*** XAVIER CAUQUIL: Phénoménologie politique de l'Europe. L'Union souveraine. L'Harmattan (5-7 rue de l'École Polytechnique, F-75005 Paris. Tel: (33-1) 40467920 - fax: 43258203 - E-mail: diffusion.harmattan@wanadoo.fr - Internet: http://www.librairieharmattan.com ). « Questions contemporaines » series. 2009, 305 pp. €29. ISBN 978-2-296-09190-0.
A “contemporary philosophical reflection” aiming to clarify relations over a 60 year period between the Union, its member states and different European peoples, can be a source of many surprises, especially when it is written by a philosopher specialising in political economy. From the outset, Xavier Cauquil explains that this book seeks to provide an, “a-typical itinerary”. This confession is the prelude to an intellectual pilgrimage, which leads the reader away from the major traditional axes of commonly-held assumptions towards roads on which the author treads in his revisiting of Hegelian philosophy. This journey is impressive in several senses: sometimes it leaves us speechless or sceptical, even outraged but it does not cease to intrigue us and get us to think about this implacable voyage of erudition, which has the immense merit of providing crucial insight by expanding our field of vision and understanding.
Initially, the author enters into the minutiae of the question, backed up with quotations and the ideas of Adam Smith, in an effort to dissect, “the dialectic of the market”, in the European context and which has provided both “agent and cautionary note” to the Community project. The book also seeks to demonstrate that the professed virtues of free and unhindered competition, the cornerstone of the “Common Market” are testimony to a “vague” and disingenuous solicitation to the ideas of the father of classical economics, “marked notably by the omnipresence in technical and official European documents of a famous metaphor that has penetrated the common vernacular: the invisible hand”. This is the essential element in Adam Smith's faith, which according to Xavier Cauquil, have been instrumental in the thinking underpinning the European context. The author also strives to illustrate, with an undeniable force of conviction, to demonstrate that Smith's praises of the state in the sphere of economics and which leads him to claim that peace in Europe, “does not result from political detachment or by economics alone” through the market and competition but through eminently political choices aimed at directing, “the free expression of the provisions of trade”. This leads him to purport that Europe will be achieved, “by following this strategy that perfectly conforms with the logical schema designed by Hegel”, namely, that the market will work for Europe without the latter having to affirm itself as an independent political actor that is likely to threaten national sovereignty. Therefore, “the European Idea”, can be asserted even more strongly than the supra-state legitimacy conferred on the Union through the determination to initially accomplish rapprochement between member states and a more marked and comprehensive return to, “an act of submission to the entity born of their common goals”. To summarise, by way of a “strategem of reason” diagnosed by Hegel, the political actor “Europe” is born, which leads to explore, in the second part of the book, the consequences for member states provoked by this new agent of intervention, “which proceeds from their will but which cannot claim to direct what they will become”. In the “dialectic of the market” part of the book, Xavier Cauquil provides many examples in an attempt to clarify how the vicissitudes witnessed in the construction of a European territory, to accession and the absence of clearly defined geographical limitations in the project, including the entry onto the scene of the Union in place of the initial Communities, have created an enlargement “con-substantial principle” in Europe and is, “a way of revealing the Union's relations to the outside world”. This enlargement can be particularly characterised by the way in which the Union has worked on the issue of human rights and very rapidly enlarged this sphere to fundamental rights and the multi-form moral reference exposing member states themselves to be responsible for any shortcomings in this area by the supranational actor. Subsequently, the author draws a link between these member states and the corporatist “faction” perceived by Hegel and Adam Smith, reducing them to the status of derogation extortionists acting on behalf of their own national interests, “intent on beggaring their neighbour which, despite being another member state, remains a rival and competitor”. Subsequently in its encounter with the Union, the state is now in competition with pressure groups and, “nationally-based corporations, which function among other groups built around the promotion and defence of a central interest, whatever this interest should be”. It is difficult to be any less controversial, apart from claiming that subsidiarity could be an instrument used to achieve greater integration, which Xavier Cauquil does not hesitate to claim and who once again puts forward a very disturbing argument to support his hypothesis.
The author considers that states do not have that choice, as long as they have their own individual interests, to use the Union, “as a means to obtain by its intermediary, greater guarantees on protecting the choices they make”. He also believes that their accession to Europe is largely agreed even if this wish is still not explicitly manifest or is, indeed, denied. But what can be said with regard to the recognition of their work by the states, as well as their work in and for Europe and the appropriation and feeling of and for Europe by different people? Xavier Cauquil identifies the, “ dialectic of “We” as Europeans” and excessive judgmentalism of interpreting the evolution of states, “in a sense of an Hegelian fusion of their individuality and status of being a member of everything denoting Europe and its universal concept they embody in their own individual way”. The Union as a means of going beyond the principle of sovereignty characterises this book, a book in which some people would definitely locate philosophers as inhabiting a different world altogether.
Michel Theys
*** DANIELLE JOUANNA: L'Europe est née en Grèce. La naissance de l'idée d'Europe en Grèce ancienne. L'Harmattan (see address attached). "Logiques historiques" series. 2009, 329 pp., €31. ISBN 978-2-296-10825-7.
Danielle Jouanna teaches Greek to students preparing for the preparatory classes at the elite French universities. This is not her first book but it certainly leads the reader of it to regret not being among her students. This book is consummately erudite and provides a remarkable clarification of the appearance and history of the idea of Europe in ancient Greece stretching from the writing of Homer in the eighth century (and which does not mention Europe once) to the explosion of the concept in the writings of the historian Herodotus in V BC. Does Homer's silence about the name of Europe imply, however, the absence of any sign of its existence? And what exactly is meant by Herodotus on this subject? These are some of the questions that the author answers by retracing the diverse stages of gestation in the idea of Europe in the thinking of ancient Greece and by consistently and clearly demonstrating this process in an accessible way, “Europe is a continent whose contours emerge bit by bit in the western mists and wondrous stories from mythology and history during the classical era as an ideal model of geographical structure, ideology and values” in comparison to those of “Asia”. This knowledgeable quest underlines the fact that there are three kinds of myth surrounding the notion of Europe. Danielle Jouanna concludes that ancient Greeks located European identity in the political domain and defined it by, “the love of freedom, and obedience freely consented to by its citizens by way of the laws guaranteeing equality of men and the independence of the state”, which, after all, constitutes, “an undeniably element contained in the idea held by Europeans today about Europe”.
(MT)
*** FABRICE PICOD (Editors): Doctrine et droit de l'Union européenne. Etablissements Bruylant (67 rue de la Régence, B-1000 Brussels. Tel: (32-2) 5129842 - fax: 5119477 - E-mail: jean@bruylant.be - Internet: http://www.bruylant.be ). "Droit de l'Union européenne" series, No. 6. 2009, 187 pp., €45. ISBN 978-2-8027-2675-3.
In international law, doctrine is generally presented as an indirect source of law. What does it represent in Community law? Doctrine is ignored by treaties and other direct and indirect sources, as it is by Community law and jurisprudence, which means that it ends up being a kind of, “enfant terrible”. Nonetheless, there is evidence to suggest that given that this law constitutes a discipline in itself, it does have a form of legitimacy. The question of the emergence of doctrine in the European framework is examined by eminent specialists and practitioners in the first part of this book. They then look at the question of what distinguishes doctrine's character. Their goal can be summarised by Professor Picod (Université Panthéon-Assas) tas, “translating the impetuousness and sometimes impertinentence of the most burning elements contained in doctrine”. Finally, in the third part, the authors analyse how doctrine helps to clarify minds rather than, “gentle Federalist dreamers or furious Community fundamentalists” and exercises an influence on the other authorities and powers.
(Pbo)
*** PIERRE LEQUILLER: L'exécution des actes européens et la comitologie: restaurer la primauté du contrôle politique. Commission des Affaires européennes de l'Assemblée nationale (Boutique de l'Assemblée nationale, 7 rue Aristide Briand, F-75007 Paris. Tel: (33-1) 40630033 - Internet: http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr ). "Rapport d'information" series, No.1989. 2009, 44pp., €3.50. ISBN 978-2-11-125806-8.
Pierre Lequiller is a former member of the Convention and president of the Commission at the French National Assembly for European Affairs. In this Information Report he focuses on “committee procedures” which he describes as, “the science of committees” and explains that in order to find one's way through this web, 270 committee experts are required to assist the European Commission execute around 2022 measures every year. In light of the “political incompetence” characterising the three projects recently produced by the, “cumbersome machinery of the European executive” (particularly the one prudently withdrawn by the Commission, which sought to authorise the blending of rosé wine with white and red wine …, he points out that the experts' committees had on each occasion given their “green light”, “before the delayed political filter was triggered to smooth out the problems”. After highlighting the reasons for committee procedures and their opaque nature, the author diagnoses, “a system sometimes bereft of political coherency” and appeals for Council control methods to be updated in an effort to strengthen the relationship of policy over technique and for both national parliaments and the European Parliament to have a more important role to play in this context.
(PBo)
*** MATTHIAS THEODOR VOGT, JAN SOKOL, BEATA OCIEPKA, DETLEF POLLACK, BEATA MIKOLAJCZYK (editors): Europäisierung im Alltag. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, Postfach 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - E-mail: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang . com). "Schriften des Collegium Pontes" series. 2009, 347 pp., €52.80. ISBN 978-3-631-58033-2
This book is divided into three parts focusing on the Europeanization of the daily lives of the continent's citizens. In the process of the deepening of the Union, laws and political speeches increase. In addition to the expanding legal body, the Europeanization of our daily lives is translated into many different aspects: cooperation between national police forces and an increasingly multicultural environments are just two examples of the Europeanization of our daily lives. The different contributions making up this book are written by experts who have attended Pontex College, under the auspices of the German, Czech and Polish foreign affairs ministries, in an attempt to respond to the question of solidarity, through a prism of several different scientific disciplines. This book debates, for example, the Strasbourg example, which is presented as a symbol of a fully European city. Religious and cultural questions are also tackled. Other themes focus on cooperation between the EU 27, economic issues and the most recent major enlargement.
(JD)
*** L'Europe en formation. Revue d'études sur la construction européenne et le fédéralisme - Journal of Studies on European Integration and Federalism. Centre international de formation européenne (10 av. des Fleurs, F-06000 Nice. Tel: (33-4) 93979397 - fax: 93979398 - E-mail: europe.formation@cife.eu - Internet: http: //http://www.europeenformation.eu ). 2009, No. 353-354, 264 pp., €24. Subscription: €35.
To mark the first anniversary of the graphic and editorial youthful flourishing on which this journal created by the committed federalist Alexandre Marc, this double issue appropriately focuses on the 1970s. During this period Community Europe had to confront an economic recession that had had no precedent since the crash of 1929 and which, unfortunately, is subsequently currently being repeated. Was this époque really one of “Euro-sclerosis” with the member states being bent in on themselves? The writers contributing to this journal provide very measured responses which, in light of the different developments observed into monetary arena and the affirmation of a Community Europe on the international scene ( through Ostpolitik, development cooperation policy and even immigration), attempt to demonstrate that the 1970s actually paved the way to further progress in integration.
(MT)
*** The Federalist. Papers on Federalism in Europe and the World (26 via Schina, I-10144 Turin. Tel./fax: (39-11) 4732843 - E-mail: federalist.debate@libero.it - Internet: http://www.federalist-debate.org ). 2009, No. 3, 64 pp.. Annual subscription: € 15.
This Federalist review embraces Europe in an effort to embrace the whole world and includes several incendiary articles on how the economic and financial crisis currently occurring is being “managed”. It looks at the way in which they Commission dismissed with a slight of hand the Chinese suggestion to set up an international currency independent of nationality. The ideas discussed in it are far removed from the usual fare but are forcefully argued …
(MT)