Europe is becoming an undemocratic continent where force matters more than law
Paul Mason
We've had the rival launches, in which cheesy celebs and tawdry men in suits swapped platitudes about Europe. Now we're going to get the letter: David Cameron is being forced to write down his demands before the other EU governments will begin negotiations. All this in preparation for a referendum whose date has not yet been set.
Writing stuff down is good – and too rarely done in international diplomacy. What you think is wrong with the EU, and what you want done about it, will vary widely depending where in Britain you live, your class, age and ideals. My hunch is that, if we all did this, and loaded the results into some vast database, the real problem with Europe would emerge. It is power – and the lack of democratic control over it.
I have no prior hostility to the EU. But the first time you have to lug TV production kit around the stairs and tunnels at Rond-Point Schuman in Brussels, beneath the unfriendly gaze of armed Belgian cops, you begin to realise how unequal power is in this semi-superstate. The architecture of power in Brussels is faceless: it seems to embody the determination to dissolve political traditions into a monolith.
The sheer size of the EU directorates makes them susceptible only to two kinds of influence: global corporations and pan-national industry lobby groups. That means, for businesses, it is almost impossible to deal with Europe unless you have mega size, or are prepared to dissolve your specific interest into a sector agenda, which will itself be mediated through layer upon layer of protocol. For individual citizens, it's worse. The only real power to influence Europe's vast bureaucratic structures has to be expressed through one of two channels: the British government and the European Court. The commission is not accountable to the parliament, and the central bank seems accountable only to Angela Merkel.
In the past year, on two occasions when tested, European solidarity fell apart. Critics say Greece was smashed by the European central bank that was supposed to keep it solvent. There was no democratic redress. The many millions of people who saw the protest hashtag #ThisIsACoup had no way – even indirect – to influence the actions of the commission and the European Central Bank. Then, as refugees from Syria and beyond flowed through the Balkans, two key parts of the legal architecture fell apart: the Schengen agreement, which assures free movement between some central states, was suspended. And the Dublin III treaty, which forces the deportation of migrants to their first country of entry, likewise ignored.
It's hard to avoid the conclusion: Europe is becoming a continent where force matters more than law. Germany forced Greece to accept a programme that will destroy its economy and strip its state of assets for the next 50 years. Half a million people forced their way across borders in a way that all forms of rhetoric against migration could not stop.That's great for them: but not for the thousands of sub-Saharan migrants trapped in violent slums across north Africa. They must rot there, simply because they do not have the power to do what the Syrians did. Businesses and politicians have also begun to understand that, in Europe, might is right. Uber, which has faced bans in Spain and had its offices raided three times in the Netherlands, has just been declared legal in the UK.
Staking a claim to a new business model then seeing if it's actually legal seems to be the new normal. In Europe, the outcome seems hit and miss. Both the action and reactions demonstated something that all Chinese city governments know: when the executive power is far away and the law lethargic, arbitrary pursuit of self-interest is the most effective course of action.
For the "stay" lobby, in the run-up to the referendum, the strongest argument will be the lack of real alternatives to EU membership. Sure, let's do 50 bilateral trade deals and sell our infrastructure to China – but don't think this comes with a return to Great Power status for the UK. It will mean the opposite – as we bargain away our diplomatic positions and our human rights agenda for the sake of investment deals and energy security.But the "everything's fine and the critics are just nationalists" argument does not wash either. Just as the euro is destroying the economies of southern Europe, the EU's institutions might destroy European solidarity.
My own written demands would focus on the imbalance of power and the tendency to use it arbitrarily. For the EU to be a legitimate state, even a weak one, its legislature must control its executive. The rule of law means swift redress and advance compliance: but European law is neither swift nor enforcable without expensive retrospective justice.The ECB's tendency to take politicised and arbitrary action is not just a problem for euro countries, but the whole project. Finally, the power to admit new states has to lie with existing populations. The EU's logo is on my passport: before the borders of that institution are extended to Iraq (via Turkey) or the Donetsk warzone (via Ukraine), I would like not just a vote but a veto.
This problem of power is so big that both sides in the referendum have a vested interest in ignoring it. Even if we leave, it will still be a problem for Britain if there's a power imbalance between people and institutions inside the EU. The pro-EU faction seem happy to tolerate glacial change, leaving generations of Europeans to live under a semi-democracy. The real power, meanwhile, sits with large corporations, banks and elites.
And here's the strangest thing: for all the power concentrated at the top, the EU lacks the will to operate purposefully in the multipolar global power system. We know, roughly, what the US wants. Ditto for China and Russia. Ask what Europe wants – in Ukraine, Syria or the Arctic circle – and you'll draw a blank. In a multipolar world, whose chaos zones are expanding, effective states with clear diplomatic aims and red lines matter.
Paul Mason is economics editor of Channel 4 News. @paulmasonnews
