Europe must not be derailed by lies and disinformation

Will Hutton, The Observer, Sunday 15 June 2008

Eurosceptics celebrate a triumph of the little people against the Euro juggernaut. Ireland’s ‘no’ vote against the treaty on the European constitution is, in such minds, the brave assertion of democracy against bureaucracy. The European elite in Brussels, with its dark plans to hobble Europeans everywhere, deserves a good kicking for producing an unloved, incomprehensible set of reforms. It has got it. Ireland has stood up for Europe.

This is nonsense from top to bottom, a farrago of lies and disinformation. The European Union is a painfully constructed and fragile skein of compromises that allows 27 democratic states on our shared continent to come together and drive forward areas of common interest to further their citizens’ well-being. The elite that plots this is a nonexistent phantom invented by populist demagogues. The beleaguered, unloved treaty would have improved Europe’s effectiveness and tried to address its much talked about democratic weaknesses.

The reality is that Ireland’s ‘no’ voters have trashed an EU that is precious but weak. Most ‘no’ voters, grabbing on to the worst fear rather than reasoned fact, have unknowingly set in train a political dynamic that, unless carefully handled, could lead not just to Ireland but Britain leaving the EU. Everybody will be the poorer.

Sometimes, fatalistically, I think this may have to happen. Eurosceptics, such as Ireland’s leading ‘no’ vote campaigner Declan Ganley, like to position their fierce and unjustified attacks on the actual Europe we have as being pro-European because today’s EU does not correspond to some impossible notion of Europe that meets their own very particular prejudices. Such is the flaw of referendums as a means to practise reasoned democratic decision-making that the only way voters will come to realise that the sceptics are wrong is to be forced to live through the consequences of their vote.

For although the first reaction in Ireland, Brussels and the rest of the European Union has been to say that the will of Ireland’s voters must be respected, the wider political logic is that Irish voters are in effect saying no to the European Union, a will that can only be respected by other states freezing their ambitions. Ireland’s voters have primed a bomb.

Thinking through the options shows just how big the bomb is. Eighteen states have already ratified the treaty, some for the second time. The first reaction of José Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, was to ask the last eight member states, Britain included, to proceed with ratification. Gordon Brown has agreed; the final reading is on Wednesday and to stop the process because of the Irish vote would be unreasonable. The European Council of heads of state meets this week and will surely re-endorse that collective view. So the EU on 1 January 2009 will have a treaty that 26 states have ratified – but not the Irish. A new commission is to be appointed, supposedly on a new basis, as well as a new president, along with a strengthened foreign policy chief. So what is to happen?

What can’t happen is that the treaty is scrapped, rewritten to accommodate changes to meet the will of Ireland’s voters and then re-ratified in 27 countries. There are the practical questions of time and expense and there is no political readiness in the other 26 capitals to go through the whole interminable process again.

On top of these there is the political problem that the treaty can’t be rewritten to accommodate specific Irish concerns because it already does; Ireland’s ‘no’ campaigners told lies. The voters’ great concerns had been met. There is a specific protocol that guarantees Ireland’s neutrality and excuses it from membership of any joint European defence effort, if any surfaces. There is no possibility of Ireland being told to enforce abortion. And all states have autonomy over tax policy.

Crucially, the treaty contains a clause that states that do not agree to its provisions are required to leave the European Union. The existing treaty can certainly be made more obviously Ireland-friendly within its existing provisions, but beyond that, the EU will have to get tough and invoke the clause. It will have to ask Ireland to resubmit essentially the same treaty for a second referendum early in 2009, rather as Ireland held a second referendum over the Nice treaty in 2002.

If Ireland votes similarly again, then it will have to accept associate status in the EU and not be a member of its governing structures. The EU will proceed without Ireland.

Nobody wants this outcome and the language at this week’s European Council will be carefully diplomatic. Senior British government sources have told me that the EU has to be ‘respectful’ of the Irish vote and not be portrayed in any way as a bully that disregards the popular will. This may be possible for a few months, but the clock is ticking. Decisions cannot be deferred. Sometime during the autumn, the President of the European Commission or the Irish Prime Minister must spell out Ireland’s choices.

Irish and British Eurosceptics, in close alliance, will react in fury. I can see it now. This will be proof-positive of the Brussels elite’s malevolence and anti-democratic intent. David Cameron’s Tory party will say that Ireland is being treated disgracefully. I don’t see how Cameron will be able to avoid a pledge to give British voters the same chance for a referendum on the treaty as the Irish, not least to strengthen the hand of the Irish ‘no’ campaigners in their second referendum. One of Europe’s big states will be on Ireland’s side when the Tories win power. They can take on Brussels bullies etc.

Battle is going to be joined in earnest because it must. Pro-Europeans everywhere must engage. We need this Europe – to fight climate change, to ensure security of energy and food, to underwrite our prosperity and to fight for our common interests.

The world needs it too. The EU is the citizens’ friend. If it did not exist, Europe would have to invent something similar. Over the next few months, Europe’s leaders are going to have to develop concrete initiatives to support these points and to present what they are doing as European and only possible because of the EU.

Maybe pro-Europeans can win Ireland’s second referendum and then, in 2010 or 2011, our own. But referendums work best for the demagogue, the dissimulator and scaremonger, as Hitler and Mussolini, lovers of referendums, proved. Increasingly, Ireland and Britain are heading for the European exit and that could portend further break-up of the Union. Pro-Europeans look out.

The Naked Emperor

José Ignacio Torreblanca
Translated by Douglas Wilson, El Pais, 16 June, 2008

The Irish no has made patently clear once again the fracture between the political class and European public opinion. With the exception of the minority Sinn Fein group, the five main parliamentary parties proved themselves incapable of mobilising the Irish people to vote yes. In Parliament, 156 MP’s voted in favour of the Lisbon Treaty and 10 against; but opinion in the country at large was very different, with final results showing 53% against the Treaty and 46.6% in favour of it.

Aware of the lack of popularity of European construction, from the beginning of the decade the European elites have tried to widen their support base with the European public. A Charter of Fundamental Rights was drawn up, followed by a Convention consisting of members of national parliaments, summoned to prepare the way for a Constitution. Finally, a good number of countries decided to call a referendum in order to ratify the resulting document. However, none of these strategies led to the desired effect; France and Holland soon regretted calling a referendum, while Spain and Luxemburg were left smarting by a low turn-out and a narrow margin of victory respectively.

But European leaders decided to ignore the growing breach with their citizens, beginning a new reform process of the Treaties which was designed, from the very outset, to get round the need for any more referenda. The old European Constitution changed its name, was chopped into two and its symbols quietly forgotten. After an eighteen month hiatus, technically described as “a reflection period” but during which reflection was conspicuous by its absence, a new Treaty was drafted behind closed doors. Up until last Thursday, the scheme seemed to have worked well enough, but there were some loose ends which couldn’t quite be tied up, namely, the mandatory Irish referendum. 862.415 Irish voters have tugged away at those loose ends, unraveling a whole process and leaving the Emperor without clothes.

Although the Irish result can’t simply be extended to the rest of the EU (it ought to be remembered that eighteen countries have ratified the Lisbon Treaty to date), mere common sense points to a significant problem for the twenty seven member states. Certainly, for the Reflection Group on the Future of the EU headed by Felipe González, the question of how to widen popular support for the integration process now takes on an absolute, almost life or death priority, because Europe without Europeans is neither viable nor sustainable as a political actor, either in the continent itself or the wider world. It is clear that European integration creates winners and losers, and as long as European and national institutions are incapable of harnessing and channeling the demands of unhappy voters, they are likely to let off steam in the public arena.

As for the short term, doubts about how to extricate Europe from the crisis are more than justified. Plan “A” with all its constitutional fanfare, sank without trace; plan “B”, stripped of such trappings, now also seems headed for failure. The Irish Government suspended ratification of the European Constitution in 2005 on the grounds that it was too ambitious; now it has failed with a more modest text. Should we try again with an even less ambitious draft? Or should 136.964 votes lead us to muddle along with the Treaty of Nice, which everybody knows is inadequate if an enlarged EU is to become a real protagonist on the world stage? Cleary, that is no solution either.

In spite of the desire to find a rapid and painless way out of the crisis, there is no quick fix to the Irish no. The turnout (53.1%) was more than sufficient, higher even than Spain’s in 2005 (42.3%), which makes calling a second referendum with the same question unthinkable. For a second referendum to make any sense, Ireland has to agree on a set of conditions with its partners beforehand (as in the case of the “Decalogue” which the 1986 Spanish referendum on NATO membership was based on). The only problem is voters rejected the Treaty for a variety of often irreconcilable reasons, making it is hard to imagine what safeguards or derogations could keep the Irish people happy.

However, despite these complexities, it does amount to a possible and above all desirable way forward, because it would mean the ratification process could continue. That’s why it’s vital European leaders prevent contagion spreading when the European Council meets this Thursday, hold firm on the ratification timetable, categorically rule out a renegotiation of the whole Treaty and, above all, do all they can to ensure the Treaty comes into effect on January 1st 2009 as planned, or at the very latest, before the European elections in June 2009. If not, those elections might well turn into a real European referendum, with unforeseeable consequences for legitimacy. Clearly, the solution to this crisis has to come from the politicians, not the technocrats.

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El emperador desnudo

El no irlandés ha puesto de manifiesto una vez más la fractura existente entre la clase política y la opinión pública europeas. Excepto el minoritario Sinn Fein, los cinco grandes partidos con representación parlamentaria han sido incapaces de movilizar a los irlandeses a favor del sí. En el Parlamento, 156 diputados votaron a favor del Tratado de Lisboa y 10 en contra; en la calle el resultado ha sido muy distinto: un 53% votó en contra y un 46,6% a favor.

Desde comienzos de la década, las élites europeas, conscientes de la escasa popularidad de la construcción europea, han intentado ampliar su base de apoyo ciudadana: primero fue la redacción de una Carta de Derechos Fundamentales, después la convocatoria de una Convención integrada por parlamentarios nacionales que preparara un proyecto de Constitución y, finalmente, un buen número de países decidieron recurrir al referéndum para ratificar el texto resultante. Sin embargo, estas estrategias no dieron el resultado esperado: Francia y Holanda pronto se arrepintieron de haber convocado referendos, mientras que España y Luxemburgo salieron escaldados por la baja participación, en el primer caso, y por lo ajustado de la victoria, en el segundo.

Pero los líderes europeos decidieron ignorar la brecha ciudadana, iniciando un nuevo proceso de reforma de los tratados, diseñado, desde un principio, para sortear los refrendos. La vieja Constitución europea se cambió de nombre, se troceó en dos y fue despojada de sus símbolos. Tras un parón de 18 meses, técnicamente denominado “periodo de reflexión” pero en la que ésta brilló por su ausencia, se pergeñó, a puerta cerrada y en pocos meses, un nuevo tratado. Hasta el jueves, la conjura funcionó, pero debido a las peculiaridades de Irlanda, donde el referéndum es obligatorio, las élites dejaron un pequeño fleco. Y hete aquí, que tirando de ese fleco, 862.415 irlandeses han dejado al emperador desnudo.

Por ello, aunque el resultado en Irlanda no pueda extenderse sin más al resto de la UE (no debe olvidarse que 18 países han ratificado hasta la fecha el Tratado de Lisboa), el sentido común no deja de indicar que los Veintisiete se enfrentan con un problema de gran calado. Desde luego, para el Grupo de Reflexión sobre el Futuro de la UE que lidera Felipe González, la cuestión de cómo ampliar el apoyo popular al proceso de integración adquiere a partir de ahora una prioridad absoluta, casi existencial, porque una Europa sin europeos no es viable ni sostenible como actor político, ni en Europa ni en el mundo. Está claro que la integración europea genera ganadores y perdedores: por ello, mientras las instituciones, nacionales y europeas, no sean capaces de arbitrar y canalizar las demandas de los descontentos, la presión se desbordará por la vía popular.

Más a corto plazo, las dudas respecto a qué hacer para salir de esta crisis están más que justificadas. El plan A incluía toda la fanfarria constitucional y naufragó; el plan B, despojado del concepto constitucional, también parece ahora abocado al fracaso. El Gobierno irlandés suspendió en 2005 la ratificación de la Constitución Europea, alegando que era un texto demasiado ambicioso; ahora ha fracasado con un texto cicatero. ¿Debemos probar con un texto menos ambicioso aún? ¿Conformarnos, debido a 136.964 votos de diferencia en Irlanda, con un Tratado de Niza que sabemos que no es apto para hacer de la UE ampliada a Veintisiete un actor de talla mundial? Claramente, no.

Pese a los deseos de encontrar una salida fácil y rápida, el no tiene una muy difícil solución. Por un lado, la participación (53,1%) ha sido más que suficiente, superior incluso a la que registró el referéndum en España en 2005 (42,3%), lo que hace impensable convocar un segundo referéndum con la misma pregunta. Para que un segundo referéndum tuviera sentido, Irlanda debería pactar de antemano con sus socios una serie de condiciones (como en el caso del decálogo en el que se basó la consulta sobre la OTAN en España en 1986). El problema es que las razones del rechazo son tan diversas, e incluso tan irreconciliables entre sí, que resulta difícil imaginar qué salvaguardias o derogaciones podrían satisfacer al pueblo irlandés. Sin embargo, pese a la complejidad, es una vía posible, y sobre todo, deseable, porque no obligaría a suspender el proceso de ratificación.

Por ello, lo esencial es que este jueves, en el Consejo Europeo, los líderes europeos eviten el efecto contagio, manteniendo a toda costa el calendario de ratificación, descartando una renegociación global del tratado y sobre todo, haciendo todo lo posible para que el texto entre en vigor, como estaba previsto, el 1 de enero de 2009 o, a más tardar, antes de las elecciones europeas de junio de 2009. De lo contrario, éstas sí que podrían convertirse en un referéndum europeo de imprevisibles consecuencias deslegitimadoras. Claramente, la solución a esta crisis tiene que venir de la mano de la política, no de la técnica jurídica.