*** STEPHANIE ROHLFING-DIJOUX, KERSTIN PEGLOW (Editors): La subsidiarité. Regards croisés franco-allemands sur un principe pluridisciplinaire. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, Postfach 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Interne: http://www.peterlang.com ). "Travaux Interdisciplinaires et Plurilingues" series, No. 20. 2014, 258 p. €70. ISBN 978-3-0343-1135-9.
This publication stems from an international and inter-disciplinary colloquy organised two and half years ago at Université Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense. It will be of great interest to all those who are fascinated or even concerned by the subsidiarity principle. This concept appears to be interpreted in a variety of different ways in a European context, depending on what interests or goals are involved (or misgivings). The origins of this word are Latin and today it expresses the political and social doctrine according to which the responsibility for political action, when it is necessary, has to be allocated to the smallest entity that is able to resolve the problem. After an introduction by Professor Jean-Jacques Briu, who looks at the definition of the term from a linguistic point of view and subsequently demonstrates how the concept is on a scale that allows for a certain vagueness to creep in, the other contributions in the book examine the foundations of this principle and how it requires greater precision, which also applies to its very real implications and inherent restrictions and the constraints on how it is used.
The analysis initially focuses on the historic development of this principle in the context of two very dissimilar states, namely Jacobin France, which in fact promoted centralisation over time through, “ the political will to unite a France that had been torn apart and subject to much diversity” and Germany, “a federal state hierarchically built from the bottom up”. In the second part of the book, the articles focus on the impact of this principle in political, administrative and social organisation in the two countries. It very quickly and unsurprisingly illustrates the European dimension of this principle introduced by the Maastricht Treaty to delineate the division of so-called “shared” competences between the Union and its member states. The statute was again symbolically enhanced through the Lisbon Treaty. In the different articles written in German but also entirely translated into French, two authors subsequently demonstrate that the subsidiarity principle that we could be led to believe was substantially linked to the very notion of the federal state, is in fact consecrated in the Fundamental German Law and its Article 23, which refers to the… subsidiarity principle introduced by the Maastricht Treaty and which removes its, “ constitutional principle status”.
It only gets better… and in his contribution, “Subsidiarity and Federalism”, Professor Dieter Grimm (University of Humboldt Berlin and the Yale School of Law) seeks to show how the subsidiarity principle is neither identical or intimately linked to federalism because this does not recognise, “the primacy rule in favour of the lower level”. He also asserts that this partisan interpretation of the subsidiarity principle in the Union context is also further proof that, “the question of whether an objective can be reached in a sufficient way by member states but perhaps can be done so in a better way at the Union level is an essentially political question” and the reason why this principle as it currently stands, “cannot be used as a political directive for legislation or as a legal ruling”. He also explains that this is why European Court of Justice has always been loathe to use it even though it has perhaps been asked to take, “political decisions for which it neither has the power or legitimacy”? In the same vein, the French trade union expert Jean Claude Boual, points out that it has therefore become the remit of the European judges, as in the case of transport policy and services of general interest, to lay down the law or in more difficult cases, rules on the conflicts of interest that have arisen from the, “ inertia or incompetence of the Community and state institutions”. He criticises the fact that these are increasingly becoming, “techno-bureaucracies that take the decisions” and points out that in the context of the multiheaded crisis that broke out in 2008, the governments and parliaments in member states have proved that, “they are not concerned with the subsidiarity principle but quibble about a few so-called prerogatives pertaining to sovereignty and refuse, in the name of the subsidiarity principle, to take common action” in a fully democratic way for essential prerogatives that are indispensable for the construction of the Union and its citizens, all its citizens!
Michel Theys
*** VINCENT DUJARDIN, PIERRE TILLY (Editor): Hommes et réseaux: Belgique, Europe et Outre-Mers. Liber amicorum Michel Dumoulin. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). "Euroclio" series, No? 50. 2013, 651 pp. €69.60, ISBN 978-2-87574-094-6.
Contemporary historian, Michel Dumoulin, was an emblematic professor at the Catholic University of Leuven where he acted as a guide for hundreds of students, in addition to the thousands of readers of his numerous books and studies that have provided the milestones of his academic career. He has recently become an Emeritus Professor and 52 different authors pay him homage in 49 contributions in this impressive publication that is, symbolically, the 50th addition of this wonderful “Euroclio” series of which he was one of the three founders. As pointed out in their introduction, Pierre Tilly and Vincent Dujardin, his current successor as Head of the Institute of European Studies at Louvain-la-Neuve, Michel Dumoulin has always been fond of underlining that there, “has never been any out of bounds subjects or themes” for this historian and who therefore became an expert on a variety of subjects, “before becoming a specialist”. It is in this perspective that we find a little of everything, such as the histories of people and networks, in Belgium in all its different dimensions, and in other countries too. No one will therefore be surprised that a substantial part of the contributions focus on Europe and the way it was perceived and then constructed over the following decades. Nobody will be any more surprised that the author of these few modest lines also promotes a European perspective that finds its voice in the Europe of Taviani, amongst others, and in the “parallel lives” of Spaak and Luns, European regionalism in the face of the international system, “the flexibility of European identities” in light of the different cases that make up Eastern Europe and Portugal, from a central banker, “the very European and eclectic” Alexandre Lamfalussy and the thread that links up, “US anti-trusts to European competition policy”.
Keeping the best the last, let's hope we will be forgiven for arbitrarily selecting the contribution by Umberto Morelli (University of Turin), which focuses on crises that have always been the formative strength for European integration, as demonstrated by four key episodes: the declaration of the Franco-British Union in 1940, reconstruction of Germany after the Second World War, the troubles of European integration in the middle of the 1970s and, finally, the fall of the Berlin Wall. All these have inspired the solution whereby leading policies have been implemented to obtain a lasting solution that has been kept and which, ultimately, have produced the consequences that have flowed from them. It has subsequently transpired that European countries have always been obliged to cooperate more closely but that they have done this whilst leaving the questions regarding the political finality and democratic legitimacy of the Union pending. “The inter-governmental method has produced a deficit in efficiency… and a democratic deficit” according to the author, who draws the conclusion that the Union, “has denied the national democratic systems of the powers that have been transferred to Europe but without having established an efficient and comprehensive democratic European power”. In the context of the current crisis, the opportunities for making progress are now hanging in the balance with dangers of going backwards due to the absence of “political leadership” and the fact that, “populism and nationalism” are faring well in a terrain where the Union is unable inability to resolve citizens' concrete problems and confer full democratic legitimacy on its institutions.
(MT)
*** MARILENA KOPPA: Demain, c'est loin... Pour la social-démocratie et la sortie de la crise. Editions Otelos Communications Consultancy (Tel: (30-210) 3627512 - fax: 3623277 - Email: koppa@otenet.gr). 2014, 363 pp.
Marilena Koppa is both a Socialist MEP and Professor of comparative policy at the Department of International and European Studies at the Pantheon University of Athens. In this book she looks at the way the crisis that began in 2007 has radically changed Greece and Europe. She points out that no one was prepared for this change, especially not the social democratic parties, which she claims have been in crisis since the beginning of the 1990s. This book is divided into three sections. The first focuses on Greece and in 28 chapters the author examines causes of the seismic changes in the country and the different ways that could help the country to recover. In another 27 chapters, Marilena Koppa subsequently analyses the different aspects of the crisis in Europe and points out that in order to find a real crisis exit strategy, a European Marshall plan would be required and further moves towards political union. The key question is, however, whether there is still a Franco-German axis that has for a long time allowed the balance to exist in Europe. The final part of the book focuses on the crisis of social democracy and the author examines the state of social laws and the European welfare state. She then proposes a Europe with a human face, namely one based on social justice, democracy and respect for human rights.
(AKa)
*** KOSTIS PAPAÚOANNOU: "Les mains propres" d'Aube dorée. Des applications de la pureté nazie. Editions Metechmio (118 rue Ippokratous, GR-11472 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3003500 - fax: 3003562 - Email: metaixmio@metaixmio.gr - Énternet: http://www.metaixmio.gr ). 2013, 264 pp. €14.40. ISBN 978-960566417-6.
When the leader of Golden Dawn exclaimed that, “these hands can sometimes salute in this way but they are clean hands. They are not dirty and they have not stolen”, whilst he was giving a fascist salute, everyone became aware of the Nazi identity of this Greek political party. The slogan, “Fascists or even neo-Nazis but at least they are not corrupt and are honest” is a key message of the Golden Dawn party. Purity is also a key point in this Nazi phenomenon, particularly in the Greek neo-Nazi movement. Kostis Papaïoannou has been the president of the National Committee for Human Rights since 2006 and for a number of years he has also been the president of the Greek section of Amnesty International. In this book he examines the rhetoric developed by Golden Dawn in its attempt to assert itself as the “national disinfectant” and the rapid rise in power of this extremist party, up until the arrest of its leader and a number of the party's MPs. The author also looks at the way these neo-Nazis seek to “clean up” public life and attack the “dangerous infectious diseases” impacting on education and art by way of Golden Dawn's ritual of violent raids and attacks. In short, he describes and analyses the fascism invading the social core of Greece and warns against a universal expansion of this deadly phenomenon.
(AKa)
*** STANISLAW FILIPOWICZ: Democracy - The Power of Illusion. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, P. O. Box 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). “Lex et Res Publica - Polish Legal and Political Studies” series, No. 2. 2013, 235 pp. €46.95. ISBN 978-3-631-62894-2.
Is democracy being tricked? Who better than Stanislaw Filipowicz could attempt to answer this question. Iconoclast and lecturer at the University of Warsaw, he is also a specialist in the history of ideas and political philosophy. In this book he draws on the ideas of a number of sceptics and schismatics such as Plato, Aristotle, Tocqueville, Nietzsche, Heidegger and Ortega y Gasset, to name but a few. Stanislaw Filipowicz does not see his role as a prosecutor but rather a thinker with a number of doubts about the continuing myth that has been created around the concept of democracy and even more so, the understanding that we have of it. On an intellectual level, he explores the heritage created by Plato, for whom democracy would inevitably lead to tyranny, as well as Alexis de Tocqueville when he denounces, “the tyranny of the majority”. He goes on to denounce the different failings and weaknesses of democracy when it is applied in practice, whilst clearly and appropriately illustrating how this principle was able to assert itself over time, before coming an indispensable credo due to the boost provided to it by the US. This is an engaging book which sows the seeds of intellectual doubt in this period where democracy appears rather ill almost every where …
(MT)
*** OLIVIER DARD (Editor): Supports et vecteurs des droites radicales au XXe siècle (Europe/Amériques). Peter Lang (see address attached). "Convergences » series, No. 73. 2013, 262 pp. €74. ISBN 978-3-0343-1444-2.
This book provides an account of the work undertaken by the historians involved in a research programme on the internationalisation of the radical right. After illustrating in another book (edited by Olivier Dard) a number of individuals known for their ideological, popularising and propagandist profiles (Peter Lang, 2012), ten authors, on this occasion, look at the different journals, publishing houses and bookshops that are actively used in this environment. The main goal the authors pursue is to provide an understanding of how these activists get their ideas across. They also highlight a number of foreign writers that can be called on, as well as a group of publishers that have had a real international reach. The focus in these contributions shifts from France and French-speaking Europe (with a contribution on the internationalisation of negationism 1948 up until the present day), to Mediterranean Europe, with Italian and Portuguese examples and, finally, North and South America, with examples from Canada and Argentina. Particular attention is paid to the new vectors of extreme right-wing ideas, with the expansion of the Internet. According to Professor Dard (University of Lorraine) new media has been very useful in revealing the extent of the internationalisation of radical right wing ideas.
(PBo)