EUROPEAN UTOPIA:
One can do so much and no more
EU is an ideological rather
than geopolitical project. It doesn’t pretend to be the
stronghold of democracy. In this connection one might recall Herzen’s
words that Europe would never be able to live up to its
beliefs. Historically several EU countries had never met the liberal
democratic criteria, they have to stand for nowadays.
EU is an ideological rather than
geopolitical project. It doesn’t pretend to be the stronghold
of democracy. In this connection one might recall Herzen’s words that
Europe would never be able to live up to its beliefs.
Historically several EU countries had never met the liberal democratic
criteria, they have to stand for nowadays.
Recently the negotiations between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Italian
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have taken
place — forthcoming cancellation of the visa regime between Russia
and the Euro-Union has become one of its primary subjects. So far,
realization of this ripened arrangement is postponing until some
undefined future. Main reason for that is the vague structure
of European Union itself.
Recent indiscriminate widening of the European Union was replaced with the
urge to complete this formation given its current borders. For long,
if not forever. In the 2000s more than ten states have
acquired EU membership during quite a short term: former states
of the "Eastern bloc" and ex-Soviet Baltic States, Mediterranean Islands
(Cyprus, Malta) and one of the former Yugoslavian republics (Slovenia).
Adherents of the further EU expansion have already prophesied the
rest of Yugoslavian republics, Albania, even Turkey and some other former
Soviet Republics (Moldavia, Georgia, perhaps even the Ukraine and Byelorussia)
to become its members. Ideas of turning the European Union into the
European-Mediterranean Union, including Israel and Maghreb States
(North-Western Africa), were voiced up...
It seems that "spreading out" of the EU is finally over.
One of the main reasons are quite unexpected difficulties in adoption
of the ground-rule legislative acts that the European Union
is to be acting upon. European Constitution hasn’t been
approved. Mind that it were not the Eastern neophytes who queered
Euro-integrators a pitch but the old members of the Euro-Union,
France, first of all.
All-embracing European Constitution was put aside. Instead
of it short Lisbon Treaty of the basic principles for common
authority bodies of the European Union appeared. But even this didn’t
go without a flub.
"Even after adoption of Lisbon Treaty contemporary Euro-Union remains
a quasi-state" — writes V. Bliznekov on the pages
of his LiveJournal. "Perhaps, European Union would never become
a classical state, but rather is to remain the political
formation that hadn’t ever existed in the political world before.
Euro-Union adopted about 70% of sovereignty of its member-states and
worked out its own European legislation, obligatory for all the EU states,
based on the precedent-related decisions of the European Court (don’t
mix it up with the European Court of Human Rights). European
Union instituted the EU citizenship, but still, from the legal standpoint
it is not a new state".
So makes the long-term, civilizational base this formation rests on?
This is the main issue that the EU faces in XXI century.
Future of united Europe depends on adequate answer to this
question. During the work on the European Constitution that failed the
maturity test, members of certain right EU parties — mostly
Christian Democratic ones — were trying to include the mentioning
of general Christian values of European civilization into
Constitution preamble. This attempt failed mostly due to the opponents
of EU expansion. They convinced everyone that in this case Turkey and
Albania won’t join the EU. But who knows, may be if the Christian
values were formulated in the European Constitution, there would have been
no problems accepting it in France, Netherlands and
Ireland — countries that actually disrupted adoption.
What is it if not the Christian roots? The author of the
above-mentioned article gives his answer not only to this question but
to another one — about time of imposing visa-free regime between
the EU and Russia — as well and in quite
an interesting way: "As George Krays — Professor of modern
history and the director of European Institute of the University
of Basel (Switzerland) — brilliantly put in his new monograph
"Europe and its boundaries", Europe is everywhere, wherever European
principals are respected"... If the EU really appears
to be new political and valuable project of humanity... it’s
obviously that ideological values as an embodiment of definite
spirit will have an advantage over political interests of the EU
itself...European integration is coming to be an absolutely
new politically unprecedented project in a world history. This
is axiomatic and we have to understand it before even
speaking about Russian policy towards Europe. It is too early
to talk about political and economic integration of Russia into
Europe — Europeans can only estimate the value of "closer" between
Russia and Europe."
So, the EU is not geopolitical but to a much greater degree
ideological project. This ideology, however, is not Christianity but
an atheistic or "tolerant" liberalism. The EU has a claim
not only for the most precise realization of liberal democratic principles
but also for the leading role in guarding these principles and spreading
them around the world. The EU functionaries are obviously going
to follow these goals of "the worldwide liberal mission"
in their relations with Russia (in fact they already do that),
dictating Russia their standards of life and, at the same time,
protecting "pureness and chastity" of democratic Europe from desecration
by "Eastern barbarians" who didn’t quite get rid of their
"totalitarian past".
In this connection one may recall two aphorisms of great (and yet
diverse) Russian thinker A. I. Herzen that were said more than
a century and a half ago:
1. "While raising its protests in the name of freedom and human
rights, it (Europe) has raised to such heights of belief that
it would probably be unable to reach them itself".
2. "And every time when it (Europe) reproaches Russians for being slaves,
the latter will have the right to ask in return: "What about you? Are
you actually free?"
Historically, numerous EU countries hardly match criteria of liberal
democracy that are now attempted to represent as the basic values
of the European integration. We may be applied even to the
"old-democracy" countries — like France and England. How long ago was
it when the life-reaping revolution burst out in France? The right
answer is 1969.
At the same time, in the beginning of the 80s, so-called
"separatists", fighters for reunification of Ireland, who embarked
on hunger strike, were dying in the prisons of England. They
decided to use it in order to be officially recognized
as the political prisoners. But British government was just cynically
watching their political enemies die with no worries at all. Even the
electing Ulster representative to the English parliament failed
to save their leader from starvation.
Simultaneously with that about 400 people were in prison due
to political reasons, and several thousand people were banned from certain
professions because of political reasons.
Three EU members — Greece, Spain and Portugal — stopped being
fascist dictatorship only in the middle of 70s. Besides that, there
was a case of recurrence in Spain in 1981 —
it was failed putsch of Francoists that however indicated
considerable socialistic and psychological base for totalitarian order.
Lieutenant-Colonel Tejero Molina burst into parliament, laid the deputies
on the floor and delivered the machine fire over their heads. Let us
remind you that it was just a quarter of a century
ago.
Given that, there is an obvious hierarchical system inside
of the EU itself. Group of "old" EU members (generally
speaking, Western European countries) and group of newcomers (Eastern
Europe) may be singled out. The latter are not quite taken as the
"full-fledged" members, they still haven’t overcome the "totalitarian
influence", that’s why they have to earn the trust of "old" members
with total loyalty to European values. The much-talked-about, "European
values" are, however, still perceived in a very peculiar way
by these countries. In Latvia and Estonia, where Russians used
to live for more than five hundreds years, a hundred thousand people
are still restrained in civil rights, they can’t take part in the
elections, etc. It’s the same thing as in the RSA during the period
of apartheid, but the European Union considers such discrimination
to be rather natural "European feature".
Given this background, EU complaints to other "second class"
countries are tend to be quite preposterous and absurd. Speaking
of democratic values, human rights and liberty of conscience, for the
first time in the European history they’ve actually appeared in the
Czech Republic, precisely during the Hussite Wars at the beginning
of XV century. But...Czech Republic as a former socialistic
country cannot be considered to be an authority in the
issues of human rights interpretation
(no in contemporary EU, at least). It’s incredible,
preposterous, absurd, but yet it is here — arrogance
of Western Europe even to "their allies", that are taken not quite
as ones.
And still, in spite all of that, EU claims messianic liberal
ideology to be its foundation. It’s not only Russia that feels
unreasonable arrogance of Europe. Oppression of ideological system
has come to the limit patience of "insufficiently democratic and
tolerate" EU nations like Greece, for example. Mass riots against
"Europeanization" in of Greece are just a presage of the
same events in the other EU members. Hardball legal unification that
doesn’t take any national or historical peculiarities into account
is "the most advanced and liberal ideology" for now. For Greece this
ideology turns into major changes: instead of 57, now Greeks would have
to retire in 67 and they’d have to import watery
hydroponics-grown Dutch tomatoes, instead of eating their own ones, grown
under the fertile southern sun. In Holland policemen disguise themselves
as orthodox Jews or transvestites, walk the streets
in an outfit like that and provoke people to make "intolerant"
statements about religious and sexual minorities — well, there must
be someone sent to the bull-pen! It’s just like the memorable jokes
about KGB agents (it has never happened in the USSR for real, you
see)!
So, this is ideological formation we have to deal with. It’s
impossible to understand, whether it’s arrogance or ideological
surrealism that run the show. And do we also have to play the
game of people, who have forgotten their recent past?
By Yaroslav Butakov
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