22 March 2007
BBC Europe editor Mark Mardell on the contents of the Berlin Declaration to be signed at a summit this weekend, comparisons between the EU and the Roman empire, and two very different visions of the EU's future.
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"In the middle of the very grand room, one of the many grand rooms in the palace, stands a glass case, containing a book of 1,144 pages. In it are both dreams and nightmares, depending who is reading the book."
I've always fancied chancing my arm as a fantasy writer but this is hard fact. For the book is the Treaty of Rome which set up the Common Market 50 years ago. This weekend the European Union will celebrate its big birthday with the Declaration of Berlin, a statement of aims and values.
As I write, the Germans are being extremely secretive and bending over backwards to produce a text of outstanding blandness. This pussyfooting speaks volumes about the lack of accord on the way forward for the European Union.
The most contentious problem is of course what it says about the constitution.
The French and Dutch referendums left the EU stunned but the Germans and many others are keen to puff air into its lungs, and have a plan for full resurrection in three months time. The current Berlin text stresses the need for "renewing in time for the 2009 European Parliamentary elections the basis on which the European Union is built."
Although to some this is not-very-disguised code for "new constitution in two years time", Mr Blair is likely to argue it could be referring to EU values, policies or, well, just about anything.
The room where the first treaty was signed 50 years ago, the Salone dei Orazi e Curiazi in the Palazzo dei Conservatori is covered from floor to ceiling in paintings showing the slaughter, ceremony and myth surrounding the founding of Rome.
From the time depicted in the paintings, Rome went on expanding for more than 1,000 years. In its meagre half century, the European Union too hasn't stopped growing and now really does cover most of Europe.
West of Minsk, only Norway, Greenland, Iceland and Switzerland don't want to join, although of course in other nations the people may not share their governments' enthusiasm. Still, not even the most enthusiastic proponents of an ever-expanding EU suggest it will grow as large as the Roman Empire. And not even its biggest fans predict a millennium-long future.
Rome of course spread across Europe (including the coast of present day Turkey) North Africa and the Middle East by conquest. The EU's fans argue its most fundamental achievement is making sure World Wars I and II didn't spawn a third.
The Declaration of Berlin will talk about how the EU has overcome "the ravages of war". There's no doubt this was the most important reason that the European Community was set up, building on the earlier Coal and Steel Community (ECSC).
As the one of the brains behind this earlier project, French foreign minister Robert Schuman declared "any war between France and Germany becomes not merely unthinkable, but materially impossible". War between member states of the European Union is certainly unthinkable, but would it have been otherwise if there had never been any such organisation?
And was the formation of the European Union, or something pretty much like it, inevitable?
Certainly the Ruhr International Authority, set up in 1948, to run Germany's industrial heartland was a forerunner of sorts. The authority, headed up by a Belgian professor, involved five of the six countries that went on to create the ECSC and then the EEC: Germany, France, Luxembourg the Netherlands and Belgium.
The difference was that the UK and USA were also in on this first act. The founding document is quite explicit: "If operated wisely, the Ruhr authority may be regarded as a further contributory step towards a more intimate economic association among the countries of Europe".
All these years later, the big question is still how much more intimate that relationship is going to get. The coming few months will not feature the pointy bits of metal and piled up bodies that feature so prominently in the Orazi e Curiazi room, but tempers are already beginning to rise.
The Berlin Declaration will make much of the EU as a "global player" and its role in countering "global threats". Sometimes its seems "globalisation" is a word stuck in front of anything to make it sound a bit grander and a bit more important, when so often it's a load of, well, globes.
But there's no doubt that "globalisation" gives impetus to the debate about how the European Union should evolve. It is not in the nature of the European Union or public policy makers to argue that things are basically all right as they are and nothing much needs to change.
I've been reading two very different visions of the way the European Union should develop by people who've spent a long time at the centre of British politics.
EU Trade Commissioner and former cabinet minister Peter Mandelson argues in The European Union in a Global Age for more action at an EU level. And a new outfit, Global Vision, headed by Lord Blackwell, who was head of the Downing street policy unit in John Major's day, is campaigning in the politest possible terms for Britain to not only leave but break the EU.
Mr Mandelson argues that it's not a matter of salvaging the old constitution but a matter of practical and political reality that the EU needs new rules to function effectively. He argues that there is a real need for at least four specific changes:
- A single person to represent the EU abroad, although he doesn't use the phrase "foreign minister"
- An elected president to run meetings of the council (the meetings of nation states), instead of countries getting a go for six months at a time
- A new voting system for the nation states, to fairly reflect their size
- More qualified majority voting, particularly over police and criminal matters
He also talks, in much vaguer terms, of a smaller commission, and more democracy.
This is, of course, what many would see as the guts of the old constitution and is pretty close to Nicolas Sarkozy's demand for a mini-treaty. Although ministers might baulk at point four, I suspect it may also be close to what the UK government thinks is necessary.
Global Europe, on the other hand, argues that Britain should threaten to veto any new treaty based on the constitution. The British government should use this threat of spoiling the party to demand the right to set up a "European Commonwealth".
This could include countries like Turkey, which may never become a full member of the EU, and others who don't want a constitution. This would be a free trade area very much modelled on the current Swiss relationship with the EU, and could include co-operation on the environment, free movement of people and transport.
It would of course be a profound change, and a lot for any government bite on. But it's what many Conservatives hope David Cameron will end up adopting.
But before battle commences at British or European level, the EU is having pause for a party. In Brussels there will be a concert featuring Lordi, the Corrs and Demis Roussos. Rome is organising a display of art chosen by European heads of state including Rodin's the thinker (Chirac) and a Turner (The Queen). In London there is a Saturday afternoon of seminars at the foreign office and debates with "philosophers, artists and thinkers" at "cultural centres". In Berlin there will be 27 DJs, 27 bands, and free sausages and beer. Guess where I'll be.
