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The limits of Europe
A SUCCESSFUL conclusion of the current enlargement negotiations will almost double the number of European Union members. The Europe of 15 will become the Europe of 27. Many EU politicians and policymakers will want to call a halt there: they already harbour serious doubts about the union's ability to cope with even 12 new members. But drawing a line may prove impossible.
The first and most pressing issue will be Turkey's application to join the Union. The Turks have been kept waiting for decades. They signed an association agreement with the EEC--widely seen as a first step on the road to membership--back in 1963, 30 long years before the Czech Republic signed a similar agreement. Turkey's formal application for membership was submitted in 1987, seven years before Poland's and Hungary's. If and when the countries of Central and Eastern Europe are admitted, the question of what to do about Turkey will become acute.
But Turkey will not be the only country hammering at the door. Almost all the Balkan countries also aspire to join the Union. The EU is encouraging them to think about membership, in the hope that the prospect will improve stability and respect for human rights. On April 9th Macedonia, still on the brink of a civil war, became the first Balkan country to sign a "stabilisation and association agreement" with the EU, holding out the prospect of eventual membership. Croatia is already in discussions about signing a similar agreement, and Albania, Bosnia and Yugoslavia are other potential candidates.
If the Balkan countries can join, what about Russia's partners in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)? And come to think of it, what about Russia itself? Opinion polls show that over 50% of Russians think it would be a good idea for them to join the EU. But policymakers in the EU do not return the favour. Russia is just too big and too different, they say, and would be too difficult to absorb. The problem, though, would be to find an objective reason for keeping Russia (or any other future applicant) out should it ever decide to put in a bid for membership. The EU is meant to be a liberal organisation, based on rational, non-discriminatory principles. It cannot say (to Turkey): "We won't let you in because you are mainly Muslims," or (to Russia): "We won't let you in because we don't trust you." It has to apply objective criteria.
And if, eventually, future applicants were to satisfy the EU's political and economic requirements? Then let them in, some would say. After all, if Ukraine, or indeed Russia, had a well-established democracy and a functioning market economy, there would be no need to worry about it becoming a member. The Brussels-based Centre for European Policy Studies has already published a paper spelling out voting weights and numbers of MEPs in a future European Union of 50 members (echoing, not entirely coincidentally, the number of states in the USA).
Others shake their heads and say that the Union must find objective criteria to support what at heart everybody feels: that some countries can never become members. But what might these criteria be? Geography won't do. After all, if Turkey is deemed to be part of Europe, then surely Russia is too? Culture is equally tricky. Most EU leaders are understandably reluctant to define some sort of core European culture that goes beyond liberal democratic principles. Religion is a particularly sensitive area. Mr Verheugen at the commission argues that Turkey can hardly be excluded for being Muslim when millions of Muslims are already citizens of the EU. But religion clearly plays some part in his thinking about European-ness. Later in the conversation, when discussing the claims of Armenia and Georgia to eventual membership, he points out that their people were Christians when the West Europeans were still pagans.
For the moment, however, the question of EU membership for countries such as Armenia remains academic. It is a different matter for Turkey, whose application is already on the table. To date it has not been allowed to press ahead with negotiations because it is not yet deemed to have satisfied the political criteria for membership. Earlier this year Turkey presented the EU with a proposed programme of political change to meet the Union's main concerns. But many in the EU reckon that it could still take decades before the Turks are able to meet crucial political demands, such as full respect for the rights of the Kurdish minority and an end to the political role of the armed forces.
It is already clear, however, that even if Turkey does eventually meet the political criteria for membership, an important faction within the EU will continue to oppose its membership. It already has a larger population than any EU country bar Germany (64m against 80m), and forecasts suggests that within a generation it could overtake Germany too. The idea that Turkey could be the most populous nation within the EU, with all the associated voting power in the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament, is too much for some. Ulrike Guerot, head of EU research at the German Council on Foreign Relations, says simply: "You cannot have a situation in which the country with the biggest weight in the EU is also the poorest, is on the geographical periphery of Europe, is not a founding member of the European Union and has no history of European integration."
American foreign-policymakers have often argued that Turkey should be allowed into the EU for strategic reasons, and Ms Guerot believes that in granting candidate status to Turkey the EU was caving in to American pressure. "These Americans have no conception of what EU membership entails," she fumes. "Yes, there is a security aspect; but if you want the EU to be a strong partner, you cannot have Turkey inside the EU, destabilising it." Hers is not a lone voice. Helmut Schmidt, a former German chancellor in a Social Democrat-led government, and Edmund Stoiber, one of the leading figures on the German right, have expressed similar reservations recently.
The Turks are already angry about the EU's plans to form a European defence arm that would include Greece but not Turkey. They are threatening to use their leverage within NATO to prevent the proposed EU force from being given automatic access to NATO assets. But Turkish anger about the EU's military plans would be as nothing compared with the fury that would be provoked by an EU decision to admit the Greek half of Cyprus to membership. If at the same time the Turks were to conclude that the EU was giving them the runaround over enlargement, things could get nasty. The pro-western camp in Turkey has consistently argued that EU membership is essential to the country's well-being. If relations with Europe go sour, other voices--for example, those of militant nationalists and Islamic fundamentalists--might get more of a hearing.
The whole Turkish dilemma is an example of how the EU's efforts to bring stability to the countries inside an enlarged Union risk destabilising the countries that will find themselves left out. Nor is Turkey the only one. The outlook for Ukraine, for example, could go from bad to worse if the country's economic and political ties with Poland were to be weakened by new Polish visa requirements and stronger border controls.
And what of the Russians? It is certainly conceivable that EU enlargement could reactivate strategic rivalry with the former superpower. For the moment, however, Russia seems oddly relaxed about it. The Putin government has made it clear that it opposes the extension of NATO to the Baltic states, but is in favour of their prospective EU membership. Russian officials have even whispered that they regard the EU as the best safeguard for the rights of Russian minorities in the Baltic states.
But there is no guarantee that the Russians will remain so relaxed about enlargement. The Kaliningrad enclave (a bit of Russia entirely surrounded by what could become EU territory) offers an obvious potential flashpoint. More generally, whereas diplomats in the EU may talk of creating new forms of governance and international order, the Russians take a traditional "realist" approach to foreign policy. If an enlarged EU were to develop a genuine defence arm, a common foreign policy worthy of the name and a more integrated political structure, a "realist" might regard that as a threat.
Both the Turkish and the Russian questions suggest that the EU now needs to think about developing a foreign policy for countries that may remain outside the Union. Christoph Bertram, director of the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, a Berlin-based think-tank, argues that the EU has developed only one foreign-policy tool, the offer of enlargement. "It has proved a really excellent way of persuading countries to behave in the ways that you want," he says. "But sooner or later the EU has to be able to draw a line and work out new forms of relationships with countries that are not going to join the Union."
With Russia, that could involve a free-trade agreement, as well as the development of close co-operation and consultation on a range of subjects, from environmental clean-up to the fight against crime. Turkey already has a free-trade deal with the European Union and may yet join the EU itself, but if not, the EU will have to come up with new and imaginative ways to maintain a good relationship with the country. That might involve allowing the Turks access to some EU institutions, such as the defence arm, as well as a built-in right of consultation over any EU legislation that may affect them.
The most important questions posed by enlargement are about stability. How will an enlarged EU maintain internal stability in its institutions and external stability in its relations with the outside world? The questions seem different, but the answers may be connected.
For years, debates about the future of the EU have revolved around the choice between widening and deepening. Widening (meaning enlargement) has often been advocated by those who feared deepening (meaning a move towards an ever closer federal union), in the belief that a larger union would also be a looser one. For the same reason, many integrationists have feared enlargement. As widening has drawn nearer, however, the federalists have changed their argument. They are now saying that closer union is needed to ensure that an enlarged EU can still work. If there are too many national vetoes, they suggest, the EU will be unable to take decisions. In a variant of this argument, some of them appeal for a closer union restricted to an inner core of members.
But neither camp offers a real solution to the internal dilemmas posed by enlargement. A tighter federal union that attempted to impose more and more common rules on 27 countries at different stages of development, each with its own national traditions, would almost inevitably create a backlash. Before long, an empire run from Brussels would be having to quash rebellions in the provinces. The idea of an inner core at least recognises that different countries want and need different things from the EU. But defining the inner core will be difficult. Some in Brussels reckon that membership of the single currency will come to define the difference between "inner" and "outer" members of the club. But, as noted earlier, the new Central and East European members may join the euro sooner than expected; and an inner core of 16 or 17 countries would still be very hard to manage.
Fortunately, a better solution seems to be emerging of its own accord. The EU is gradually turning into a series of overlapping clubs. Some rules, in particular those governing the internal market--which is still the EU's most important feature--will have to be adopted by all members. But membership of other clubs will be optional. For example, some countries, such as Britain, may choose to play a leading role in foreign policy and defence, but stay out of monetary union. Others may stay clear of tighter defence co-operation, but go along with closer co-operation on taxation or internal policing. Such flexibility should allow the new member states from Central and Eastern Europe to choose the type of EU membership that meets their needs and allows them room to breathe.Less can be more
Advocates of a federal arrangement will complain that an EU of overlapping clubs will lack coherence, and will find it hard to act as a powerful force on the world stage. But that may be all to the good, because a looser, less coherent EU is more likely to be regarded as a force for peace and stability around the world. Any nation-state seeking to enlarge its territory in the way that the European Union is doing would long since have been accused of imperialism and made enemies for itself. The remarkable thing about the current round of EU enlargement is how little opposition it has aroused in the outside world. Indeed, most of the EU's potential strategic rivals are in favour of enlargement, because they recognise that whereas the European Union has played an important role in creating peace and prosperity, it looks unlikely ever to develop a nation-state's ability to project power.
Ultimately, the enlargement of the EU is about preserving and
enhancing stability across Europe. It can achieve that aim, but only
if it recognises that an enlarged European Union should not aspire to
be either a superpower or a superstate.
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