Brussels, 09/05/2000 (Agence Europe) - Why did the Schuman Declaration of 9 May 1950 succeed contrary to the failure of other ideas at the time? Because it was "aimed at a reduced but decisive target for the future" and provided a "permanent institution", by for the first time introducing a "limited notion of supranationality", said the former President of the French Republic Valery Giscard d' Estaing in Brussels on 9 May, on the occasion of an academic session organised by the European Parliament and European Commission for the 50th anniversary of the Schuman Declaration (see yesterday's EUROPE, p.8, for Mr. Davignon's address). "This provides us with a kind of recipe for future success", said Giscard d'Estaing also seeing in Schuman "firmness as to the principle"; he thus recalled that the Declaration had been open to all European States, but that the United Kingdom had rejected it and that Schuman had not wanted British observers at the conference that followed, as he feared that observers hostile to the principles that were the initiative's very raison d'etre "would try to delay it.." The current lesson of the 1950 Declaration "concerns the importance of enhanced cooperation for Europe's future", as the "coal-steel pool was the first form of enhanced cooperation", said Mr. Giscard d'Estaing, noting that the EU's "grand enlargement changes the nature of the initial European project, or rather adds a second project", whereas the initial project was "closer integration between neighbouring and similar States, to build a European power". According to him, "the new task" is to "provide the greater Europe with effective and democratic institutions to succeed with enlargement", and the other ("and nothing is gained in confusing these") lies in "providing the integration process between States with the political will to go further with a chance of success". Not seeing any great difference between his ideas on enhanced cooperation and Jacques Delors' "avant-garde", Mr. Giscard d'Estaing reaffirmed that the obstacles that, in the Treaty, impede enhanced cooperation (especially the "strange" obstacle that is the minimum number of State necessary - which, formulated as a percentage, would increase at every enlargement) need "correcting". Monetary Union is an example of enhanced cooperation, Giscard d'Estaing noted, saying he was "concerned for the euro" and calling on the French Presidency (and, meanwhile, the Portuguese Presidency) to try to consolidate the euro: "we wanted it to be independent, not an orphan", he said. According to him, the causes of the depreciation of the euro are, respectively for a third, its initial over-evaluation, the gap in economic dynamism in elation to the United States, and its "isolation". The euro is "independent of a government that does not exist", Giscard d'Estaing noted, exclaiming: "A fall in the value by a quarter in seventeen months should be cause for joint reflection. We have sufficiently accused the United States of benign negligence towards the dollar not to be allow ourselves total negligence". And, taking up in other words the ideas of his joint article with Helmut Schmidt (see Texts of the Week of 17 and 18 April), he said: "There needs to be a specialised Council of Ministers and a parliamentary body where the Central Bank can explain itself publicly on Monetary Union (…) It would be a useful initiative for the French Presidency".
In his address, Commissioner President Romano Prodi said in passing that enhanced cooperation was "compulsory" following the "great enlargement", and especially reaffirmed the need for the internal reform of the institutions. The Commission is the "most different" among them, he noted, stressing its political role and, in some cases, even "semi-legal", as well as administrative. Again placing emphasis on transparency and citizen participation, Mr. Prodi referred to the document he wants to present at the beginning of next year on "European governance", and reaffirmed that "nobody today wants a European super-state". The grand enlargement, he repeated, demands that we radically rethink European policies, wondering what needs doing at what level.
European Parliament President Nicole Fontaine, for her part, wanted the governments negotiating the IGC "to recover the visionary spirit" that inspired the Schuman Declaration, as in this "pivotal period", what Europe needs most is to "recover the founding political breath of its origins". One of the "secrets of the sustainable nature of this success" has been "the constant institutional concern to preserve national identities and avoid the most numerous, thus the strongest, from reducing the others to mere subjects or secondary decision-makers", she said, calling for this balance to be maintained.
Summarising the debates of the first day, Jacques Delors considered that some questions had emerged from the debate: how to reconcile enlargement with deepening; how to articulate the development of a European security and defence policy with the on-going reflection at foreign policy level; - how to preserve the "basic triangle" of the Single Act (competition that stimulates, cooperation that enhances and solidarity that unites); - how to overcome the "institutional hyper-complexity" (we must "return to the sources", he said here, referring to the words of Jean Monnet on the strength and wisdom of the institutions); - what to do with the future Charter of Fundamental Rights ("will it really be the expression of the desire to live together?" Delors wondered).
All these questions are "very valid", British Conservative and former EP President Lord Plumb considered, asking: let's deliver our message today at home, especially among the young (the day before, affirming his European conviction born in the Fifties, he had considered that if Murdoch were more pro-European, the British would doubtless be so too). Professor Meny, Director of the Robert Schuman Centre at the European University Institute of Florence, welcomed this call to arms (previously, he had called on Europeans not to "dilapidate" Schuman's most "precious legacy", the institutions, and not to have a "notary" concept of the acquis communautaire, as what counts for "all living beings" is movement, the "becoming"). In his address on Monday, Euro-MP and Nobel Peace Prize winner John Hume stressed the topicality of Robert Schuman's approach and of the other founding fathers, citing as example the efforts at reconciliation in Northern Ireland.
Van Miert: European integration is more necessary than ever
The basic ideas of the Schuman Declaration remain topical, "who can claim today that this is no longer necessary?" asked the former European Commissioner Karel Van Miert in the debate on "What Project for Europe?". We cannot claim that "we are protected for ever against war", he said, and, addressing Mr. Delors (for whom he was Commissioner for transport before being put in charge of competition policy), he said: "Jacques, I shall never forget that we signed a transit agreement with Yugoslavia the day before it began to disintegrate, and that day, nobody believed in a solution on the battle field". Who can claim to be wholly sovereign today? Unfortunately, there are still too many Euro-MPs here who have not grasped that the notion of sovereignty has moved on. When it comes to competition, for example, as Europe "we speak to the United States on an equal footing", Van Miert pointed out, citing in particular the Boeing affair, and stressing that the EU had its voice heard when there is a person, an institution that can speak for it. This is particularly true for the euro, Karel Van Miert stressed, once again turning towards Jacques Delors, saying: "Obviously, as we have a common currency there also needs to be a kind of European economic government; today, we risk paying dearly for not having listened to Jacques Delors at the time". This also goes for enlargement, Van Miert stressed, for whom the applicant countries need clearly telling what joining the Union means: here, he raised the problem of "where will the Union end", considering it "disastrous not being able to answer public opinion" on this issue (at a more general level, he noted that, today, "the great challenge, is public opinion").
Regarding enlargement, Jacek Saruysz-Wolski, main advisor on European integration for the Polish Prime Minister, said that the real danger of diluting the European Union was not the risk that accession by new members should lead to a simple free-trade area, but the exclusion of certain candidate countries from certain policies (like the CAP or the "fourth freedom", and the "exclusive nature of the avant-gardes"). The current enlargement is exceptional and "demands exceptional solutions", it "needs vision and leadership, it demands above all courage, like that of Robert Schuman, and imagination", he said, considering that "without vision or leadership, we shall reduce this historic event to an affair of quotas, plant health rules, costs".
As for Prof. Michel Foucher (who stipulated that he was speaking in as personal capacity and that, given his role - charge de mission o the French foreign minister - he could say nothing on the future French Presidency), he in particular sketched out the paths the Union should follow in the next "three-four years", considering that what could be termed a "crisis of growth" would have to be overcome, and: - further integrate the international dimension, so as to make of the Union a "responsible" player, capable of providing answers; - develop the Union's capacity to act: saying that he was "taking up the Schumanian concept of de facto solidarity", Mr. Foucher declared himself "personally convinced that in each advance there needs to be a group of initiators at the outset" and that only thereafter, "we open"; - overcome the contradiction between "power Europe" and enlargement, through sound institutional responses; - invent a sustainable articulation for the EU which is in the process of enlarging with its neighbours, like Russia; - consider the establishment of a genuine "European public area".