*** PAUL COLLOWALD: J'ai vu naître l'Europe. De Strasbourg à Bruxelles, le parcours d'un pionnier de la construction européenne. Editions La Nuée Bleue (3 rue Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune, F-67000 Strasbourg. Tel: (33-3) 88157727 - Email: lanueebleue@editions.quotidien.fr - Internet: http://www.nueebleue.com ). 2014, 155 pp, €20. ISBN 978-2-7165-0849-0.
This author of this book didn't choose the title or the subtitle, but the editor had his own reasons, which the author recognises, against his will. In this book of interviews with lawyer, theologian and journalist Sophie Allaux-Izoard, Paul Collowald aimed to once more deliver his truth as a credible witness, to construct and transmit (by intersecting archives and eyewitness reports) the portion of historical fact that it should be possible to achieve. Very often, this young man born in 1923, Lorrain by background and Alsatian by birth, is busy 'restoring the truth' and setting the record straight, relentlessly taking on the people who falsify history, the people who in his own country and elsewhere in Europe, betray the genuine aim at the roots of the European construction, which was 'an extraordinary venture to construct peace a different way.'
'Everything was at stake at the beginning,' wrote Paul Valéry. Everything was at stake in the Schuman Declaration, agrees Collowald. A young reporter on the newspaper 'Le Nouvel Alsacien,' he met Robert Schuman in August 1949 when the Council of Europe was being set up in Strasbourg. This was a key meeting because the Declaration in the clock salon at the Quai d'Orsay in Paris was the answer that the man who had become the French foreign minister provided to the questions he had been asking and had confided less than two years earlier to his young interlocutor in the metropolis of Alsace: 'What tangible measures should be launched for Franco-German reconciliation? What kind of post-war system should be built together?' From that moment, Paul Collowald would dedicate himself to being the indefatigable guardian of the precious legacy transmitted by Schuman and Monnet, making an effort to 'transmit to young generations the dream that was there in the beginnings' and refusing to let it be sullied and deformed by guardians of the cult of intangible national sovereignty. 'Contributing to the historical truth is a duty,' he explains, a duty he devoted himself to throughout his working life. First of all as a journalist, which he took to very naturally. In March 1958, as a correspondent in Strasbourg for Le Monde newspaper, he wrote his final article on the founding session of what wasn't yet called the European Parliament back then and of which no less a figure than Robert Schuman was to become the president. Immediately afterwards, he joined the European civil service and more particularly the Press and Information Service set up by his compatriot Jacques-René Rabier. The vision that these activist-officials had of the European project would cause them some serious problems, but these problems didn't prevent Collowald from having a brilliant career that led him to become Director at DG Press and Information, Director of the Cabinet of the President of the European Parliament, Pierre Pflimlin, and, finally, Director General of Information at the EP. Throughout his career, Collowald was careful to ensure that 'his' historical truth would be heard. He has long been in retirement but is as active as ever in this connection. Hence this book. 'He is still carrying the flame with lucidity and conviction,' explains Jacques Delors in an enthusiastic preface.
In this fine tome, one souvenir follows another, rectifying here, adding a nuance there, always convincing. Without Monnet, Schuman would no doubt not have had 'all the substance for that crucial decision that he would take (…) in that decisive weekend of the first of 1950,' but Paul Collowald provides the evidence that this man who was imprisoned by the Gestapo in April 1942 didn't wait for Monnet. He was already thinking about the future back then: 'We have to put an end to the notion of 'born enemies' and suggest to our peoples that they form a community that will be the foundation one day of a European nation.' And in the words of one of his close collaborators back then, the future French foreign minister then said: 'If we do this, then we will have accomplished the final wishes of those who have died in all countries.' Having the desire to bring such a message also forces one to become a righter of wrongs. Collowald therefore condemns those in France, which had become Gaullist, who did their best to play down the funeral of Robert Schuman and give it as little coverage as possible. Monnet wasn't even 'invited to the official dinner at the prefecture' and Chancellor Konrad Adenauer was advised not to attend his funeral. His memories suddenly become provocative, such as Collowald's account of this understatement by a philosopher: 'At time of this mourning, which should have been a great event for France and Europe alike, there was official reticence that showed that great men and reformers were perfectly capable of thinking small and washed-out.' Committed social Christian Paul Collowald also has the 'conviction that the historic document of 9 May 1950 was the result of reflection by men from Christian, Jewish and agnostic origins,' in other words 'a very unusual type of humanist alliance' which, he confesses, is hard to find in political action these days. Is he wrong about that? Some will think so. But that is of little import because in this book, he continues the battle for 'his' truth… Michel Theys
*** FRANCOISE JURION-DE WAHA: Fernand Herman. La passion de l'Europe. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - http://www.peterlang.com ). Mémoires de l'Europe en devenir series, No. 4. 2014, 359 pp, €49.20. ISBN 978-2-87574-150-9.
Fernand Herman was never a political icon, even in his native Belgium. This book shows, however, that this man of convictions marked the history of his country and the history of Europe to an even greater extent. Nothing predestined him for this, were it not a lively intelligence that took him away from his native land to get degrees in law and economics along with other young people who, as minister of state Mark Eyskens, his fellow pupil at that time and who remained his friend until his death in 2005, points out, belonged to 'that generation of young intellectuals fascinated by the European dream.' After a year's detour (with Eyskens) at Columbia University in New York, it was in fact in the Congo - which was still Belgian at the time, but would soon become independent - that he began his career as a lecturer at Lovanium University. When Mobutu came to power, he returned to his native land, where he worked so well for the Belgian economy that he would become economics minister in the mid-70's. He caught the European virus in 1979, when he was elected to the European Parliament as a centre right Social Christian and where he would remain for twenty years, winning recognition for his work, in which he took over from Altiero Spinelli the task of drawing up a draft European Constitution. Formally, the constitution would remain a dead letter, but it was reflected somewhat in the Laeken Declaration of 2001, which was the starting point for the European Convention. Eyskens notes in the preface that at that time, while being a convinced federalist, Fernand Herman, as a realistic politician, was 'in search of the magic formula, having to reconcile a federal Europe with a European confederation.' His full career, and particularly the various acts and facets of his 'passion for Europe' are recounted in this book by an archaeologist by training who supported for a dozen years the European action of a man who, as Mark Eyskens says, 'was in his own way an idealist without many illusions, which is better than being an illusionist without ideals.' (MT)
*** Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law. Intersentia (31, Groenstraat, BE-2640 Mortsel. Tel: (32-3) 6801550 - Fax: 6587121 - Email: mail@intersentia.be - Internet: http://www.intersentia.com ). 2014, Vol. 21, No. 1, 222 pp. Annual subscription: €195.
This issue of a very highly reputed review on European and comparative law starts with an editorial by an invited German author who accuses the German constitutional court in Karlsruhe of trying to take advantage of the European Court of Justice for its own ends. Professor at Humboldt University in Berlin, where he also heads the Walter Hallstein Institute for European Constitutional Law, Ingolf Pernice looks at the questions that were sent by the German court to the European Court of Justice on the announcement by the European Central Bank in the summer of 2012, and its desire otherwise to take action in the field of Outright Monetary Transactions. As the author sees it, rather than being a sign that the Karlsruhe court has finally decided to cooperate with the European court in Luxembourg, the questions asked of the Court of Justice were designed in such a way as to 'to confirm the legal view the GFCC has already decided to take and that the GFCC does not appear ready to change in any event.' Prof. Pernice explains that in this way, Karlsruhe is defying the role of the Court of Justice and the principle of primacy of European law, in order 'to give itself a competence for assessing Union law that neither the EU Treaties allow, nor which German Law provides for.' The invited editorialist methodically unpicks the German constitutional court's arguments, although this does not prevent him from pointing out that the European Court of Justice is well and truly trapped. He therefore makes this implacable call to reason: 'The German Federal Constitutional Court assumes that it acts in favour of democracy. Can it be in terms of democracy, for six judges of a national court to strike down, as an ultimate consequence, the Euro system and with it, as a potential result, the world economy?' Other contributions look, for example, at bank supervision by the European Central Bank, renewable energy and consumer dispute resolution. (MT)
*** KAJSA EKIS EKMAN: Le Printemps volé. Le temps de la crise grecque à travers les yeux d'une journaliste suédoise. Editions Kedros (3 rue G. Gennadiou, GR-10678 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3809712 - Fax: 3302655 - Internet: http://www.kedros.gr ). Etudes-Essais series. 2014, 405 pp, €16.60. ISBN 978-960-04-4509-1.
When the crisis struck, most European media started to blame the Greek people with moving unity. The stereotypes tended to merge into one - the Greeks are lazy, they retire early, they have a mammoth public sector and so on. In order to verify these sayings, Swedish journalist and writer Kajsa Ekis Ekman lived in Greece for two years. In this book, she recounts what she discovered and uncovers the roots of a Greek problem that is not, in her view, specific to Greece, but is rather the manifestation of a global crisis of capitalism, of which the euro is one component. The author explores how the crisis is affecting Greek society, after monitoring and analysing the general strikes, mass rallies and elections. She also examines the nature of the polymorphic Occupy Syntagma Square movement, talks to young unemployed people, entrepreneurs, conspiracy theorists, workers who took over the factory where they were working, political leaders and voters from across the political spectrum. The book also contains two revealing interviews, one with the former prime minister, George Papandreou, and the other with Alexis Tsipras, leader of the radical left Syriza party. This is a living chronicle of a political and societal débâcle that unveils the perverse mechanisms at work within the State and gives a voice to the people who are still paying the price... (AKa)
*** CHRISTINE KADDOUS, FABRICE PICOD (Eds.): Traité sur l'Union européenne - Traité sur le fonctionnement de l'Union européenne. Stämpfli Editions (1 Wölflistrasse, Case postale 5662, CH-3001 Berne. Tel: (41-31) 3006644 - Fax: 3006688 - Email: verlag@staempfli.com - Internet: http://www.staempfliverlag.com ). 2014, 375 pp, CHF 67.30. ISBN 978-3-7272-3126-1.
The fifth edition of this collection of essays, updated to 15 August 2014, gives easy access to fundamental texts of the European Union, as amended by the Lisbon Treaty and Croatia's Accession Treaty. It includes both Treaties mentioned in the title in a single consolidated version, along with two correlation tables, the protocols and declarations, the European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights and explanations of it, the 2 February 2012 Treaty that set up the European Stability Mechanism and the 2 March 2012 Treaty on stability, coordination and governance within Economic and Monetary Union, which came into force on 1 January 2013. In the introduction, Prof. Kaddous (Geneva University) and Prof. Picod (Panthéon-Assas University) present the main topics relating to the Union, viz. its structure and competences, its institutions, policies and action, enhanced cooperation, fundamental rights, democratic principles, legislative instruments and external action. A detailed index makes it easier to find the information required. (CDe)
*** Politique. Revue de débats. ASBL Politique (9 rue du Faucon, B-1000 Brussels. Tel: (32-2) 5386996 - E-mail: secretariat@politique.eu.org - Internet: http://politique.eu.org ). September/October 2014, No. 86, 84 pp, €9. Subscription: €40.
This issue of a high-quality Belgian progressive review includes a rich special report on 'drug prohibition impasses.' A member of the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addition, political scientist Danilo Ballotta, explains here that there isn't a formal European policy in this domain, but rather a 'common approach' based in part on scientific knowledge of said domain. As a result, and this is positive, a purely ideological approach ('drugs are bad') is rejected or put in context, he explains, while public health and citizen safety are valued. Also in this issue, Edgar Szoc provides a summary of a book by French economist Thomas Piketty, entitled 'Le capital au XXIe siècle,' that has now 'become an event,' noting that its author makes very tangible proposals to, for example, ensure that the need for a harmonisation of company tax at European level is rapidly recognised, along with an inheritance tax. Other articles look at the lessons to be learned from the recent general elections in Belgium and the new Michel government. (MT)