opportunity to praise the substantial and very positive influence which Parliament has had both with regard to starting the reform and developing it further.’ (EP Debates, 10 February 1999, emphasis added).
Following Followers: Leadership from Behind A somewhat different form of ‘steering capacity’ was visible during the processing of the biotechnology patenting proposal (eventually adopted as Directive 98/44/EC, OJ L213, 30 July 1998: 13–21). The initial, highly controversial, proposal was perceived by the Commission to be ‘largely technical in character’ (Commissioner Mario Monti, quoted in Earnshaw and Wood, 1999: fn. 8). Clearly, this was an interpretation not shared by MEPs, or by large numbers of campaigning organizations opposed to gene patents, and contributed to the rejection by the EP of the first proposal in March 1995. This rejection forced the Commission, admittedly only belatedly, to accept that EU legislation on biotechnology patenting was far from being simply a technical issue revolving around the intricacies of intellectual property (IP) law. Instead, other intensely contested and, hence, political issues had to be taken into consideration. These included the ethics of human cloning, modifying the germline genetic identity of human beings, using human embryos for industrial purposes, and animal welfare, as well as the social and economic implications of IP rules in modern biotechnology. Specifically, the EP succeeded in incorporating into EU law the evaluation of ‘all ethical aspects of biotechnology’ by the EU’s ethics committee (article 7, Directive 98/44/EC). Before the biotechnology patenting proposal MEPs had been active, informally, in pressing the Commission to address the ethical issues raised by biotechnological advances. In 1991 the Commission, led by President Delors,
European Parliament
261
had acknowledged the need to confront these issues through the creation of a Group of Advisers on the ethical implications of biotechnology. Yet, it was not until the 1998 directive that the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies (EGE), which had developed out of the Group of Advisers, was effectively institutionalized in ‘biotechnology governance’. Notably, the EGE openly acknowledged the significant contribution of the EP in its institutional development: ‘the existence of the EGE was enshrined in law as a result of a parliamentary amendment during the adoption of the Directive on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions’ (EGE 2000: 8). In this manner, the EP helped to reformulate the agenda to include the ‘political’ and ‘ethical’ concerns of ‘followers’—of ordinary citizens and organized publics— who had been excluded initially from the ‘shaping’ of policy on biotechnology patenting. The fact that these concerns were many, varied, and inherently conflictual (in the sense that there were manifest ideological and partisan divisions within the EP itself, which reflected much broader, fundamental divisions within organized publics in the EU) prompted the EP, as part of its strategy for agreeing to the proposal, to press a compromise upon the Council and the Commission. This compromise, to give bioethics formal institutional recognition in the EU, was initially unacceptable to both institutions. Exactly how, and the conditions under which, the EP fulfilled this entrepreneurial role are beyond the scope of the present discussion (see Earnshaw and Wood 1999: 294–307; Judge and Earnshaw 2003: 260–1). Importantly, however, the EP served as the primary arena for deliberation on the ethical dimensions of the draft directive. It connected the broader political concerns of ‘followers’ to the technical perspectives of ‘leaders’ in the field of biotechnology; and transformed the future agenda of biotechnology policy to include consideration of bioethics.
CONCLUSION If the preceding discussion has brought the EP into the discussion of leadership in the EU, the EP still languishes at the peripheries of that discussion. The focus of most academic analyses remains the Commission, Council, European Council, and member-state governments. All that is being claimed here, therefore, is that the EP has a historic right to be considered alongside these other institutions in providing vision, accountability, and policy direction. That it has not done so consistently and comprehensively is not in dispute. Nonetheless, the EP has participated in leadership coalitions in the past and is likely to provide leadership in the future.
262
Where Can Leadership Come From?
The certainty of this last phrase is based upon the factors helping to explain the leadership role in the past. In terms of the ‘vision thing’, the EP has offered grand visions at times of sclerosis or indeterminacy arising from reconstitutions of leadership coalitions among member states. The uncertainties surrounding changes to the Constitutional Treaty post-2005 have, for example, provided a ‘window of opportunity’ in which the EP sought to sketch a broad brush-stroke picture of a more democratic Europe. Alone among the EU institutions, the EP has the legitimate claim, based upon Europe-wide elections, to advance a supranational democratic vision. It claimed for itself a ‘major role . . . as a precursor, an initiator and a source of inspiration at what is a decisive stage in the process of European Integration’ (PE 335.142 2004: 15). It also asserted for itself a ‘leading role in the European dialogue’ (PE 364.708 2005: 6–7) in the ‘period of reflection’ occasioned by the rejection of the Constitutional Treaty in France and the Netherlands. In identifying itself as being of ‘critical importance’ in promoting the engagement of citizens and national representative institutions ‘to clarify, deepen and democratise’ the public debate about the future of European integration (PE 364.708 2005: 5) the EP launched a series of deliberative forums in 2006. These included two joint parliamentary meetings of European and national parliamentarians in May and December to consider the ‘Future of Europe’ and a series of ‘citizens forums’. The identified need for a coordinated and meaningful dialogue between leaders and led was perhaps recognition by MEPs that, in their desire to lead other EU leaders in the Constitutional Convention, they had become disconnected from ‘followers’. Significantly, Hans-Gert Pöttering, in his inaugural programme speech as President of the European Parliament in February 2007 (www.europarl. europa.eu/president/defaulten_mac.htm accessed 10 December 2007), made clear that: ‘The European Union needs a new departure, a renewal. . . . Leadership is expected of us as politicians.’ He also emphasized that ‘we must not allow there to be any doubt about this: the European Parliament stands by the Constitutional Treaty’, and that the European Parliament must be appropriately involved in translating the Treaty into ‘a legal and political reality’. But, in doing so, Pöttering also recognized that: ‘we must convince the public of our actions’ and that ‘we need a new pact between the citizens of Europe and their political institutions in the European Union’. There was a need, in other words, to grow ‘followership’ within the EU. Similarly, in terms of the ‘accountability thing’, the promotion of the linkage of elected leaders to their ‘followers’ in the demoi of the EU will continue to guide the EP’s institutional vision in the twenty-first century. The EP has consistently ‘made the case for better democratic control and accountability at European level’ (PE 347.119 2004: 13) and will continue to do so
European Parliament
263
in the future. Already, despite a firmer grip on the tiller (to continue the ‘steering’ metaphor) of the selection of the Commission president, the EP envisages further increments of Commission accountability. Andrew Duff (ALDE/UK) noted, for example, in his report for the Constitutional Affairs Committee on the guidelines for the approval of the European Commission that: it is clear that there is room for considerable improvement in the procedures if we are to ensure in the future a greater degree of fairness between the candidates, a more robust dialogue between the Commission and the Parliament, and a sharper verdict. In any case, some revision will be required to reflect the greater powers the Parliament will enjoy once the Constitution is in force. (PE 355.359 2005: 15)
This inbuilt dynamic for institutional reinvigoration also finds reflection in the ‘policy thing’. The EP pursues a constant quest for participation in the full range of EU competences in which it can aspire to shape policy. Yet, even after the Constitutional Treaty, the EP would still remain a vocal spectator in many policy areas, shouting at the main players from the treaty prescribed sidelines and desperate to change the rules of the game to enable the playing field to be expanded to include direct parliamentary participation. Perhaps the most obvious example is the area of European Security and Defence. This is claimed to be the ‘last major “construction site” in the building of the European Union’ (PE 341.376 2004: 44) and is an area from which the EP has traditionally been excluded (see Chapter 7, above). Even here, however, the EP seeks to carve out a potential leadership role by stressing the notion of the ‘democratization’ of policies. It propounds the normatively unassailable position (see Lord and Beetham 2001; Rittberger 2004; Maurer, Kietz, and Völkel 2005) that ‘European security and defence policy requires wide parliamentary legitimization’ (PE 341.376 2004: 44). This general claim of ‘legitimization’ has enabled the EP ‘to gain considerable ground’ already in the strongly intergovermentalist area of Common Foreign and Security Policy (Maurer, Kietz, and Völker 2005: 4). These gains have been made on the basis that ‘in all EP documents, the prevailing belief is that according to “the principles of parliamentary democracy, which are amongst the most fundamental values of the EU”, only the EP’s participation supplies European foreign policy with sufficient democratic legitimisation’ (ibid. 16). The certainty is that the EP will seek to secure greater transparency and accountability in these areas in the future (as it has in other areas in the past), and it will use creative procedures (of internal rules of procedure, inter-institutional agreements, etc. (see Kietz and Maurer 2007) ) to extend parliamentary competencies and, ultimately, to claim a role in ‘steering’ EU policies. In advancing this claim the EP will simply be guided by the recognition that legitimate ‘leadership’ requires informed
264
Where Can Leadership Come From?
and participative ‘followership’. Whereas other EU institutions can provide the former, only a directly elected supranational institution can offer the prospect of securing the latter.
REFERENCES B, D. (2005) The Dynamics of European Integration: Why and When EU Institutions Matter. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. B, V. (2007) Legitimacy, Accountability and Democracy in the European Union. London: Federal Trust. B, C. (2005) ‘Who Pays? Who Gains? How do Costs and Benefits Shape the Policy Influence of the European Parliament?’, Journal of Common Market Studies 43/3: 485–505. C, F., H, M., J, F., and J, J. P. (1986) The European Union Treaty: Commentary on the Draft Adopted by the European Parliament on 14 February 1984. Oxford: Clarendon. C, M. (1996) The European Commission: Leadership, Organisation and Culture in the EU Administration. Manchester: Manchester University Press. C, R. (1998) The European Parliament’s Role in Closer EU Integration. Houndmills: Macmillan. J, F., and S, M. (2005) The European Parliament. 6th edn. London: John Harper. C, W., and C, B. (2003) ‘Towards Effective and Accountable Leadership of the Union: Options and Guidelines for Reform’, EPIN Working Paper 3. Brussels: European Policy Institute Network. S, P. (2006) ‘The European Council’, in J. Peterson and M. Shackleton, The Institutions of the European Union. 2nd edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press. D, S. (2005) Thematic Strategies for the Environment: The Next Generation of Environment Policy. Briefing Note for the College of Commissioners, July 2005. Brussels: European Commission. D, D. (1999) Ever Closer Union: An Introduction to European Integration, Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. (2003) ‘How Did We Get Here’, in E. Bomberg and A. Stubb, The European Union: How Does it Work? Oxford: Oxford University Press. (2004) ‘Reconstituting Europe’, in M. Green Cowles and D. Dinan (eds.), Developments in the European Union. 2nd edn. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. D, F. (1994) Jean Monnet: The First Statesman of Interdependence. New York: W. W. Norton.
European Parliament
265
E, D., and W, J. (1999) ‘The European Parliament and Biotechnology Patenting: Harbinger of the Future?’, Journal of Commercial Biotechnology 5/4: 294– 307. EGE (2000) General Report on the Activities of the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies to the European Commission, 1998–2000, European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies, Brussels (available at , accessed 10 December 2007). E P (1994) Draft Treaty Establishing the European Union. Luxembourg: European Parliament. (2001) Resolution on the Treaty of Nice and the Future of Europe, adopted 31 May 2001, A5-0168/2001. Brussels: European Parliament. (2001) Rules of Procedure. 15th edn. Brussels: European Parliament. (2004) Rule of Procedure. 15th edn. Brussels: European Parliament. E U Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe, OJ C310, 47, 16 December. Brussels: European Union. (2005) Council Statement Concerning the Framework Agreement on Relations between the European Parliament and the Commission, OJ C161, 48, 1 July. Brussels: European Union. F, H., and H, A. (2003) ‘Formal and Informal Institutions under Codecision: Continuous Constitution Building in Europe’, Governance 16/4: 577–600. H, E. B. (1958) The Uniting of Europe: Political, Social and Economic Forces 1950– 1957. Stanford Calif.: Stanford University Press. H, N. (2003) Manual of Environmental Policy: The EU and Britain. London: Maney Publishing. H, S. (2002) ‘Constitutional Agenda Setting Through Discretion in Rule Interpretation: Why the European Parliament Won at Amsterdam’, British Journal of Political Science 32/2: 259–80. N, A., and R, G. (2004) ‘Power to the Parties: Cohesion and Competition in the European Parliament, 1979–2001’, British Journal of Political Science 35/2: 209–34. J, J. (2005) ‘Leadership Coalitions and Change: The Role of States in the European Union’, International Affairs 81/4: 821–33. J, A. (2002) The Europeanization of British Environmental Policy: A Departmental Perspective. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. J, D. (1993) ‘ “Predestined to Save the Earth”: The Environment Committee of the European Parliament’, in D. Judge (ed.), A Green Dimension for the European Community. London: Frank Cass. (1999) Representation: Theory and Practice in Britain. London: Routledge. E, D. (2002) ‘The European Parliament and the Commission Crisis: A New Assertiveness?’, Governance 15/3: 345–74. (2003) The European Parliament. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan.
266
Where Can Leadership Come From?
J, E, D., and C, N. (1994) ‘Ripples or Waves: The European Parliament in the EC Policy Process’, Journal of European Public Policy 1/1: 27–52. K, D., and M, A. (2007) ‘The European Parliament in Treaty Reform: Predefining IGCs through Interinstitutional Agreements’, European Law Journal 13/1: 20–46. K, A. (2005) ‘Political Representation in Leader Democracy’, Government and Opposition 40/3: 358–78. L, A. (2005) ‘Environmental Policy: Contending Dynamics of Policy Change’, in H. Wallace, W. Wallace, and M. A. Pollack (eds.), Policy-Making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. L, J. (1984) ‘European Union and the First Elected European Parliament: The Spinelli Initiative’, Journal of Common Market Studies 22/4: 377–402. L, C., and B, D. (2001) ‘Legitimizing the EU: Is there a “PostParliamentary Basis” for its Legitimation?’, Journal of Common Market Studies 39/3: 443–62. L, A. (2003) ‘Delegation and its Perils’, in K. Strøm, W. C. Müller, T. Bergman, Delegation and Accountability in Parliamentary Democracies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. MC, J. (2001) Environmental Policy Making in the European Union. Houndmills: Macmillan. (2005) Understanding the European Union: A Concise Introduction. 3rd edn. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. M, P. and N, K. (2004) ‘The European Convention: Bargaining in the Shadow of Rhetoric’, West European Politics 27/3: 381–404. M, A., K, D., and V, C. (2005) ‘Interinstitutional Agreements in the CFSP: Parliamentarisation through the Backdoor?’, Institute for European Integration Research Working Paper Series 5. Vienna: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. M, W. C., B, T., and S, K. (2003) ‘Parliamentary Democracy: Promise and Problems’, in K. Strøm, W. C. Müller, T. Bergman, Delegation and Accountability in Parliamentary Democracies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. N, N. (2001) The European Commission. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. PE 218.545 (1996) Report Concerning the Commission Communication to the Council and the European Parliament on European Union Water Policy, Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Protection, A4-0290/1996. Brussels: European Parliament. 303.546 (2001) Report on the Treaty of Nice and the Future of Europe, Committee on Constitutional Affairs, A5-0168/2001. Brussels: European Parliament. 323.600 (2003) Report on the Draft Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe and the European Parliament’s Opinion on the Convening of the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC), Committee on Constitutional Affairs, A5-0299/2003. Brussels: European Parliament.
European Parliament
267
335.142 (2004) Overview of the Work of Committee on Constitutional Affairs (July 1999–April 2004), Directorate-General for EU Internal Policies. Brussels: European Parliament. 341.376 (2004) Activity Report 5th Legislature (1999–2004), Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defence Policy, Directorate-General For External Policies of the Union. Brussels: European Parliament. 347.119 (2004) Report on the Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe, Committee on Constitutional Affairs, A6-0070/2004. Brussels: European Parliament. 355.359 (2005) Report on Guidelines for the Approval of the European Commission, Committee on Constitutional Affairs, A6-0179/2005. Brussels: European Parliament. 355.690 (2005) Report on the Revision of the Framework Agreement on Relations Between the European Parliament and the European Commission, Committee on Constitutional Affairs, A6-0147/2005. Brussels: European Parliament. 364.708 (2005) Report on the Period of Reflection: The Structure, Subjects and Context for an Assessment of the Debate on the European Union, Committee on Constitutional Affairs. Brussels: European Parliament. P, J., and B, E. (1999) Decision-Making in the European Union. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. S, M. (2006) ‘The EU’s Institutions: An Overview’, in J. Peterson and M. Shackleton (eds.), The Institutions of the European Union. 2nd edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press. P, H. (1967) The Concept of Representation. Berkeley: University of California Press. R, B. (2004) ‘The Politics of Democratic Legitimation in the European Union’, Nuffield College Working Papers in Politics, 2004-W4 (available at <www.nuff.ox.ac.uk>). (2005) Building Europe’s Parliament: Democratic Representation Beyond the Nation-State. Oxford: Oxford University Press. R-R, C. (2003) ‘From ‘Talking Shop’ to ‘Working Parliament’? The European Parliament and Agricultural Change’, Journal of Common Market Studies 41/1: 113–35. S, M. (2003) Democracy. Cambridge: Polity. S, A., and J, A. (2005) ‘Coordinating European Governance: SelfOrganizing or Centrally Steered’, Public Administration 83/1: 201–20. S, J. A. [1943] (1976) Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. London: George Allen & Unwin. S, M. (2000) ‘The Politics of Codecision’, Journal of Common Market Studies 38/2: 325–42. S, J. (2004) Reinvigorating European Elections: The Implications of Electing the European Commission. London: Royal Institute of International Affairs. S, D. (2000) ‘Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose? Attempting to Reform the European Commission’, Journal of European Public Policy 7/1: 1–25.
268
Where Can Leadership Come From?
W, J., and D, B. (1997) ‘Autonomous Policy Leadership: Steering a Policy Process in the Direction of a Policy Quest’, Governance 10/1: 1–22. W, M. (1994) A Modern Guide to the European Union. London: Pinter. G, D. (2005) The Council of the European Union. 2nd edn. London: John Harper. Z, A. R. (2000) Creating Environmental Policy in the European Union. Houndmills: Macmillan.
14 Beyond the Rotating Presidency Adriaan Schout
The presidency of the Council of Ministers is probably one the leastresearched elements in EU decision-making. Only recently has a stream of research come to life (Wurzel 1996; Schout 1998; Elgström 2003; Tallberg 2004; Schout and Vanhoonacker 2006). One research question concerns the influence of the presidency and, as Tallberg (2003) concludes, the scholarly literature is overwhelming sceptical about its significance, and also some interviewees presented the chair as powerless. Secondly, there is the question of whether its influence is a contribution or a hindrance. Practitioners and scholars alike can be wary of a ‘pushy’ chair (for a review see Schout 1998) and veterans in EU integration studies have stressed the advantages of a prudent chair (Ludlow 1995; Hayes-Renshaw and Wallace 1997: 146). Agendas may seem identical at a general level (Wurzel 1996) but the ambitions with individual topics and the strategies pursued clearly reveal the choices of chairmen. Presidency workshops, background studies, and informal ministerial meetings have had major impacts on future agendas (see e.g. IEEP 2005). Many policy EU innovations have happened thanks to the initiatives of the rotating chair. The EU’s Northern Dimension, integration of environment in ‘Lisbon’ and the incorporation of Schengen into the first pillar were pushed by presidencies that targeted these as priorities. Presidencies have greatly expanded the EU’s pallet of policies. Besides the landmark initiatives, less visible policies and ambitions can equally be related to strategic choices of presidencies such as the EU’s Kyoto agenda, the striving for higher environmental ambitions in the auto oil directive, or the deregulation of the plant health variety directive under British chairmanship. Every presidency left its marks. This influence goes much beyond moving issues up and down the agenda or added topics (see Tallberg’s agenda-setting and shaping influence (2003)). Importantly, many chairmen have shifted the focus in the negotiations to its preferred outcomes. It influences the tone of the negotiations, formulates the ambitions, and builds bridges (Schout and Vanhoonacker 2006). Presidencies can take things forward as the Irish showed in concluding the IGC in June
270
Where Can Leadership Come From?
2004, whilst bad presidencies may reinforce deadlocks (cf. the Italians on the IGC in December 2003 (Schout 2004); Chirac’s team in 2000 (Gray and Stubb 2001)). Even though seldom credited with it, the rotating presidency is one of the reasons why decision-making moves beyond lowest common denominators. It is hard to determine the influence of the presidency precisely. In interviews, officials stressed that 90 per cent of the agenda is given and pointed to other limitations. However, the interviews also showed the intrusive powers of focusing on specific topics or tilting outcomes towards deregulation. Without wanting to overstate its power in the complex EU negotiations, and given the many constraints, potentially the chair’s influence ranges from agendasetting to concluding technical negotiations. But resource constraints and the obligations vis-à-vis the rolling agenda impose limits and a need for careful priority setting and preparations (Schout and Bastmeijer 2003). The discussions on the Constitution have reignited debates about changing the EU’s presidency system. The invisibility of its contributions has made the debates about presidency reform deceptively simplistic. Most reform proposals were brief and quickly moved to solutions without much analysis of whether there are indeed problems, how proposals relate to the problems, whether they would create new problems and how they relate to reforms of other institutions (Schout and Vanhoonacker 2002). There is a widely shared feeling that the rotating presidency is no longer suitable. Governments have discharged the tasks with varying success. The inefficiency and approach of some chairs have been highly criticized (e.g. Gray and Stubb 2001). Arguments about enlargements and overloaded agendas are not new (Report of the Three Wise Men 1979) but the 2004 enlargement refuelled the debates. It became one of the most debated topics in the Convention (Hoffmann 2005). Blair’s statement that ‘we cannot go on like this’ summarizes the feelings well. Representing small countries, prime ministers Kok and Verhofstadt noted in the shadows of the Barcelona Summit (2002) that it is too much work. However, even though the presidency is widely perceived as a liability, sixteen countries opposed a permanent chair (Euroactive, 7 April 2003). The Laeken Declaration which provided the start of the Convention, specified that the EU should be made simpler, stronger, and closer to the public (European Council 2001). Based on interviews with key players from different member states (chairmen and coordinators at inter- and intra-ministerial level) and officials from the general secretariat, this chapter analyses the reform agenda and presents a model to structure the main arguments and to compare the proposals. There are many proposals and full discussion should cover the interdependence with reforms of the other institutions (as Chapter 7
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
271
deals with the second pillar, this chapter focuses on the first pillar). This chapter is not specifically tied to the reform discussions that characterize the start of this century. The debates have raged at least since the 1970s and whatever the outcome will be, there is little chance that it will be definitive (Schout and van Schaik, forthcoming). Institutional change has always been gradual and without end. The remainder of this chapter first unpacks ‘leadership’ into three basic roles. This offers a classification for the many tasks of the presidency. To complement these roles, we also address legitimacy considerations of leadership. This leads to our analytical model (Table 14.1) and criteria for discussing reforms. The third section discusses substantiation of the current dissatisfaction. Subsequently, using the model, the impact of the reforms on the three leadership roles and the chair’s legitimacy are assessed. The concluding section reviews the value of the proposals and their contribution to the Laeken objectives.
PRESIDENCY: TASKS AND ROLES The rotating presidency developed during the formative decades of the EU by default rather than by design (Westlake 1999) but the prospects of a Union of a dozen more countries instigated its crumbling. The conclusions of the European Council (2002) in Seville ended the traditional unity of the presidency with the creation of the team presidency. Specialized presidencies have been created (e.g. in the Euro-group) in the meantime and the draft Constitution added the Union Minister for Foreign Affairs and president of the European Council. Nevertheless, the rotating presidency has remained the dominant form for the time being in the first pillar. Due to the unplanned way in which the presidency emerged its duties are multifarious and not well defined.1 The Treaty establishing the European Community says little more than that the chair rotates and convenes meetings (articles 203, 204). In general, the chair has to help in finding common positions in the Council and to conclude negotiations between Council, Commission, and EP. This involves management and administration; shaping the agenda; point of contact; mediator and honest broker; initiator; representative functions (vis-à-vis EP and the international environment); ensuring of horizontal coordination with other policy fields. Behind these tasks lies a world of detail that chairs have to cover. Over time, Rules of Procedure of different kinds developed to constrain the governments (Hayes-Renshaw and Wallace 1997).
272
Where Can Leadership Come From?
These tasks can be presented at different levels of detail (General Secretariat 2000; the Council Rules of Procedure 2004). To get at the essence of the presidency, we group the various tasks into a limited number of roles. This tilts our analysis from focusing on many individual tasks to a more general discussion of leadership roles. Similarly, the Report of the Three Wise Men on the reform of the institutions (1979: 35) referred to the ‘dual role of organizational control and political impetus’. We separate the broker role from the organizational role and arrive at a set of three roles that the presidency has to juggle with (Schout 1998). In most negotiations, the chair’s activities encompass each of these. The roles have specific conceptual origins (Schout and Vanhoonacker 2006) and relate to three key aspects of leadership: task-oriented, group-oriented, and transformational leadership (Yukl 1998). Yukl’s presentation of the roles matches the organizer, broker, and political leadership roles (Table 14.1). Taskoriented leadership is about chairing efficiently as emphasized in the Rules of Procedure. It is highly demanding but, if all goes well, hardly noticed. However, if neglected—e.g. if papers are late—it causes a lot of frustration. Group-oriented leadership involves sounding out positions and finding common ground. Task-oriented leadership and group-oriented leadership aim at a common denominator and facilitating group processes irrespective of their quality. Transformational leadership is related to the level of ambition. It is longterm oriented and aims at finding new solutions. Political leadership implies adding issues to the agenda or settling negotiations from a different perspective. Examples include the efforts from the Dutch presidency to move large parts of Schengen into the first pillar (most member states were against this when the chair started to work on it), aiming at a deregulated outcome of the negotiations on a specific Directive (as happened in several working parties under British chairs) or raising awareness of relations with specific parts of the world (Finnish, Belgian, and Spanish presidencies have been active in this direction). This third role is not undisputed. As indicated above, some would prefer presidencies refraining from political leadership but governments want to use it to call attention to national issues and to their ambitions for the EU. Clearly, these are the more risky courses of action. Leadership is only effective if it is legitimate. Hence, we also examine how reform proposals affect the legitimacy of these roles. There are different kinds of definitions of legitimacy, some related to the quality of output (Majone 1996) while others focus on the wider design of the EU polity including visibility and democratic control (Weiler 1997; Scharpf 1999; see also Hoffmann 2005). The presidency plays a role in each of these aspects. We focus on the impact of the chair on transparency of the EU agenda, on the
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
273
quality of EU policies, and the ability of states to influence the EU agenda. The quality aspects link to the EU’s objectives to arrive at better consultation, simplification, and factual underpinning of policies (COM 2001; COM 2002). The three roles and the legitimacy aspects provide the framework for analysing reform processes (Table 14.1).
IS REFORM NECESSARY? It would be dangerous to discuss reform proposals before knowing what the problems are and whether these warrant reforms. The rotating presidency has been problematic at least since the middle of the 1970s. There is considerable continuity in the list of shortcomings and in the solutions. Discussions on enlargement and poor preparations in the Report of the Three Wise Men from 1979 read like many of the recent papers. Also the proposals have covered familiar themes such as lengthening the period, team presidencies, and measures to discipline member states (e.g. Tindemans 1976). Yet, not much has changed so far in the format of the presidency. At the end of the 1990s a number of proposals for reform emerged.2 The alleged shortcomings in the rotating system these tried to repair include: -
discontinuities of agendas, workload due to the growing agenda and increase in member countries, over-ambitious agendas and hobby horses, number of years between the presidencies of a member state, doubts about the abilities of the new countries, high costs.
Maybe more important for explaining the recent concerns is the—hardly discussed in public—fear of former East European and ‘micro’ countries representing the EU externally. These complaints have to be taken seriously. After a bad presidency, it is easy to find many highly frustrated national and European officials begging for change. Inefficient meetings are highly disruptive for all concerned. A single working party meeting easily affects hundreds of people (national and EU officials, MEPs, coordinators in the capitals, etc.). The lack of analysis of problems and alternatives led a senior official to conclude that the discussions are about ‘caricatures’ of the presidency. The debates have been more about the weaknesses of the rotating presidency and less about disadvantages of alternative systems. Moreover, a closer look at the complaints shows that they are overdone or that the problems can be
274
Table 14.1. Presidency roles
Focus
Broker Group-oriented leadership
Political leadership Transformational leadership
Planning Representation Drafting agendas of meetings (listing the agenda items) Chairing (i.e. organizing the debates) Preparing documents Mapping aspects of the topic Devising strategies for moving forwards Background studies Efficiency
Sounding out Creating a good atmosphere Creating understanding for each other’s problems Identifying mainstreams Identifying bargains and trade-offs Formulating compromises Serving group processes
Putting current discussions in a long-term perspective of EU challenges Steering debates in specific directions Convincing delegations to look beyond short-term or narrow interests Reducing frictions by recasting the debate in a long-term perspective Long-term objectives
Fairness in the search for a common position (preserving trust)
Legitimacy
Ensuring a transparent agenda Steering towards the objectives of better regulation Offering member states equal opportunity to influence the agenda (as part of bringing the EU close to the public)
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Tasks
Organizer Task-oriented leadership
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
275
solved. For example, the first Portuguese presidency was much better than the subsequent British presidency. The debates also largely ignored the strong aspects of rotation, such as the impact of presidencies on the Europeanization of administrations (e.g. investments in EU knowledge and upgrading of EU planning and coordination mechanisms; socialization of national officials and politicians in European cooperation). It is clear that there are, at times, shortcomings in carrying out the organizational, brokerage, and leadership roles. However, the arguments for change are not overly convincing. We will examine below whether the suggestions solve the problems or even create new ones.
THE CHANGE AGENDA ANALYSED The wealth of reform ideas makes any review here incomplete. It is also impossible to deal with the impact of reforms of the other institutions on the functioning and legitimacy of the Council presidencies (e.g. appointment of Commission president, smaller and stronger Commission, see Chapter 6, above). The analysis below picks up some of the main themes that have been around for many years and reappeared during the IGC2003/4 (see also HayesRenshaw and Wallace 1997: 155):3 • Long-term agenda (shared presidency). Allegedly, six months is insufficient to achieve results and leads to unstable agendas. The Seville conclusions cemented the cooperation between chairs and abolished the six-monthly agenda. This resulted in the annual agenda. Seville also introduced the threeyear agenda but hardly anyone found it important (see Schout 2004). In the meantime, the annual agenda has already been changed into a more flexible agenda of 18 months allowing presidencies to have their six-monthly agenda back again, and, moreover, the three-year-agenda has disappeared. This succession of changes seems symptomatic of the tinkering that takes place with presidency reform. It also shows the apparent stickiness of EU traditions and that the practical difficulties of the alternatives are easily ignored beforehand (Schout and van Schaik, forthcoming). • Sharing workload within the presidency team. Ideas for longer-term presidencies and sharing of workload have been around for decades. Following Seville, the IGC2003/4 agreed the possibility of an 18-month presidency in which the workload can be shared. In principle, each state chairs all configurations but the team may decide on alternative arrangements (Declaration on Article I/24(7) adopted by the IGC).
276
Where Can Leadership Come From?
• Permanent presidencies started to appear in Council formations (‘Mr Euro’) and expert meetings. The draft Constitution foresaw a president of the European Council and a Union minister of foreign affairs. The deputy secretary general, de Boissieu, noted that the general secretariat is better at chairing—implying a desire to move more tasks to this institution (European Voice 2001). The discussion below is limited to permanent chairs at the technical level and the president of the European Council. • Over the years, the presidency has been the target of additional rules of procedure (see Council Rules of Procedure 2004). These measures indicate a ‘banalisation’ or ‘decapitation’ of the rotating presidency (interviews with General Secretariat officials). The sensitivity of the debates in the Convention and IGC make it plausible that some sort of rotation will remain. But, given the limited success of earlier reforms, will the proposals actually be implemented effectively? Will presidencies indeed cooperate more? What support systems at EU and national level will the teams require? Since rotation remains, we have to see if, and how, the weaknesses of the presidency are now avoided. These proposals will be analysed below in relation to three roles, organizational and institutional requirements, legitimacy, and feasibility.
Team Presidency with Annual or Longer Agendas The 2002 Seville Conclusions introduced the annual and multi-annual agenda. The first annual programmes were from Greece-Italy; Ireland-The Netherlands; and Luxembourg-UK. One has to be careful with evaluating the contributions this has made in view of the differences in countries that have been in the chair and given the fact that—at the time of writing—we saw only presidencies with previous experience. Yet some patterns seem to be emerging. As regards the organizational role, even when there was the annual agenda, the countries have still more or less presented their own agendas for six months. These displayed remarkable continuity but some of this is cosmetic as the member states strike deals during the formulation of the longer-term agenda so that they can include their priorities while paying less attention to those of the partner. Moreover, shortly before the presidency, politicians still introduce new topics. Hence, annual agendas (or 18-monthly agendas) end neither discontinuities nor overload. A closer examination of the experience of the national presidency coordinators shows that the annual agenda made a difference as well as suffered from some important limitations. The annual agenda played a major role in
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
277
aligning it with previous and following presidencies. It gave Foreign Affairs a tool to further preparations and to limit all kinds of initiatives by pointing to the need to be consistent with the longer-term agendas. Moreover, it gave the presidency coordinators in the ministries additional weight and allowed them to call for attention to the presidency obligations early on in the preparations. The involvement of the secretariat and the foreign ministry acted as an early wake-up call and institutionalized preparations. However, this applies mainly to the ‘second’ presidency. Interviews show that the early warning worked less well for the first presidency. Hence, the effect on preparations is uneven within the team. Moreover, the prospects of an agenda of more than a year seem meagre. Interviewees underlined the uncertainties that grow with time and that depend on the record of the previous chairs, the Commission’s proposals and the extent to which ministers think ahead. In addition, governments still present their own agendas because they have to inform, and be accountable to, their national parliament. This easily develops into an updated version of the previously agreed annual agenda. Finally, the cooperation between the two (three since 2007) presidencies may be smooth but the cooperation between the annual agendas proved to be a lot more difficult. Hence, some organizational benefits may result especially for the second presidency in the team. The team agenda is an additional instrument in the presidency preparations but does not seem to be the crucial component that was missing. The organizational advantages will support the broker role. The longerterm preparations and the additional national control mechanisms (i.e. the national framework for preparing the presidency) will lead to a better awareness of what actions are suitable. The chairs are more exposed to EU colleagues and forced to discuss their strategies, moving them away from national priorities and styles. Also, individually as well as in combination with preceding and next presidencies, a chair may find it easier to focus discussions on the actual sticking points. The emphasis on the limitations of a six-month presidency underlines the hope that reformers have for more transformational leadership from an annual—or 18 monthly—outlook. It should reduce their stop–go nature and contribute to the chair’s independence. But, as discussed above, a longer-term presidency does not check the erratic behaviour of ministers. Hobbyhorses are likely to continue. Moreover, there is little reason to assume that states will work only with the presidencies in their team. Cooperation with likeminded countries over longer periods is likely to continue. Hence, the supposed gains are not convincing. Considering the impact the many presidency initiatives have had, this may be beneficial. Legitimacy may benefit from the transparency the annual agendas offer and the partners (EP, NGOs, member states, lobbyists) have somewhat more time
278
Where Can Leadership Come From?
to prepare themselves. Also, the longer-term agenda may support the efforts of the Commission to arrive at better inter-institutional cooperation with a view to creating more realistic agendas and more focus (Commission of the European Communities 2003). Moreover, individual presidencies may have less urge to get a long tally sheet and opt for presidency or Council conclusions because the team rather than individual presidency has to succeed. The flipside may be that with a more technical agenda (i.e. without the highly political Councils) agenda-setting becomes less transparent. National officials have already explained that Commission, EP, and Council (general secretariat and presidency) now get together and agree on priorities and approaches early on—focusing on key partners in the decision-making process—so that it is now much harder for others to steer outcomes. Shifting agenda-setting to ‘Brussels’ has its price. Furthermore, continuity and constraining hobbyhorses mean that governments can call less attention to specific problems or preferences. The capacity of the presidency to bring the EU close to national officials would disappear. There seem to be mainly organizational advantages related to preparation and professional running of meetings. Whether these will emerge also depends on whether the European Council and ‘high-politics’ remain a part of the rotating system (see below). Moreover, the reform ideas ensure neither continuity nor fewer hobbyhorses. Politicians can still inflate agendas in the months before the presidency. The interviews also show that major interand intra-ministerial planning capacities are required within the member states. Whether these will be available will very much depend on the political commitment of the leaders. Neither the secretariat nor anyone else will help— or press—governments to build these capacities. In any case, annual planning relates to the rolling agenda and not to the issues member states will want to raise additionally.
Team Presidency—Sharing the Workload Sharing workloads within teams has been at the forefront of the reform debates and aims at avoiding shifts in approaches and agendas. ‘Seville’ formalized the possibility to start earlier but Luxembourg already had much experience with such cooperation. The organizational advantages concern the continuity in chairs and management of the rolling agenda. Risk of issues moving up and down the agenda will be less and—among others— international cooperation will be dependent less on the interests of chairs. In addition, the workload is not much reduced, as chairs have to operate longer, but there will be less preparation and governments are less obstructed during
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
279
the presidency—a full presidency of six months can bring the national agenda to a stop. There is little chance that many governments will use this possibility—apart from the Luxembourg-type pragmatism that already exists. It is difficult to conceive a true team presidency in which Councils are distributed among the team members and important dossiers will hardly ever be shared. This would lead to major coordination costs between the member states if not outright fights over the major Councils (Schout and Vanhoonacker 2002). Hence, as in the draft Constitution, the rotating presidency will be responsible for all Councils without a hierarchy within the team. Secondly, in so far as presidencies of the new countries have yet thought about it (but only the bigger ‘new’ countries are lined up in the near future), they try to organize the work themselves relying on the secretariat for support. It could contribute to brokerage as the chair will be much more socialized in the EU debates and may become detached from national positions. However, brokerage may suffer due to the loss of time pressure (a deadline of six not eighteen months). Secondly, ‘new brooms sweep clean’. Council officials have often been happy with a new chair. Every six months a new lead gives fresh perspectives and new opportunities. The possibility to swap files more easily may contribute to legitimacy as states can avoid dossiers that could cause political problems at home. On the other hand, fragmentation may not help transparency and fights within the team may harm the image of an effective Union.
Permanent Chairs—Technical Level As the Economic Policy Committee shows, fixed chairs are not particularly new. Their use is increasing in sensitive areas such as employment and political cooperation (elected chairs and vice-chairs) and in highly technical areas such as data protection (chaired by the secretariat). The analysis of the organizational role overlaps with the longer-term chair issue but it has additional consequences for the EU’s brokerage capacity. It will be more difficult to mediate if others around the table do not have to chair themselves at some point. This will not contribute to a feeling of collective responsibility (Schout and Vanhoonacker 2002). Secondly, if this were also to apply to Councils, the meetings would become more bureaucratic and less effective without the minister, who can use his political weight. These separate and more bureaucratic structures might reduce the appeal and the transparency of the Union. Moreover, their activities would be less visible in discussions on presidency agendas in EP and national parliaments.
280
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Permanent Chairs—the President of the European Council (EC) Transforming the political apex would be a major breakthrough. The creation of the president of the EC has happened in parallel with the move towards the Union minister for foreign affairs and Mr Euro (see Chapter 7, above). The debate about the EC goes back at least to Tindemans (1976) and has been recurring ever since (Stuttgart Declaration 1983; Dooge Report 1985; Solana Report 2002). Apparent lack of organization, overload of agendas, and ill-prepared discussions begged for solutions (de Schoutheete and Wallace 2002). Moreover, team presidencies would be impossible to match with the European Council. No head of government would share this role or, in view of the workload, take it for more than six months. Being power related, the tasks and nationality of this position proved to be very sensitive during the 2003/4IGC. The responsibilities of this president could move beyond the EC and include horizontal coordination within the Council. However, the threat to national prerogatives limited the president’s tasks to the EC (excluding legal responsibilities). Moreover, the overall leadership within the Council is not likely to be concentrated at one point and fragmentation is likely to persist. The major contributions of the EC are providing impetus for the development of the Union and discussion of major policy issues (articles I-21, 22 of the Draft Constitution). The latter includes problem-solving and coordination between Councils, but the president will have to work closely with the rotating chair of the general affairs council. In the first pillar, similarly to the reforms mentioned, the main contribution seems to be in terms of organizational leadership. Major themes such as the Lisbon process or IGCs will benefit from continuous and consistent leadership but we have to bear in mind that Wurzel (1996) notes that there is already considerable continuity in terms of the agendas. Moreover, the different approaches may also have their benefits. For example, the emphasis of the Swedish presidency on the environmental component of the Lisbon process added colour to the objective of reinvigorating Europe’s economy. In interviews, national and EU officials reveal considerable doubts about the abilities of the EC president to provide continuity and consistency. Prime ministers from the rotating presidencies may not keep their hands off the European Council, especially when they have international aspirations. Secondly, there are coordination challenges to be expected. The EC president is supposed to cooperate closely with the Union minister for foreign affairs as both have external obligations. This resembles the tension between national prime ministers and foreign affairs ministers. However, these are still bound by
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
281
Cabinet. In the field of external relations, these coordination problems may go beyond the Council and affect the relations with the other commissioners with external relations related to trade, fisheries, etc. In addition, the EC president has to work closely with the Commission president. There is possibly also a very important effect on the organization of the presidency in general. With the removal of the major political functions (EC president, Mr Euro, Union minister for foreign affairs), governments may see the presidency as an administrative affair. Particularly, the EC presidency as the heart of each presidency and as major focus of evaluation, has stimulated governments to work hard. Without these functions, the presidency will be less of an issue for governments as a whole, less politically salient, and less interesting for parliaments. As a result, proactive political attention and incentives to invest in it may become limited. ‘Decapitation’ may mean better summits but at the price of less organization in the other areas. Brokerage will be an essential part of his brief in all fields (including foreign affairs). Whatever his considerable experience, he will be a Eurocrat nevertheless. He will represent ‘Brussels’ which makes him comparable to the president of the Commission amidst heads of state or government. The risk is that he will not be the primus inter pares. On top of this, the other heads of state no longer have to chair, so being uncooperative will be easier. Finally, the number of potential brokers will imply additional complications. Transformational leadership has been the essence of this body. Major initiatives in which summits were highly instrumental include the launching of the monetary union (Hanover 1988), enlargement (Copenhagen 1993 and the tumultuous meeting in December 2002) and integrating environment in EU policies (Schout and Jordan 2005). In view of its successes, Peterson and Bomberg (1999: 33) regard it as the ‘primary source of history making decisions’ (see also Ludlow 2002). Judging the consequences of reform for transformational leadership is not a straightforward matter as leadership, even at this level, has several origins. Commission presidents have exploited this meeting to float ideas. Delors used the European Council to get the Single European Act, monetary union, and the Delors packages off the ground (Hainsworth 1990). There may be a winning coalition if the EC and Commission presidents get along well. However, the federal-based Commission and the IGC-based EC may compete and complicate transformational leadership. With a fixed chair, the EC may be less inclined to fall victim to Euroscepticism. Similarly, an ‘overconfident’ rotating presidency may not be conducive to finding agreement (Quaglia 2004). However, the rotating presidency of the (European) Council has stimulated governments to provide transformational, organizational, and group-oriented leadership already in the years
282
Where Can Leadership Come From?
before their turn in office. At any one time, there are at least three presidencies preparing, providing background studies, contacting actors all across the EU, finding compromises, etc. This creates an enormous, albeit hardly visible, push to European integration. A fixed presidency removes considerable leadership capacity. Being a symbol of equality between small/big, rich/poor, and old/new countries will have a negative impact on legitimacy. Similarly, policy circuits will be even more concentrated in Brussels and may increase the distance to the public. Governments may lose a vital instrument for making their marks on EU integration or for raising national dilemmas. More than a symbol of equality, the presidency offered equal opportunities for initiatives. It was the forum for Finland to flag the northern dimension (Bengtsson, Elgström, and Tallberg 2004). Finally, a permanent chair may be more visible (Schoutheete and Wallace 2002: 21) but several presidencies simultaneously may decrease attention, nor should the importance of the visibility of a national head of government be downplayed.
Rules of Procedure The Report of the Three Wise Men (1979) led to a formalization of the planning and running of meetings. The rules of procedure have been adapted ever since and raised the expectations of good behaviour (compare the logic of appropriateness, Elgström 2003). The ‘dull procedural precisions’ present the organizational details (Council Guide 2000; General Secretariat of the Council 2003; Council Rules of Procedure 2004) but also restrain its responsibilities (Hayes-Renshaw and Wallace 1997: 139). To accommodate enlargement, the rules of procedure now emphasize limits to speaking time and negotiations outside the room and proscribes round tables (Schout, Guggenbühl, and Bayer 2004). These measures are primarily related to ensuring organizational efficiency. It is doubtful whether the 2003 version has really made much difference. As it appeared from interviews with chairmen, the emphasis on efficiency takes a lot of preparation in the form of sending out questionnaires, ‘massaging’ member states outside the meetings, building ex ante understanding for the selection of sticking points that will be discussed in the meetings, etc. Only a limited number of dossiers can benefit from such an approach. Moreover, the efficiency-oriented style may not suit each chairperson’s nature. More importantly, the interviews underlined the importance officials attach to grouporiented chairing including tours des tables and opportunities for expressing at length national frictions and sensitivities.
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
283
The practical constraints of group size, the limited number of suitable rooms, and scarce translation and interpretation resources made efficiency essential. However, careful planning does not seem to depend on rules of procedure (national officials and some secretariat officials were not even aware of them). What seems equally vital are the identification of priorities and preparations in the year before. Here the presidency stands mainly on its own. Despite its obligation to assist the presidency (art. III-344.2 of the draft Constitution; Declaration on article 1–24(7)), the general secretariat is too overloaded to help with preparations. Moreover, it shies away from sensitive tasks of ‘disciplining’ future presidencies. Hence, its services are limited to the running of the presidency and hardly concern the preparations.
CONCLUSIONS The presidency is an important actor in EU decision-making. Unpacking the notion of leadership, the presidency provides organizational, group-, and change-oriented leadership. These contributions influence speed, atmosphere, and direction. In this way, the presidency has greatly facilitated integration and been a major source of leadership. Due to the rotating presidency, there are at any time at least three countries working on moving negotiations forward, doing background studies, initiating policies, and devising new approaches for old problems. In addition, it contributes to legitimacy. There are also a great number of weaknesses associated with the rotating presidency and it has been the target of long-lasting reform debates, which seem to be focusing on its negative aspects. Moreover, the drawbacks have become distorted and a real reason for reform—the fear of small East European member states as presidency—has hardly been made explicit. The arguments for reform are therefore not overly convincing. The invisibility of the presidency’s contributions seems to have invited tinkering with the system. This chapter presented an assessment of some reform proposals. Based on Table 14.1, we examined the implications for the three leadership roles—task, group, and transformational—and for legitimacy. In addition, we raised the questions of what they would demand in terms of organizational support at national and EU levels and, having noted the limited impact of earlier adaptations, whether reforms would work this time. Despite apparent advantages especially of the organizational role, even this leadership aspect hardly seems to benefit from replacing the rotating system. Apart from the difficulties involved in foreseeing agendas sufficiently in advance and the urge of governments to present their own agendas, a very
284
Where Can Leadership Come From?
important obstruction will be the ‘decapitation’ of the presidency. Without full Cabinet support and push from national parliaments, the presidency of the Councils will attract less political attention and probably become just another—and inconspicious—task for governments. Even less attention and preparations may result (possibly leading to ever more calls for reform). Group-oriented leadership may gain from presidencies becoming more ‘European’ because they operate in teams for considerable periods and are less bound by national constraints. However, the chances of confusion between presidents and institutions may complicate brokering. Moreover, removing politicians from the scene reduces socialization and political pressure. In any case, the primus inter pares status of the rotating presidency disappears. There are also high risks involved for leadership and legitimacy. The total amount of transformation leadership diminishes considerably with the disappearing of the preparations of member states. Moreover, governments have fewer opportunities to call attention to national issues—one of the driving forces for previous changes. Moving beyond the rotating presidency therefore seems a risky business by creating half-way houses between rotation and fixed structures. There is no guarantee that the reforms will solve the alleged problems and new difficulties are highly likely. The proposals do not seem to advance the three leadership roles at all. As a result, they may not contribute to the simpler and stronger Union of ‘Laeken’. The Three Wise Men (1979) drew similar conclusions and therefore pleaded for strengthening instead of changing the system. This time the debates seem to have been more about fears of, among other things, micro-presidencies from Eastern Europe, and show a greater eagerness to search for political compromises. There has been little analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the alternatives. For example, subsidizing presidencies to live up to the high expectation of the office, has not been considered even though leadership is a collective good in which individual governments are less inclined to invest (Schout 2004). Moreover, the reforms seem to demand considerable organizational support at national and EU levels. Better preparation in teams and the translation of team-agendas into actions in the capitals require strong coordination between presidencies and between and within ministries. Given the sensitivities involved in discussing national coordination mechanisms, these capacities cannot be simply assumed, nor has the secretariat been able or willing to press governments to create the structures required for the presidency or to take preparations seriously. The secretariat is weak in supporting the crucial national preparations due to lack of resources and interest in designing new monitoring instruments such as benchmarking (ibid.). Particularly if the high-politics functions of the rotating presidency are removed, political
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
285
pressure from the secretariat will be necessary to ensure that member states take agenda-setting and preparations seriously. However, reform of the secretariat is hardly ever discussed—maybe because it is regarded as an administrative theme. Moving beyond the question of the rotating presidency, the need seems to be for more resources for the overstretched secretariat and for it to be involved more strongly in the preparations of presidencies.
NOTES 1. The section on the tasks and roles of the presidency is based on Schout and Vanhoonacker (2006). 2. Among the many others, the Trumpf-Piris Report (1999), Straw (2002), Chirac (2002), Solana (2002), Grant (2002), the Benelux paper from 8 may 2003. For a review see Schout and Vanhoonacker (2002). 3. There are many other ideas for reform, e.g. the option of commissioners chairing Councils (Notre-Europe 2002).
REFERENCES B, R., E, O., and T, J. (2004) ‘Silencer or Amplifier? The European Union Presidency and the Nordic Countries’, Scandinavian Political Studies 27/3: 311–34. C, J. (2002) Discours de Monsieur Jacques Chirac. Strasbourg: EP, Wednesday 6 March. C E C (COM) (2001) European Governance: A White Paper. Brussels: COM (2001) 428 final. (2002) European Governance: Better Lawmaking, Communication from the Commission. Brussels: COM (2003) 275 final. (2003) Better Lawmaking, Report from the Commission. Brussels: Com (2003) 770 final. C R P (2004) ‘Council Decision of 22 March 2004 adopting the Council’s Rules of Procedure’, Official Journal of the European Union, L 106/22, 15 April 2004. Dooge Report (1985) Report from the ad hoc Committee on Institutional Affairs to the European Council, Brussels, 29 and 30 March. E, O. (ed.) (2003) European Union Council Presidencies. A Comparative Perspective. London: Routledge. E C (2001) The Future of the European Union—Laeken Declaration. Laeken: European Council.
286
Where Can Leadership Come From?
E C (2002) Presidency Conclusions, Seville European Council, 21/22 June 2002, SN 200/1/02 Rev 1. E (2003) ‘16 Current and Future Member States Oppose Idea of EU President’. 7 April. <www.euroactive.com>. European Voice (2001) ‘Top official attacks the way governments conduct EU business’, 6–12 April. G S C (2000) Council Guide I: Presidency Handbook. Brussels. (2003) Guide for Producing Documents for the Council and its Preparatory Bodies. Brussels, 28 March. G, C. (2002) ‘Restoring Leadership to the European Council’, Bulletin, Centre for European Reform. April–May 2002. G, M., and S, A. (2001) ‘Keynote Article: The Treaty of Nice—Negotiating a Poisoned Chalice?’, Journal of Common Market Studies 39/s1: 5–23. H, S. (1990) Coming of Age: The European Community and the Economic Summit, Country Study 7. Toronto: University of Toronto, Centre for International Studies. H-R, F., and W, H. (1997) The Council of Ministers. New York: St Martin’s Press. H, L. (2005) ‘Making Europe Less Democratic—the New Permanent President of the European Council’, paper presented at the EUSA Conference, 31 March–2 April, Austin, Texas. IEEP (2005) Exploration of Options for the Implementation of the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) for Environmental Policy. Brussels: IEEP. L, P. (1995) Preparing for 1996 and a Larger European Union; Principles and Priorities. Brussels: CEPS Special Report 6. (2002) The Laeken Council. Brussels: EuroComment. M, G. (1996) Regulating Europe. London: Routledge. N-E (2002) A la recherche d’un gouvernement européen. Paris, September. P, J., and B, E. (1999) Decision-Making in the European Union. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. Q, L. (2004) ‘The Italian Presidency’, Journal of Common Market Studies 42/s1: 47–50. Report of the Three Wise Men: Report on European Institutions, presented by the Committee of Three to the European Council (1979) Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. S, F. W. (1999) Governing in Europe. Effective and Democratic? Oxford: Oxford University Press. S, A. (1998) ‘The Presidency as Juggler: Managing Conflicting Expectations’, Eipascope 2 (June): 2–10. (2004) ‘The Rotating Presidency: Governance without Governance’, paper presented at 2004 Maastricht Forum on European Integration—Making the Constitution Work, Maastricht: EIPA, 19 November.
Beyond the Rotating Presidency
287
B, C. (2003). ‘The Next Phase in the Europeanization of National Ministries: Preparing EU Dialogues’, Eipascope 1: 13–24. J, A. (2005) ‘Coordinated European Governance: Self-Organising or Centrally Steered?’, Public Administration 83/1: 201–20. S, L. (forthcoming) ‘Reforming the EU Presidency?’. V, S. (2002) ‘Naar een versterkt Voorzitterschap’, Internationale Spectator 56/6: 309–15. (2005) ‘Nice and the French Presidency’, in F. Laurson (ed.), The Treaty of Nice: Actor Preferences, Bargaining and Institutional Choice. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff. (2006) ‘Evaluating Presidencies of the Council of the EU Revisiting Nice’, in Journal of Common Market Studies (forthcoming). G, A., and B, N. (2004) ‘The Presidency in the EU of 25’, Eipascope (June). S, P., and W, H. (2002) The European Council. Paris: Notre Europe, Research and European Issues 19. S, J. (2002) Préparer le Conseil à l élargissement, Brussels: General Secretariat of the Council, 12 March (‘Solana Report’). S, J. (2002) Speech by the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw. The Hague: Instituut Clingendael, 21 February. T, J. (2003) ‘The Agenda-Shaping Powers of the EU Council Presidency’, Journal of European Public Policy 10/1: 1–19. (2004) ‘The Power of the Presidency: Brokerage, Efficiency and Distribution in EU Negotiations’, Journal of Common Market Studies 42/5: 999–1022. T, L. (1976) European Union, Report to the European Council. Brussels: Commission. ‘Trumpf-Piris Report’: Council of the European Union (1999) Operation of the Council with an Enlarged Union, Secretary-General of the Union, SN 2139/99, 10 March. W, J. (1997) Legitimacy and democracy of Union governance, in: Edwards, G., A. Pijpers, The Politics of the European Treaty Reform: the 1996 intergovernmental conference and beyond, London: Pinter. W, M. (1999) The Council of the European Union, London: John Harper. W, R. (1996) ‘The Role of the Presidency in the Environmental Field: Does it Make a Difference which Member State Runs the Presidency?’, Journal of European Public Policy, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 272–91. Y, G. (1998) Leadership in Organisations, Fourth ed. Upper Saddle River: PrenticeHall.
15 Collective Leadership in Leaderless Europe: A Sceptical View Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos
INTRODUCTION: COLLECTIVE LEADERSHIP AND POLITICAL DECISION-MAKING The purpose of this chapter is to assess the extent to which collective leadership is an option for the post-Convention European Union. It advances two arguments. First, the European Union is well suited to the establishment and the exercise of collective leadership, which it has never needed more than it does in the post-Nice era. Nevertheless, hopes for the provision of collective leadership are baseless or, at best, an expression of wishful thinking. Second, this is so because in the immediate post-Nice era the EU is lacking in terms of the three potential sources of such leadership, namely, a dominant common conception of material interests, an explicit and legitimate mobilizing set of ideas, and a robust and politically mature institutional arrangement. In the absence of these co-ordinating factors, the prospects for the establishment and the effective operation of collective leadership appear to be bleak. Collective leadership—leadership that is ‘exercised by and through a group’ (Baylis 1989: 3)—is contentious both in academic debates and political practice. This is so in part because it is couched in the notion of collegial decisionmaking. For example, one of the founding fathers of the United States, Alexander Hamilton, defended the notion of a single executive1 because, as he claimed, unity is a fundamental ingredient of an energetic executive. Unity, he argued (Hamilton 1788), can be destroyed ‘either by vesting the power in two or more magistrates of equal dignity and authority; or by vesting it ostensibly in one man, subject, in whole or in part, to the control and co-operation of others, in the capacity of counsellors to him’. Writing nearly a century later about the executive in representative government, John Stuart Mill claimed:
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
289
As a general rule, every executive function, whether superior or subordinate, should be the appointed duty of some given individual. It should be apparent to all the world who did everything, and through whose default anything was left undone. Responsibility is null when nobody knows who is responsible. Nor, even when real, can it be divided without being weakened. To maintain it at its highest there must be one person who receives the whole praise of what is well done, the whole blame of what is ill.’ (Mill 1946: 264)
Although both Hamilton’s and Mill’s criticisms focused primarily on the cardinal issue of political responsibility and its implications,2 others have attacked other aspects as well. Max Weber, for example, associated it with the effort to enfeeble the leader. He was very critical3 of it because, in addition to blurring the lines of responsibility, it inhibits precise, uniform, clear, and prompt decision-making (1980: 162–4).4 Neither the criticisms of this concept nor their prevalence in the world of real politics are surprising. Leadership itself is about conflict because it entails choice, values, and priorities. This is what executives do. The key trait of collective leadership, however, is the way in which choices are made, priorities are set, and conflict is resolved. These decisions essentially concern (1) the definition of an institution’s mission and role, (2) the defence of its integrity, and (3) the ordering of internal conflict (Selznick 1984: 62) but they are typically made by a group of actors. This raises the issue of the basic coordinating principle, idea, institution, or mechanism that holds these actors together (see below) and it also highlights the fact that collective leadership is couched in compromise. Compromise, in turn, is the origin of many of the weaknesses of this model because it goes against precision, uniformity, clarity, and promptness. Crucially, active involvement in collective leadership means that a political actor must reconcile the exigencies of their constituency with those of collective leadership per se. The latter inevitably involves compromises as well as collective responsibility for any decision. Both undermine clarity, promptness, and uniformity but they also blur the lines of responsibility. In the eyes of members of their constituencies, ‘[w]hat “the Board” does is the act of nobody; and nobody can be made to answer for it’, as Mill (1946: 264) put it. Institutional arrangements—such as secrecy and the potential use of majoritarian decision-making—often amplify this sense of opaqueness. Perhaps paradoxically, some of these weaknesses of collective leadership account for the fact that it is particularly well suited to the needs of the quasicontinental EU. Indeed, this is how the EU and its predecessors were historically meant to operate. As the history of the EU demonstrates, the process of integration has almost invariably relied on the exercise of collective leadership. The most successful periods of its history have been marked by the presence
290
Where Can Leadership Come From?
of a group of leaders who set priorities, resolved conflicts, and defined the organization’s mission and role. This is why this option is worthy of serious consideration both as a solution to the EU’s problem of leaderlessness in the post-Nice era and as an academic exercise. This first claim is discussed in the second section of this chapter. Secondly, as the study of collective leadership at the national level demonstrates, its provision is conditional (Baylis 1989). In other words, collective leadership entails a combination of material, ideational, and institutional factors that not only shape but also give practical meaning to its content. The prospects for the establishment and the exercise of collective leadership in the post-Convention EU are discussed in the third section where this chapter’s main claim is presented and discussed. The EU is lacking in terms of the three potential sources of collective leadership—a dominant common conception of material interests, an explicit and legitimate mobilizing set of ideas and a robust and politically mature institutional basis. Given the absence of these co-ordinating factors, the prospects for the establishment and the effective operation of collective leadership in the post-Nice EU are bleak.
COLLECTIVE LEADERSHIP IN THE HISTORY OF EUROPEAN INTEGRATION
The Origin of Collective Leadership There are many reasons why collective leadership is particularly well suited to the needs of the EU. Understanding this point entails a prior discussion of the various functions of collective leadership. By defining an institution’s mission and role, setting priorities, and resolving conflicts (Selznick 1984: 62) collective leadership makes primarily critical decisions, i.e. decisions of systemic importance. It also performs a more subtle but equally important function. Collective leadership bodies are not only actors; rather, they often operate as fora or arenas where political actors are socialized. Socialization entails the diffusion of modes of appropriate behaviour and the establishment and gradual enhancement of collective identities, as well as the stepwise definition and redefinition of material interests or, more accurately, the ways in which these are perceived by the actors who are in charge of defending and promoting them. Collegiality at the national level has historical-cultural roots (Baylis 1989: 147–8). Baylis’s analysis of this form of leadership at the national level reveals that historical precedent5 is a key inducement. In addition, cultural
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
291
predilections, such as the emphasis on accommodation placed in the Netherlands, the emphasis on consensus-building within social groups in Japan, the distrust for strong leaders found in Switzerland, and the frequent use of Proporz devices beyond the political sphere in Norway are also conducive to the adoption of collective, as opposed to monocratic, leadership in the political domain. Nevertheless, it would be wrong to assume that these are the only sources of collective leadership. In fact, collective leadership is also rooted in political realities that dictate its creation, though its precise shape is the result of a broader set of determinants. For example, political leadership in consociational democracies such as Belgium is collective precisely because there are multiple ideological, linguistic, religious, and other cleavages that define political groups and parties, none of which can ever hope to dominate over the others in the political domain. Arguably, this is the main reason why the EU and its predecessors have been led collectively for much of their history. The institutional make-up of the original European Communities was explicitly geared towards the collective exercise of power (see Hayward, Introduction to this volume). Two institutions exemplified this logic, namely the Commission6 and the Council. Both have done much—either by means of the ‘myths’ that all organizations create and use (Meyer and Rowan 1977) or the rules and practices that they have adopted—to foster the emergence and preservation of collective leadership in the context of the EU. First, the composition of the College of Commissioners was (and remains) a product of national decisions, but once they have been appointed commissioners have the power to make decisions by majority. However, the actual use of majoritarian decision-making has historically been prevented by the fact that it was likely to replicate within the College interstate tensions that exist in its environment. Since its establishment, key actors within the Commission have maintained the direct link between the survival of this singular institution and the need to avoid turning it into a forum that replicates interstate tensions that inevitably arise in the policy process. As a result, the Commission has traditionally operated in a collegial7 manner. This trend has been supported by the careful creation and diffusion of the ‘myth’ of the Commission as a technocratic8 and, as a consequence, politically ‘neutral’ body9 that is meant to transcend ideological, interstate, and broader political cleavages. The presence of a permanent and independent professional civil service, recruited mostly on the basis of merit, supported this view.10 Reputation for ‘impartiality’ meant that the Commission was well placed to provide technically sound proposals that gave precise meaning to the collective
292
Where Can Leadership Come From?
fuite en avant. This is why it became part of the EU’s collective leadership. The pivotal position of the Commission in the EU legislative process has also been enhanced by the fact that its legislative proposals cannot be amended without its consent; if the member states choose to amend a legislative proposal without the agreement of the Commission, a draft piece of legislation can be adopted only by unanimity. Second, despite its composition and the gradual expansion of the formal scope for QMV, the Council of Ministers has systematically fostered the logic of compromise which is a key component of collective leadership. Moreover, it has systematically avoided the use of formal voting. Rather, it has opted for consensual decision-making, a key trait of collective leadership. Council members who can but do not force a vote (even one they can confidently predict to win) accumulate significant ‘negotiating capital’ that becomes very useful when, in the context of another negotiation, they are in a minority. This was, and remains, an effective way of serving both the needs of domestic constituencies and the requirements of membership of a collective body. The emphasis on consensus is one of the Council’s major contributions to the gradual emergence and preservation of collective leadership in the EU. This emphasis has been facilitated by the composition of the Council. Until 2004 the emergence of an ‘ideological’ Council was unlikely. Moreover, its specialized nature and the frequency of its meetings also meant that the Council often acts as a clearing house that resolves issues and gives meaning to ‘grand bargains’ struck in the European Council whose own contribution to the EU’s collective leadership is threefold. First, it has consistently relied on consensus for most of its decisions, in part because of its initially informal nature. Second, by resolving thorny issues of systemic importance and by defining the EU’s priorities, it has systematically acted as the EU’s supreme political decision-maker.11 Finally, it has shaped the EU’s major constitutional bargains. There are many instances that exemplify this pattern, but the most prominent is perhaps the relaunch of the single market project in the mid-1980s. Although much has been written about the role of Jacques Delors, the FrancoGerman alliance, and private interests in that process, a more balanced account would include not only Margaret Thatcher12 (despite her rhetoric) but also the significant contribution of the European Parliament (which was already practising the logic of compromise13 in its own ranks through the distribution of the main posts to the coalition of the two main groups) as well as those of the leaders of small member states who agreed on not only a specific objective but the way to achieve it too.14 Taken collectively, these actors performed the tasks of collective leadership by (1) redefining the mission and role of the EU; (2) defending its integrity (e.g. by enhancing its institutions
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
293
and by promoting the logic of an inclusive compromise); and (3) resolving internal conflict. The aforementioned arrangements and practices are rooted in the history of the EU and its predecessors in the sense that they reflect the need to defeat narrowly defined egotistical national interests and the interstate conflict that they frequently foster. As a result, an institutional network has been established in a successful attempt to diffuse power and exercise it collectively (see Hayward, Introduction to this volume). Although this reflects the emergence of collective leadership in the context of the EU, it does not account for its preservation over time.
The Preservation of Collective Leadership How is collective leadership sustained? Part of its endurance at the national level has been traced in neo-corporatism (Baylis 1989: 151–2) which entails bargaining, accommodation, and incremental decision-making.15 This environment promotes a sense of inclusion and favours continuity16 which legitimizes both this mode of decision-making and its specific outcomes even when the latter diverge from the preferences of individual actors. When it is used intensively over a long period of time and across various decisionmaking arenas, this mode is gradually institutionalized, i.e. it is infused with value17 (often as much value as its specific outcomes) and a premium is placed on its preservation at the risk of the triumph of the organization over its purpose. Engagement with and the preservation of the system become as important as the positive quest for solutions to collective problems, even when the intensity or the consequences of the latter vary across the members of the collective leadership. This logic, in turn, provides a criterion for the assessment of behaviour within the arena of collective leadership. In the context of the EU, one good example is the reaction to Mrs Thatcher’s demands for a rebate in the early 1980s. Although the substance of her demand was legitimate, the way in which she presented it was harmful to its objectives because her style went against the prevailing mode of appropriate behaviour in the European Council. The fact that her demands were, as a result of her style, only reluctantly and partly satisfied is unsurprising. The institutionalization of collective leadership is key to its preservation but it does not guarantee it because the context in which that leadership operates is only under partial control at any point in time. Paradoxically, perhaps, collective leadership in its institutionalized form can become the victim of its own success. Its institutionalization means that it is often taken for granted.
294
Where Can Leadership Come From?
Thus, its response to changes in its environment is not necessarily optimal, to put it no more strongly. The EU provides an excellent example of this problem. The consensual style of decision-making that has been fostered by the diffusion of power to various institutions and levels of government in the EU was ideal for the task in hand, namely the need to defeat egotistical national interests and the conflict that they often generate. Since the establishment of the European Communities in the 1950s, the emphasis on consensus and technocracy replaced or, more accurately, obscured, divisions along national lines. Linked to the action trap (see Hayward, Introduction to this volume) this facilitated the establishment of collective leadership that served the purpose of ‘building Europe’ as the means for the definition and the promotion of the ‘common European interest’. This quest led to the emergence of a new cleavage that divided those who wanted more from those who wanted less ‘Europe’. The members of the EU’s collective leadership were instrumental in two respects. First, they gave precise meaning to the notion of the ‘common European interest’, for example by creating the single market, the single currency etc. Second, they consistently sought to convince domestic constituencies that their own conception of the national interest was a component of the larger common European interest and that the former could not be defined or practiced without reference to the latter.18 For example, Jacques Delors was instrumental in shaping the attitude of the British Trades Union Congress vis-à-vis the single market.19 The successful implementation of the integration project means that politicians and citizens often take it for granted. In addition, the motives that led to the establishment of the European Communities in the 1950s are both less important and less visible in the immediate post-Nice era. Thus, the calls for the definition of the ultimate purpose of integration,20 that preceded the enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe, were unsurprising. Unlike previous discussions regarding the future of Europe, the emerging debate calls for explicit value judgements, has already challenged the status quo and, specifically, the autonomy of governing elites (be they in national capitals or in Brussels) in the conduct of European affairs. What kind of Europe do we want? This is the new central question that inevitably requires politicians and citizens to make new value judgements and to move away from the question of having more or less ‘Europe’, i.e. yesterday’s debate. As a result, although the emphasis on consensus may remain unaffected, the pivotal position hitherto occupied by technocracy in the debate on ‘Europe’ has already become the first casualty (see Chapter 6, above). The debate and the negotiations that took place in the context of the Convention on the Future of Europe demonstrated clearly the inability of the European Commission to articulate and defend a robust project for the future of Europe. As a result, it quickly resorted
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
295
to the tactical use of its own existential principle (Dimitrakopoulos and Kassim 2005). Further evidence of the Commission’s weakness became evident in 2004 when José Barroso, then president designate, was forced to remove Rocco Buttiglione from the new team of commissioners designate, although he appeared to share the view that the comments made by the latter about single mothers and homosexuality reflected personal views that would not affect policy-making (Dimitrakopoulos 2005). Given these developments, the new issue that emerges concerns the basic principle or mechanism that can organize and sustain the EU’s collective leadership. In the light of the apparent inability of the existing leaders to respond to the new challenges that the EU faces, how can the EU’s collective leadership be organized? In the next section of this chapter it is argued that in the absence of three co-ordinating factors—a dominant common conception of material interests, an explicit and legitimate mobilizing set of ideas and a robust and politically mature institutional arrangement—the prospects for the establishment and the effective operation of collective leadership are bleak.
EXPLAINING THE CURRENT GAP
Material Interests Material interests can provide the basis for the establishment of collective leadership, as they did in the mid-1980s, but this requires a shared conception of (1) these interests and (2) the best way to promote them. Such a conception was at the heart of the relaunch of the single market project in the mid-1980s. Leaders such as Delors, Kohl, and Mitterrand saw it as a way to modernize ailing national economies, Margaret Thatcher as a projection of policies she was already implementing in Britain, while (socialist) leaders of southern member states saw the trade-offs21 offered to them as an opportunity to enhance (and secure gains from) the EU’s redistributive dimension. The enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe has led to the claim that support for the British market-orientated views on European integration was likely to grow and thus help dilute the aspects of EU policies that distort trade and, in the long run, undermine the role played by the Franco-German alliance (see Chapter 8, above). Although significant aspects of domestic economic policies in these countries22 may lend a degree of support to this view, the 2005 negotiations regarding the EU’s financial perspective covering 2007– 2013 revealed the impact of domestic economic realities. Indeed, given the presence of large agricultural populations and the significant domestic needs
296
Where Can Leadership Come From?
in terms of infrastructure and broader economic development, the support provided by these countries to the CAP and the EU’s regional policy was hardly surprising. So, although the prevailing belief system and ideological orientation of the governing elites may well be neo-liberal, the harsh domestic economic realities compel them to lend support, at least at present, to policies that they may have otherwise opposed. In addition, an equally revealing aspect of these budgetary negotiations was the absence of a clearly articulated alternative capable of meeting the challenges posed by stagnant national economies. Given that the policies of the EU are usually the result of compromises, it was unsurprising to see so many issues being raised—varying from the cost of CAP to the need for better and more development aid. Nevertheless, the promoters of reform—including the British government—have for the most part refrained from articulating a positive alternative capable of creating a new broad coalition, or at least, taking the debate a step further. Rather, they have remained focused on criticisms. At the same time, the negotiations on the EU’s 2006 budget showed both the limits of the imagination and the unwillingness of the collective leadership to redeploy expenditure away from agriculture support and failure to move beyond a pale and ultimately inadequate compromise. The proposal of the British presidency to reduce spending on research and technological development in 200623 — which is an area of strategic importance for the EU—is part of a broader pattern that points towards the gradual disintegration of an already weak collective leadership. This pattern also included Gerhard Schröder’s frequent outspoken attacks on the European Commission which has been accused of trying to implement neo-liberal policies without taking into consideration domestic economic and political realities,24 as well as the French conservative government’s reaction to the ‘Bolkestein directive’ liberalizing services, which in the past had received its tacit support. These actions indicate that despite some evidence of gradual convergence in terms of domestic economic policies, the neo-liberal policy paradigm does not have enough legitimacy (at least in the immediate post-Convention stage) to enable the EU’s collective leadership to defend it vigorously in public. The contrast with the support that Keynesianism enjoyed in the 1950s and 1960s (Hall 1989) is very telling indeed.
Ideas Existing accounts of the role of ideas in political processes highlight two kinds of influence. On the one hand, cognitive influence is exerted when ideas—in the form of expert knowledge—resolve policy problems and enable leaders to identify a course of action in periods of crisis (ibid.). On the other hand,
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
297
ideas also exert normative influence by enabling actors to choose between appropriate and inappropriate options and by acting as filters that help to identify their interests (Finnemore 1996) and the strategies (Berman 1998) that are suited to their achievement. Both these forms of influence have been present in the history of the EU. The Single Market and EMU projects are expressions of the increasing power of the neo-liberal policy paradigm but their strength lies partly in their ambiguity.25 This has hitherto allowed political leaders of the centre-left to avoid the thorny issue of the ideological content of this experiment. Both the Single Market and EMU have been associated with the modernization of ailing national economies.26 Coupled with the exigencies of ‘building Europe’ and the absence of an explicitly articulated alternative, these ideas and policy prescriptions have allowed leaders with different ideological orientations to coexist, however uneasily, in the same EU-wide collective leadership.27 Nevertheless, there are two reasons why this policy paradigm cannot provide the basis for the revival of collective leadership at the level of the EU in the immediate post-Nice stage. First, it does not enjoy the explicit legitimacy that would elevate it to that level. Second, its serious weaknesses are gradually becoming evident to such an extent that opposition is mobilized and the demand for an alternative is becoming increasingly powerful.28 Another important weakness stems from the fact that the EU is increasingly debated in a manner that dissociates it from a part of its origins, namely the need to maintain peace in Europe. Whereas in the past the members of the EU’s collective leadership could actively obscure the ideological content of their choices by using the notion of ‘building Europe’ as an effective (and often technocratic) cover, the referendum campaigns and outcomes in France and the Netherlands enabled domestic political forces to begin to question the content of the European project without necessarily running the risk of being construed as ‘anti-European’. In other words, the increasingly ideological debate regarding the future of Europe forces the question of the redefinition of the EU’s collective leadership onto the political agenda, without answering it. The switch to this new debate is likely to be opposed by parts of the two main beneficiaries of the status quo ante namely, national leaders and the European Commission. This is unsurprising, given that the change is likely to reduce the autonomy that they enjoyed in the past (see below).
Institutions The main argument presented in this chapter pitches the needs of the EU against the capacities of the present collective leadership. A significant part
298
Where Can Leadership Come From?
of the problem lies in existing institutional arrangements that, for decades, shielded both the Commission and the Council of Ministers from a discussion that goes beyond the need to ‘build Europe’. The fact that neither the Commission nor the Council had, until 2004, a clearly articulated ideological identity, has meant—in conjunction with de facto policy convergence and the frequently professed end of the distinction between the political Left and Right— that the public(s) in Europe have been deprived of a key way of understanding politics, namely the distinction between the Left and the Right. In addition, institutional arrangements ensured that citizens did not have the power to ‘vote the (EU) scoundrels out’. Poor media coverage, poor understanding of the EU’s complex institutional structure, coupled with dissatisfaction with national political processes and outcomes, have contributed to turning European elections into ‘second-order’ elections. These factors have allowed the members of the EU’s collective leadership to establish and develop the EU since the 1950s but as the inclusive peace settlement of post-war Europe is increasingly taken for granted, and the public(s) question some aspects of the institutional edifice built on it, there is no institutional forum capable of acting as (or at least fostering the development of) the EU’s collective leadership. Without undertaking a detailed discussion of individual EU institutions, two, the European Council and the Commission, deserve a brief discussion because in the past they played a significant role in the establishment and the effective operation of the EU’s collective leadership. The increasing involvement, since the early 1990s, of the European Council in the running of the EU has been construed (Kassim and Menon 2004) as an indication of the increasing importance of the intergovernmental logic and the retreat of the ‘supranational’ aspects of the EU. This may be true but the increasing frequency of intergovernmental conferences, the frequency of the meetings of the European Council, and the length of their agendas also indicate increasing tensions and disagreement between the member states. The task of the European Council as a potential source of a new collective leadership has also been undermined by the enlargement of 2004. Unlike previous enlargements that either preceded or followed major debates regarding the future of the European project, this enlargement coincided with the major exercise of the European Convention and the IGC that followed it—both of which were rendered necessary in part as a result of the major deficiencies of the Treaty of Nice. As a result, the socialization of its new members into the working practices and the consensus-focused decision style has not yet materialized (see Chapter 10, above). Like the European Council, the Barroso-led College is much more coherent in terms of ideology (Libération, 17 January 2007) than the Commission has
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
299
ever been, but the use of this basis for its active involvement in the EU’s collective leadership depends on two additional factors. First, the Commission must be credible and must also be perceived to be credible. Its credibility is damaged when it shies away, as it did at least temporarily in the case of the Bolkestein directive, from tough decisions. Second, reliance on ideology as a basis for the reinvigoration of the Commission as an institution and its renewed involvement in the EU’s collective leadership assumes that the College will be bold enough to stop portraying the Commission as a primarily technocratic body and go against the declared wishes of some of its main supporters. The handling of the Buttiglione case (see above) does not leave much room for optimism in that respect. This lack of optimism is further supported by the membership of the Barroso Commission which, unlike the Prodi Commission, is clearly lacking in terms of ‘political heavyweights’ (see Chapter 6, above). Finally, it is important to point out that despite the fanfare that followed its establishment through the Treaty of Amsterdam, the mechanism of enhanced cooperation, which allows groups of member states to work more closely on issues covered by the Treaty, has not yet been used extensively enough to provide the basis for a systematic assessment.29 Nevertheless, it is by definition unable to provide the only basis for the establishment of a new collective leadership capable of steering the EU as a whole. Rather, in the short term it is more likely to be utilized as a threat against member states which obstruct progress that enjoys large support in the Council.
CONCLUSION As the time for action traps is over, where can leadership come from? Collective leadership is well suited to the needs of a leaderless EU. The latter has always been guided by a group of politicians who, despite their diverging views on individual aspects of European integration, have defined the organization’s mission and role, defended its integrity, and resolved internal conflict. As a result, the EU is an excellent example of regional integration that brought together states which after the end of the Second World War were unable to resolve common problems on their own. Detachment from national publics, increasing reliance on technocracy and the determination to avoid as much as possible ideological and interstate tensions have served this collective leadership in its effort to ‘build Europe’. Nevertheless, now that the EU is taken for granted, the debate on its future is gradually changing. Although collective leadership remains well suited to the needs of the EU, it is
300
Where Can Leadership Come From?
not forthcoming because of the absence of a dominant common conception of material interests, an explicit and legitimate mobilizing set of ideas, and a robust and politically mature institutional arrangement that could form its basis. However, two more sanguine reservations ought to be added to this negative assessment. First, in spite of divergence in terms of material interests, there is a significant degree of ideological convergence between the twenty-seven governments of the member states since most of them are dominated by rightwing parties or parties of the centre-right (Libération, 17 January 2007). Although ideological convergence does not translate directly into policy convergence, it can provide the basis for greater cohesion in the European Council and the Commission. Nevertheless, much of the debate has been conducted by political leaders who are either weak or on their way out of office. The ongoing debate in France, as well as other countries, indicates that a more significant degree of convergence may well emerge in the coming years. Second, the preceding discussion does not take into account important differences between and within policy sectors. For example, although national governments were unable to agree on Iraq, a clear and robust common stance has been forged in the case of Iran. The roles of France, Germany, and Britain has been central to this development. Nevertheless, there is no room for real optimism because the main stumbling block remains: the inability or unwillingness of existing leaders to stop shielding themselves with the help of hitherto necessary myths that new realities have rendered redundant.
NOTES The author would like to thank Jack Hayward and the participants in both the conference on Leaderless Europe held in Hull, and the lunchtime seminar of Cambridge University’s Centre of International Studies for useful comments on earlier drafts of this chapter. Thanks are also due to Hussein Kassim, Anand Menon, and Argyris Passas for enlightening discussions. Of course, the usual disclaimer applies. 1. Although leadership is typically associated with executive bodies (Blondel 1995: 269), other bodies (including parliaments) may well contribute to it. 2. Hamilton, for example, argued that ‘all multiplication of the executive is rather dangerous than friendly to liberty’. 3. Nevertheless, he did acknowledge that this kind of decision-making entails more thorough considerations (Weber 1980: 163).
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
301
4. This is why he concluded that it is at odds with the principles of rational bureaucratic organization arguing that ‘fully developed bureaucracy comes to require monocratic domination’ (Baylis 1989: 4). 5. The pre-1848 cantonal executives in Switzerland are a good example. 6. It was based, by Monnet’s influence, on the French Commissariat du Plan which he had formerly headed. 7. It is important to note that the presence of strong presidents such as Hallstein and Delors does not disprove the point made here. This is so because their strength and influence were demonstrated primarily outside the College, i.e. in their interactions with national leaders. 8. The correlation between a technocratic environment and collective leadership has been observed at the national level as well (Baylis 1989: 151). 9. The fact that the presidency of the Commission has, for decades, alternated between small and large states as well as between the centre-left and the centreright further supports the ‘depoliticization’ thesis. 10. Jean Monnet’s and Jacques Delors’s aversion to politics has contributed to this pattern. Crucially, both were influential because they were insiders (see Chapter 1 in this volume). 11. The agreement on the British rebate in 1984 is a good example. More generally, the European Council has performed its systemic role by means of ‘package deals’ (Janning 2005: 825). 12. It is important to note that her famous Bruges speech of 1988 was remarkably ‘pro-European’ though it became famous for the exact opposite reasons (Menon 2003). 13. The fact that, already in the 1950s, MEPs chose to form groups on the basis of ideology must be interpreted primarily as an attempt to reduce the impact of nationality in their deliberations. 14. In that sense, the conception of leadership used here goes beyond Edinger’s (1975: 257) view, which focuses on control over outcomes. 15. Strong bureaucracies also favour the preservation of collective leadership, especially when they support technocratic decision-making and are closely linked to interest groups through neo-corporatist arrangements (Baylis 1989: 153). 16. Incrementalism is not incompatible with radical change. The latter can be the cumulative effect of the former. 17. This is the essence of Selznick’s definition of institutionalization (1957: 17). 18. In some perhaps extreme cases national leaders went as far as to argue that the national interest had been successfully projected and adopted at the European level, in an effort to legitimize their decisions. 19. This was transforming leadership in action. For the distinction between transactional and transforming leadership, see Burns (1978: 4, 425–6). 20. German foreign minister Joschka Fischer started this debate with his famous speech at Humboldt University, Berlin (2000). 21. The Commission (and Jacques Delors specifically) provided transactional leadership in that context by facilitating the establishment of a credible agreement.
302
Where Can Leadership Come From?
22. The limits of this rather premature view which ascribes to this group of states an unrealistic degree of coherence and co-ordination on EU matters are demonstrated by the fact that in many cases they have not appeared to operate as a bloc (Janning 2005: 830). 23. EUObserver, MEPs lash out at ‘selective cuts’ in 2006 budget, , accessed 7 September 2005. 24. Such criticisms may be justified but certainly not when they stem from the German ‘red–green’ coalition that has adopted the neo-liberal (and deeply unpopular) Agenda 2010. 25. The key aspect of this ambiguity is the often-cited idea that the establishment of the Single Market is compatible with social democratic principles but on a continental scale. 26. The same argument can be made about the whole European integration project since its inception (Milward 1992; Judt 1996). 27. Margaret Thatcher, Helmut Kohl, and Jacques Delors supported the Single Market project but for different reasons. 28. Arguably, this is one of the lessons drawn from the French referendum on the Constitutional Treaty. 29. The Treaty of Nice, adopted in 2001, has simplified this mechanism, unused since its establishment. Although the need for simplification may account for this fact, the decision to discuss the reform of this mechanism also allowed European leaders to avoid the much more cumbersome issue of its purpose.
REFERENCES B, T A. (1989) Governing by Committee: Collegial Leadership in Advanced Societies. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. B, S (1998) The Social Democratic Moment: Ideas and Politics in the Making of Interwar Europe. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. B, J (1995) Comparative Government: An Introduction. 2nd edn. Harlow: Pearson. B, J MG (1978) Leadership. New York: Harper & Row. D, D G. (2005) ‘Barroso’s Troubled Start in Brussels’, Unpublished paper presented at the Centre for European Union Studies, University of Hull, 28 February. H K (2005) ‘Inside the European Commission: Preference Formation and the Convention on the Future of Europe’, Comparative European Politics 3/2: 180–203. E, L J. (1975) ‘The Comparative Analysis of Political Leadership’, Comparative Politics 7/2: 253–69. F, M (1996) National Interests in International Society. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Collective Leadership: A Sceptical View
303
F, J (2000) Vom Staatenverbund zur Föderation—Gedanken über die Finalität der europäischen Integration. Speech delivered at Humboldt University, Berlin, 12 May. Available online at , accessed 7 November 2005. H, P A. (ed.) (1989) The Political Power of Economic Ideas: Keynesianism across Nations. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. H, A (1788) The Executive Department further considered. Federalist Paper No 70. Available online at , accessed 7 November 2005). J, J (2005) ‘Leadership Coalitions and Change: The Role of States in the European Union’, International Affairs 81/4: 821–33. J, T (1996) A Grand Illusion? An Essay on Europe. New York: Hill & Wang. K, H, and M, A (2004) ‘The EU Member States and the Prodi Commission’, in D. G. Dimitrakopoulos (ed.), The Changing European Commission. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 89–104. M, A (2003) ‘Still Leading from the Wings? The United Kingdom and the European Union’. Inaugural lecture delivered at the European Research Institute, University of Birmingham, 27 May. M, J, and R, B (1977) ‘Institutionalized Organizations: Formal Structure as Myth and Ceremony’, American Journal of Sociology 83/2: 340–63. M, J S (1946) [1861] Considerations on Representative Government, edited with an introduction by R. B. McCallum. Oxford: Blackwell. M, A (1992) The European Rescue of the Nation State. London: Routledge. S, P (1984) [1957] Leadership in Administration: A Sociological Interpretation. Berkeley: University of California Press. W, M (1980) [1925] Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Grundriß der Verstehenden Soziologie. 5th edn. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr.
This page intentionally left blank
Epilogue: The Elusive European Prospect Jack Hayward
In the aftermath of the European Union’s 2005 inability to achieve unanimous agreement on the legitimizing constitutional treaty that set out its institutional principles and summarized its policy purposes, the situation seemed desperate. However, it was less serious than it appeared in one sense, because in so far as a clear interpretation is possible, it probably amounted more to a hesitation and a pause than to a call for reversal. Nevertheless, even if one takes into account the inauspicious context of economic stagnation and undigested massive enlargement a year earlier, as well as specific domestic causes, there were more deep-seated reasons for anxiety, related to the theme we have pursued. The consociational confederalism that has both inhibited the capacity for effective elite leadership of European Union and memberstate representatives, and predisposed them to be remote from their peoples remains a constraint on the process of integration, both in terms of consolidating past achievements and seeking new ones. Will anything short of an external crisis be sufficient to call forth the will to overcome the forces of inertia and national interest fragmentation that, as in the past, have paralysed the EU’s capacity for leadership? Without seeking to predict precisely specific or general outcomes when the outlook compounds persisting complexity and increasing uncertainty, a cautious assessment of the prospects for the EU is in order, as indicated by the preceding analyses. Do they suggest an impetus towards integration, a resignation to stasis, or a reaction resulting in disintegration? Subsumed under the pervasive ramifications of the ‘logic of leaderlessness’ (Menon dixit in Chapter 7, above) we may detect dispersed acts of creative innovation and consensus-building that owe more to the expedient exploitation of opportunities that arise than to the sustained, consistent projection of a comprehensive plan of action. Before attempting an overall characterization of the prospective state of the union, we should consider what indications the specific findings of particular parts of the enterprise examined have to offer, while conceding
306
Epilogue
that an incomplete set of partial views cannot yield incontrovertible general conclusions. Despite rhetorical flourishes that alarm rather than inspire, nowhere within the EU’s polycentric institutional structure has the reversion to a humdrum style of leadership been more evident than in the role of the president of the Commission. Without the legitimacy to promote formal institutional reforms, he and his colleagues have to rely on informal and inconspicuous legislation while reducing the flow of new proposals. Recourse to consensual, cooperative coordination, relying upon indicators of good practice and the persuasion of laggards to improve their performance by comparison with leader nations rather than formal directives, is a feature of the Commission’s modest focus upon facilitating intergovernmental piecemeal progress. The Commission president will continue to struggle to secure greater internal cohesion between its directorates, coordination of divergent policies being rendered more difficult owing to the tendency of commissioner national loyalties to exacerbate habitual conflicts of competence that arise when ‘horizontal’ issues have to be dealt with by ‘vertical’ structures. To prevent the fragmentation and paralysis that would result from a combination of inter-directorate and intergovernmental discord, the Commission will impose its credibility and agenda-setting influence if it can continue to get a better grip on its own internal relations and steer EU policy networks towards practical solutions of pressing problems. The limited impact of the ambitious policy priorities of the 2000–10 Lisbon agenda, because of the unwillingness of national governments to take consequential action, confirms that the Commission’s leadership role has been unceremoniously curtailed in line with the diminutive EU budget (1 per cent of EU gross national income). In the three specific policy sectors discussed, the most momentous exertion of Commission presidential leadership has been in monetary integration, with Roy Jenkins initiating and Jacques Delors pushing through the Economic and Monetary Union project to completion. However, despite the Commission’s formal budgetary and macro-economic powers in enforcing the Stability and Growth Pact rules on member governments, the latter, notably through their finance ministers in Ecofin, have succeeded in first bending and then softening these constraints, whose credibility had been impugned as ‘stupid’ by Romano Prodi, speaking more as an economist than as Commission president. Because the Pact’s rules have become more flexible, there is more scope for avoiding clashes between the Commission and national finance ministers, but the Commission’s function of guardian vis-à-vis the veracity and rigour of member government behaviour is liable to give priority to expediency over virtue. The guardian of price stability is the independent and depoliticized European Central Bank, which has consistently exerted a deflationary policy bias. The new EU members, led by Poland, show little enthusiasm to join the single currency,
Epilogue
307
while those who have opted out show no inclination to change their minds. A common fiscal policy has proved unacceptable (a European tax even less so) to fund an EU budget that will remain modest because it does not cover defence or welfare expenditure. Forlorn calls for a coordinating EU ‘economic government’ as a political counter weight to the ECB by French Socialists, instead of the informal Euro Group of ministers, has fallen on deaf ears. The future of EU integration will depend in part on whether the Eurozone proves to be an economically successful and politically unifying rather than a divisive institution. So far, with only half the member states in the monetary union, an EU lacking cohesion in a pivotal policy will be a persisting handicap in achieving vigorous leadership. Environmental policy has been an activity where some member states have played a leading role, with the Commission devoting itself more to harmonizing national standards than to promoting its own stringent common EU policy. This frontrunner function has been performed by the European Parliament, with ‘green’ NGOs and the firms most affected by the EU’s environmental legislation being especially prominent. However, because it impinges on so many other sectors, but unlike monetary policy cannot claim as pivotal a place in EU decision-making, environmental policy may become increasingly a tributary of compromises made in international fora. In the entrepreneurial promotion and use of electronic technology, the record has been mixed, with a conspicuous failure in Commission-led High Definition Television but success in firm-led Digital Video Broadcasting as the strategic instrument of advancing European competitiveness. Liberalization in the cultural field has come up against resolute French vetoes, which have reinforced EU protectionism of its diverse constituent national identities despite anti-Hollywood market-oriented integration through ‘Television Without Frontiers’. While the European Court of Justice has empowered the EU to treat audio-visual infrastructure as an economic service like any other, it has not authorized it to intervene in the content of what is communicated. More imaginative use has been made by the Commission of the Internet both to improve its own administration and encourage informed interaction with European citizens, going beyond consultation with organized interests and officials in the member states towards deliberative democracy. However, while the bureaucratic aspects of the Commission’s eGovernance practical innovations have led to significant improvements, its more ambitious democratic aspirations have so far been less successful in extending public participation as a way of increasing the legitimacy of the EU in general and of the Commission in particular. Two important areas of EU action with significant international implications which have not been considered—the Common Agricultural Policy and Competition Policy—are moving in opposite directions as far as Commission
308
Epilogue
leadership is concerned. Despite long-drawn-out resistance, notably by successive French presidents from de Gaulle to Chirac, the CAP is losing its position as the leading EU common policy, while still taking the lion’s share of its budget. Justified as assistance to uncompetitive peasants, it has profited mainly large-scale capitalist farmers. A combination of factors—declining numbers of peasants (except in Eastern Europe, but this has been a further incentive to curtail subsidies), budgetary constraints, the demands of forwardlooking activities, the World Trade Organization pressures from the developing countries and the USA—will shift the Commission from economic to welfare concerns, more consonant with the modest place of agriculture in the EU. By contrast, the competition commissioner has, since the 1990s, acquired wide discretionary power over the burgeoning industrial mergers and acquisitions involving both major private and public national champion firms, despite the attempts by French and German governments to resist EU vetos. Because the enterprises concerned are generally either American or European, the conflicts that arise from the EU adoption of US-style anti-trust regulation have an extraterritorial dimension and are more aggressively assertive than the status quo defensiveness of the CAP. Although a number of ECJ decisions have reversed the prevention of mergers, the increasing impact of industrial and financial globalization will compel the Commission to exert increasing regulatory power. This is indicative of the necessity to avoid simplistic generalizations about the decline of the Commission. Its activities sometimes continue to advance even when they retreat elsewhere. With national governments—especially those of France and Germany— seeking to control the agenda-setting and transformative leadership of the EU, a more prominent role was assumed by the Council of Ministers but its ineffectiveness in performing these functions led to the creation in 1974 of the European Council on the initiative of Giscard d’Estaing and Helmut Schmidt. As finance ministers they had become frustrated by the working of EU institutions and as newly installed president and chancellor respectively they sought to put this right. However, although they and their successors Mitterrand and Kohl were able sometimes to impart a decisive political impetus, this was by fits and starts and did not amount to the Franco-German comprehensive hegemony often proclaimed. Nevertheless, in association with Delors as Commission president, from the mid-1980s to early 1990s Mitterrand and Kohl did provide much of the EU leadership. Thereafter, post-unification German governments became less inclined to defer to French leadership, which under Chirac became increasingly erratic and ineffective. Former German foreign minister Joschka Fischer’s attempt in 2000 to push ‘From Confederacy to Federation’ fell on deaf ears (Leonard, 2000: esp. ch. 2).
Epilogue
309
The 2005 advent of Angela Merkel has led to a more explicitly independent German stance. Earlier attempts at a triumvirate with a Britain led by a more pro-European New Labour Government from 1997 never got very far. This was because Prime Minister Blair was unable to secure mass public support for his wish to play a leading EU role, as well as his combination of restraining some initiatives and opting out of others, notably the single currency. Blair attempted to revive the flagging 2000 Lisbon agenda of increasing economic competitiveness by stressing the need to concentrate on specific practical reforms consistent with national interests and rejecting comprehensive institutional reform as putting the cart before the horse (Blair 2006; Gamble 2006). Relying more on a US-led NATO, Britain was unable to give a strong lead on security and foreign policy, where it would have been in a position to do so. French attempts to mobilize opposition to an over-mighty ally, reviving an old Gaullist strategy by looking towards Russia as a counterbalance to the USA, does not commend itself to East European members, or since the Merkel Government even to Germany. EU leaderlessness in foreign and security policy remains dogged by divisions, underfunding and the lack of a clear foreign enemy, so it has come to rely primarily on soft rather than coercive powers. The hope of creating a semi-permanent or fixed president of the European Council and a Union minister of foreign affairs by the constitutional treaty that was rejected in 2005 has left the EU to manage with its six-monthly rotating presidency. Although this has seemed a curious form of leadership, it does correspond to the confederal consociational nature of the EU, allowing the heads of all the member governments to take their turn in co-ordinating its affairs. The leaders pro tem of the EU are thus not chosen for their qualities, party, or programme but because they are the political head of the state whose turn it is to occupy the presidential post, all member states being treated equally. Team presidencies have shared the workload and have been of help particularly for the under-resourced smaller states. While there may be a revival of at least the institutional reforms of the constitutional treaty, the emphasis in practice will continue to be upon humdrum, ‘low politics’ bargaining despite occasional rhetorical flourishes in the direction of heroic, visionary ‘high politics’. The European Parliament has made progress towards providing some direct leadership but tends to be overly ambitious, as was clear from the constitutional treaty mishap. It has been more successful in enforcing a measure of accountability on the Commission, exerting indirect leadership. On some issues it has provided influential leadership, notably environmental policy, but while the impending crisis of global warming could prompt a unifying mass mobilization challenge, it has not yet dwarfed petty preoccupations, so the
310
Epilogue
EU has been largely confined to setting minimum standards, underpinning national regulatory discretion. Political parties remain rooted in their national contexts. Despite sharing a left/right split, no distinct European electorate or party system has emerged, so that David Marquand’s projected Europe des partis has not displaced a predominant Europe des patries, the precondition of an EU democratic citizenship making possible electoral integration (Caramani 2006: 19–22). Parliamentary parties do not provide support for any specific leadership because they have ‘no office with real power to fight for at the European level’ (Tsoukalis 2005: 43). With no one leading, who should European peoples follow? An open-ended purpose of the EU has been to promote political democracy and economic stability in the countries to its eastern and southern peripheries. Apart from prosperous Norway and Switzerland, the EU has proved a powerful attraction, especially to impecunious states that have seen accession as a passport to prosperity and assisted modernization. While ‘it is virtually impossible to refuse membership to any applicant that is both European and democratic . . . you can certainly keep the applicants waiting a long time’ (Tsoukalis 2005: 22; cf. 171). This has been the usual practice, the stringent preconditions of membership being in part a pretext concealing a lack of enthusiasm of the peoples of some existing member states, particularly when the candidate is Turkey. Previous enlargements having escaped much public debate, the process has become explicitly controversial. The inability to secure elite agreement on strengthened leadership, coupled with public reluctance to stretch the sense of European identity to breaking point, has dissipated such enthusiasm as existed within for further enlargement. This is reflected in less favourable terms of accession and prolonged procrastination and equivocation calculated to discourage applications to join a more exclusive fortress Europe disinclined to subordinate its interests to the lofty ideal of pan-European solidarity. ‘EU institutions sometimes legislate but they never implement. Implementation is still exclusively the responsibility of national institutions’ and enforcement is slow and patchy, especially in the new member states, despite the overloaded ECJ’s capacity eventually to impose fines (ibid. 99; cf. 33, 100). Not merely is the EU lacking direct coercive power; it is fragmented both between Commission directorates and Council of Ministers committees. Securing agreement is an arduous undertaking and major difficult decisions are usually left to the four or more annual meetings of the European Council and its twice-yearly rotating president. This is not calculated to produce strategic leadership, so ‘muddling through’ predominates when it can
Epilogue
311
overcome the leaders’ recourse to the protection and assertion of national interests. EU political leaders operate within a crowded and confusing arena, endeavouring to deal with an insoluble integration puzzle that subsumes a multitude of smaller puzzles. The unheroic task of political leadership in such circumstances is to fit the pieces together, resolving some puzzles while new ones emerge. Reluctance by leaders to fix the limits of inclusiveness and diversity has deliberately left unsettled the ultimate purpose of a contested integration process. They will have provisionally muddled through if they can preserve a collective sense of stability while making a multitude of small and occasionally large incremental adaptations to changing contexts not of their choosing. This will have to suffice until the unpredicted impact of a crisis necessitates a more ambitious collective response capable of securing a willingness to follow from otherwise divergent elites and detached peoples, who are disinclined to follow non-existent or ineffective leadership. The probabilistic general outlook suggests neither dramatic disintegration nor transformative integration. Instead, a modified stasis is likely to prevail, consisting of a combination of drift and cautious, piecemeal improvisation as opportunities present themselves to a perennially leaderless Union engaged in a trial and error exploration. While short-term improvisation in the service of diminished national sovereignty damage limitation is probable, political experimentation will continue with unpredictable longer-term outcomes, especially because the EU is not powerful enough to steer the processes of global reorganization. (Bauman 2004: 136–8). It does not help when member governments make commitments they do not intend to honour, except if they are convenient. In conclusion, the EU will have to manage its affairs with a minimum of ‘leadership heroics’. A wise organization theorist, James March, in 1982 suggested four humdrum features of successful leadership. They are everyday competence at all levels; reliance upon reciprocal anticipation rather than formal direction; trust within the hierarchy between leaders and led; avoidance of indispensability (March 2005: 118–19). While all these ways of compensating for the absence of heroic leadership are demanding, the inclination of leaders to exaggerate their own importance means that an invitation to modesty by an indisputable leader, Georges Clemenceau, should be borne in mind. ‘The cemeteries are full of people who thought they were indispensable.’ Lowering excessive expectations, nevertheless, should not be regarded as implying resignation. Rather, it is the precondition of an effective collective commitment to achieving realistic outcomes in a context where the objectives of action remain shifting, contested, and ambiguous.
312
Epilogue REFERENCES
B, Z. (2004) Europe. An Unfinished Adventure. Cambridge: Polity. B, T. (2006) 2 February, speech at St Antony’s College, Oxford, . C, D. (2006) ‘Is There a European Electorate?’, West European Politics 29/1 (January). XXIX/1. G, A. (2006) ‘The European Disunion’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations 8/1, special issue, ‘After the Constitutional Treaty: Rethinking Britain and Europe’. L, M. (ed.) (2000) The Future Shape of Europe. London: The Foreign Policy Centre. M, J. G. (2005) ‘Mundane Organizations and Heroic Leaders’, App. 2 in J. G. March and T. Weil, On Leadership. Oxford: Blackwell. T, L. (2005) What Kind of Europe? Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Index Acquis Communautaire 2, 150, 192–3 action trap (and see engrenage) 7–9 joint decision trap 70 Adenauer, Konrad 15, 91–2, 94, 96–100, 108, 148, 151, 160 agenda-setting vi, 20, 23, 33, 60, 83, 95, 115, 152, 211, 269–70, 273–81, 283–4, 297, 306 Atlantic Alliance—see NATO Austria 42, 78–80, 85, 119, 154, 188, 191, 193, 196, 198, 201–3 Barroso, José Manuel 51–2, 76, 82, 125–8, 199, 229, 295, 298–9 Belarus 188 Belgium 117, 138–9, 155, 176, 193, 196–7, 231, 252, 272, 291 Benelux 3, 154–6 Berlusconi, Silvio 139 Blair, Tony 141–2, 151, 157, 163, 167–83, 199, 309 Bolkestein services directive 23, 159, 198–9, 296, 299 Brandt, Willy 99, 151 Britain, British government, UK vi, 7, 19–20, 57, 60, 63, 69, 72–6, 81, 84, 90–3, 95, 97–101, 103–5, 108–9, 135, 137, 141–2, 151, 153, 160–1, 163, 167–83, 188, 193, 196, 198–201, 215, 222, 224–5, 269, 272, 276, 294–6, 300, 309 Brown, Gordon 174, 181–2 Budget vi, 20–1, 31, 36, 41–2, 103, 115, 144, 162–3, 180, 191, 195, 199–200, 204, 293, 296, 306–7 budgetary surveillance 36–8 Bulgaria 194–5, 199–202 Callaghan, James 100, 102 Charter of Fundamental Rights 215 China 50 Chirac, Jacques 151, 157, 159, 163, 176, 180, 270 Commission of the European Communities vi–vii, 3, 8, 15–17, 19–24, 28–44, 47–53, 55, 57–8, 61–3, 66–8, 70–7, 79–82, 85, 95–7, 99–101, 103,
106–7, 113–28, 134–6, 138–41, 144, 151, 157, 159, 177, 189, 192–7, 199–201, 203–4, 213–14, 216, 218, 222, 247–50, 253–61, 263, 271, 277, 291–2, 294–300, 306–8, 310 President v, 19, 21–2, 28, 76, 82, 103, 113–14, 116–17, 119–20, 124, 248, 255, 260–1, 275, 281, 306, 308 Reforming the Commission White Paper 237–8 White Paper on Governance 122, 228–9, 241 and Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) 51–2 and CONECCS 232–4 and Internet 227–43, 307 Committee of Permanent Representatives (COREPER) 15, 95, 101, 137, 256 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) vi, 96, 150–4, 162, 171, 191, 197, 199–200, 296, 307–8 Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) 106, 134–45, 160, 214, 263 High Representative for Foreign Policy vi, 134–5, 138, 140–1 Political and Security Committee (PSC) 136–7, 141–2 Union Minister of Foreign Affairs (UMFA) 214, 271, 276, 280–1, 309 Common Market—see European Economic Community Community method of integration 6–8, 16–17, 19, 22–4, 66–7, 114, 127, 197 Competition Policy vi, 159, 162, 307–8 CONECCS (Consultation, the European Commission and civil society) 232–4, 241 Confederal, Confederalism, Confederation v, vii, 2–5, 10, 24, 308 Conseil d’État 217–18 Consociational, consociationalism 2–4,10 Consultative Committee for International Radio (CCIR) 52–3 Convention on the Future of Europe 8, 121–2, 126, 141–2, 157, 173, 176–8, 180, 182, 196, 212, 252, 262, 270, 276, 288, 290, 294, 298
314
Index
Council of Europe 148 Council of Ministers vi–vii, 3, 9, 15–17, 19, 23, 41, 48, 53, 55–7, 62–3, 67, 77, 82–3, 92, 95–6, 100, 108, 137–9, 144, 153–4, 156, 178, 189, 192, 200, 231, 248, 261, 278, 291–2, 298–9, 308, 310 Council Secretariat 135–7, 144, 278, 283–5 President (rotating) vii, 67, 75, 77, 79, 138, 173, 180, 247, 269–85, 309–10 Team presidency 276–9, 284, 309 Croatia 161, 188, 202 Cyprus 193, 203 Czech Republic 193, 197, 200 Davignon, Etienne 19, 49 Delors, Jacques 8, 17–22, 24, 28, 74, 82, 103–4, 107, 113–14, 116–19, 127, 189, 191, 195–6, 248, 260–1, 281, 292, 294–5, 301–2, 306 White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment 17, 21, 50, 82, 229 Demos, demoi 3–4, 24, 198 democratic deficit 229 Denmark 7, 72, 76, 83, 85, 104, 155, 193–4, 229 Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) 48, 58–61, 63, 307 Ecofin (Finance and Economic Ministers) 23, 31, 33, 35, 38–42, 136, 139, 306 and Early Warning Procedure (EWP) 39–40 and Excessive Deficit Procedure (EDP) 38–42 Economic and Monetary Policy vi, 20 Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) 24, 28–43, 106–7, 121–2, 140, 152–3, 173–4, 191, 297, 306 European Monetary Institute 29, 33, 35 European Monetary System (EMS) 28, 34, 101–2, 151, 191 Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) 82 engrenage 7, 21, 66 Enlargement of EU Membership v–vi, 3, 8, 80, 119, 121, 136, 154, 156, 163, 188–204, 270 Central and Eastern Europe 191–6, 198–200, 294 Copenhagen criteria 191–2, 201–2 Europe Agreements 192 Stabilization and Association Agreements (SAA) 188
Environmental Policy vi, 66–85, 191, 257–8, 307, 309 Environment Action Programme (EAP) 72–5 Environment Council 78, 80, 82–5 Erhard, Ludwig 95–6, 98–9, 151 ESPRIT (European Strategic Programme for Research on Information Technologies) 49, 51 Estonia 193, 195 Eureka 57–8, 62 Euro—see Single Currency European Central Bank v–vi, 3, 29, 39, 41, 44, 154–5, 158, 306–7 European Coal and Steel Community(ECSC) 3–4, 7, 92–4, 250 High Authority 15–16, 93–4, 248–9 Treaty of Paris 17, 92, 94, 250 European Constitutional Treaty (TEC) vii, 4, 8, 23–4, 77, 108, 154, 156–9, 163, 176–8, 181, 188, 196–8, 201, 211–15, 248–9, 251–4, 262–3, 271, 279, 309 European Convention on Human Rights 215 European Council vi, 3, 15, 17, 19–23, 31–4, 36–41, 72, 77, 83–4, 100–1, 118, 120, 122, 125, 133–9, 151, 154, 156–7, 175, 177, 180, 193, 196–7, 201–4, 231, 247, 252, 261, 271, 278, 292, 298, 300–1, 308 President v, 77, 83–4, 141,156–7, 214, 231, 252, 271, 276, 280–2, 309 European Court of Human Rights 223 European Court of Justice vii, 3, 8, 17, 40–1, 66–7, 70, 81, 155, 211, 216–25, 307–8 Advocate-General 217, 220–1, 223 European Defence Community (EDC) 94, 250 European Economic Community (EEC) 3, 7, 10, 19, 51, 89, 94–5, 148, 150, 170 European High Definition Television (HDTV) and (HD-MAC) 48, 52–63, 307 European Ombudsman 215, 233 European Parliament (EP) vii, 3, 17, 21–2, 71, 77, 81, 85, 103, 114, 117, 120, 124–5, 154–5, 157, 170, 180, 189, 193, 198, 231, 245–64, 271, 277–8, 292, 307 Environment Committee 81, 84, 259 European Elections 5, 254, 298 President v, 262 Water Framework Directive (WFD) 258–60 European Political Community (EPC) 250
Index European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) 135–7, 140–2, 161, 263 Eurocorps 160 St. Malo Agreement 135, 154, 161, 173, 175, 180 Eurosceptics 171, 174, 178, 181–2, 190, 195 Federal, Federalism, Federation v, 4, 6–7, 18, 24, 122, 156–7, 251, 308 Finland 78–80, 85, 119, 139, 188, 191, 193–4, 272 Fischer, Joschka 301, 308 Fouchet Plan—see Franco-German tandem France, French government vii, 4, 7–8, 18–19, 23–4, 38, 40–2, 48, 53, 57, 60–1, 63, 73, 75, 91–109, 137, 139, 147–63, 172–3, 175–6, 178, 181–2, 188, 192, 196–8, 201, 204, 220–1, 223, 229, 245, 250, 262, 297, 300, 309 Franco-German tandem vi, 90–109, 147–63, 184, 197, 199, 292, 295 Adenauer-de Gaulle 91, 96–9, 148, 151 Giscard-Schmidt 19, 91, 99–102, 105, 151 Mitterrand-Kohl 91, 102–8, 148, 151, 160, 163 Elysée Treaty 97–9, 148, 157, 159–60 Fouchet Plan 97–9 Gaulle, Charles de, Gaullist 4, 15–16, 18–19, 89–91, 95–9, 148, 151–2, 160, 162, 248, 308–9 Germany, German government 38, 40–2, 67, 69, 75, 77–80, 83–5, 91–109, 123, 137, 147–63, 172, 176, 178, 181, 188, 191, 193, 196–201, 203, 216, 223, 300, 308–9 German Constitutional Court 217–18 Giscard d’Estaing, Valéry 19, 91, 99–102, 105, 151, 157, 308 Greece 42, 104, 158, 189, 195, 197, 200, 203, 276 Hallstein, Walter 19, 91, 95–7, 99, 101, 114, 116, 301 Heath, Edward 169, 184 Hungary 193, 195, 197, 200 Internet vii, 52, 227–43, 307 Interactive Policy Making 233–6, 241 Interchange of Data between Administrations (IDA) 239–40 Iran 131, 177, 203, 300 Iraq War 131, 155, 161, 175–7, 203 Ireland 21, 72, 201, 269–70, 276
315
Italy, Italian government 81, 138, 153, 158–9, 173, 191, 195, 197, 276 Japan 49–50, 53–4, 59, 291 Jenkins, Roy 19, 28, 101, 116, 169, 184, 306 Kinnock, Neil 120, 127, 167–8, 184 Kohl, Helmut 21, 90–1, 102–8, 158, 163, 295, 302, 308 Kosovo 139–40, 175, 203 Kyoto Protocol 70, 76, 79–80, 139, 269 Latvia 193, 195 Leadership collective vii, 2, 189, 204, 288–300 heroic v, 6–7, 9, 107, 143, 306, 311 hierarchical 211 humdrum 6–7, 9, 107, 143, 306, 311 transformational 272, 274, 277, 281 transnational 2–3 and democracy 246–7 Lisbon agenda, strategy 75, 83, 180, 204, 230, 237, 306, 309 Lithuania 193 Luxembourg 67, 117, 188, 193, 199, 201, 276, 278–9 Luxembourg Compromise 96, 99, 176 Maastricht Treaty on European Union (TEU) 21, 28–31, 34, 36–7, 43, 75, 81, 105, 116–17, 140, 149, 151–2, 154–5, 158, 170, 173, 175, 229, 254–5, 297, 302 Macedonia 188, 202 Macmillan, Harold 97, 100 Major, John 172–3, 177–8 Malta 193–4 Merkel, Angela 149, 163, 198–201, 309 Mitterrand, François 90–1, 102–8, 158, 160, 295, 308 Moldavia 188 Monnet, Jean 4, 7–8, 15–19, 66–7, 84, 91–4, 114, 248, 301 and see community method National champion firms vi, 61 Netherlands, Dutch vii, 4, 7, 10, 48, 57, 67, 76–9, 85, 91, 94, 138, 157, 181, 188, 193, 196, 198–9, 201, 203–4, 245, 262, 272, 276, 291, 297 New Labour 167–83, 309 North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) 96, 98, 137–8, 140, 144, 148, 160, 175, 309
316
Index
Open Method of Co-ordination (OMC) 22, 124–5, 213, 230 Party of European Socialists (PES) 169–70, 184 Poland 109, 154–5, 193–7, 199–201, 214 Pompidou, Georges 19, 99, 151 Portugal 159, 189, 195–7, 200 Prodi, Romano 23, 41, 82, 113, 117, 120–3, 135–6, 140, 306 Qualified Majority Voting (QMV) 69–70, 73, 103, 153, 173, 214, 292 Referendum 1992 155 2005 vii, 7, 9, 24, 75, 77, 91, 188, 198, 212, 245, 297 Ripa di Meana 74, 82 Romania 194–5, 199–202 Russia, Soviet Union 6, 16, 80, 92, 104, 309 Santer, Jacques 21–2, 32, 113, 117–19, 127, 195, 229, 255 Sarkozy, Nicolas 108, 149, 163, 188, 203 Schengen Agreement, Zone 38, 180, 269, 272 Schmidt, Helmut 19, 91, 99–102, 151 Schröder, Gerhard 151, 157, 161, 172, 176, 296 Schuman, Robert 15, 92–3, 248 Schuman Plan 91, 94 Serbia 203 Silguy, Yves Thibault de 32, 35 Single Currency, Euro, Euro-zone 32–3, 35, 119, 158, 173–5, 182, 306–7 Mr. Euro 280–1 Single European Act (SEA) 17–18, 20–1, 47, 57, 66–7, 69–70, 73, 81, 84, 103, 152–3, 162, 177, 281 Slovakia 193, 195–6 Slovenia 161, 193, 195 Smith, John 169–70 Social Charter, Social Chapter, Social Protocol 21, 180 Solana, Javier 133, 135, 138, 143–4 sovereignty, national v, 1–2, 6–7, 10, 15–17, 24, 171, 184
Soviet Union—see Russia Spaak, Paul-Henri 15, 94 Spain 21, 138–9, 154–5, 173, 189, 194–7, 214, 223, 272 Spinelli, Altiero 251 Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) 28–9, 31, 38–43, 121–2, 149, 156, 158–9, 306 subsidiarity 214 Sweden 7, 69, 75–6, 78–80, 82, 84–5, 119, 188, 191, 193, 196–7, 199, 201, 224 Technology Policy 47–63 European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies (EGE) 261 Information and communication technologies (ICTs) 51, 227–8, 230, 233, 237–8, 241 Research and Technology Development programmes (RTD) 51–2 Thatcher, Margaret 20, 90, 103, 172–3, 177, 182, 292–3, 295, 302 Thorn, Gaston 21 Treaty of Amsterdam 81, 105, 117, 119, 123, 152, 154–5, 158, 175, 180, 191, 195–6, 255, 299 Treaty of Maastricht—see Maastricht Treaty of Nice 121, 136, 155, 196, 215, 252, 288, 290, 294, 297–8, 302 Treaty of Paris 17, 92, 94, 250 Treaty of Rome vi, 3–4, 17–18, 23–4, 36, 66, 71, 94–6, 114, 137, 250–1, 271 Turkey vii, 180, 188, 193, 196, 203, 310 Ukraine 188 United Kingdom (UK)—see Britain United Nations (UN) 67, 75, 83, 85, 140, 147, 161 United States of America (USA) 6–7, 10, 16, 49–50, 53–4, 58–9, 76, 89, 92, 97–8, 100, 138, 141–2, 152, 155, 161, 176, 218, 220, 288, 309 United States of Europe 6, 10 veto players 8–9 Western European Union (WEU) 148 Your Voice in Europe 233–4
