Tanguy de l’Espinay

Rumania, Bulgaria tomorrow, but maybe Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Ukraine, Russia later… Robert Schuman would be very surprised if he could see what EU has become! But, even ourselves, do we know really what we expect it to be?

The European Union is again going to widen a little more in January 2007, with the entrance of Rumania and Bulgaria. And later? Later we do not know. Some people would like a break, but what for? Because of European geographic limits? But is anybody able to draw the limit of geographic Europe by taking the history, the culture, and especially the economic and political current stakes into consideration? Many people would like to stop before integrating Turkey due to the possible religious shock but let us not forget that Bosnia, closer to us than Turkey, is a Moslem country. The religious border is not thus the cultural border. On the other hand, saying that Europe has to stop before Turkey’s entrance, in order to the Human Rights disrespect, is relevant in the way that protecting Europe’s political coherence becomes a major issue.

What is important is that, whatever we want to make of Europe, we need to bear in mind geographic boundaries, but especially preserve political, historic, cultural and organizational coherence! Thus, and once Europe is not a club, but a decision-making power, one may stress that the decision-making process is getting more and more complicated each time a new country enters the E.U. But if the enlargement has some organizational bad consequences, it also has good political reasons: the enlargement in 2004 to ten countries of central and oriental Europe, was considered as a ” historic duty ” to finish with the division of Europe. And today, the only means to enforce the safety of the widened Union with regard to the unstable nearby countries, is to include them in the E.U. This is how a real “gearing of enlargement” has begun, making a lot of people sceptic about it… Sceptical regarding the capacity of Europe to function, but also sceptical about its capacity to keep a political internal coherence. And we don’t need to go so far as Ural or Black Sea, to realize the danger that some countries represent.

From 1999, the European council of Helsinki adopted a process of stabilization and association concerning the Balkan countries ravaged by the ethnic wars following the explosion of the Yugoslav union. We thus have a coherent political logic. In December, 2002, the European council of Copenhagen confirmed the vocation of five Balkan countries – Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia-Montenegro, Albania – being a part of the Union. 27+5=32. We would be 32 there.

And it is not finished yet! Norway, taking advantage of the common market without being in the EU, has to adopt the directives (without being able to influence the contents) and to finance the enlargement…That is why a feeling of marginalization could drive to a new debate on the membership, rejected in 1972 and in 1994. And Switzerland multiplies agreements with the Union to which it gets closer little by little . 32+2=34…to decide is not an easy thing ! Nevertheless, it is not the most relevant criterion to stop the enlargement, once those countries are in a political logic which corresponds to Europe. On the other hand, if we look towards Russia, the limits of coherent Europe appear.

Russia is considered European for a part of its territory and the great majority of its population, but it is extended over two continents and thus goes beyond the theoretical limit which is the Ural. And it would not respect the criteria : it is neither a true democracy, nor a real market economy. Although Russia really wants to develop commercial partnerships with Europe, it is pressing these close neighbours not to look towards the west. Byelorussia is very far from being a part of Europe, with a president dictator and a Soviet system. Moreover it prefers Russia to West. Ukraine, on the other hand, is more sharply separated from Russia. With a parliamentary presidential regime and economic reforms, it tries to get closer to Europe, but Russia makes it difficult by pointing out their economic system and their many Russian-speaking inhabitants.

Moldavia really wants to enter the European Union, especially because Rumania, of which it was a part before the WW2, is going to enter in 2007. But with a “communist type” regime and failures in the economic reforms, this country – the poorest of Europe – undergoes widely the pressure of Russians, very present via their numerous military bases and the “marionette” state of Transdniestry. So, it is not necessary to go to Ural and to the Black Sea to find countries which would not respect the political coherence of Europe. The political criteria ( human rights, democratic politic system…), more than the geographic one or any other, is thus the one who fixes the current borders of Europe.