Has Europe Lost Its Heart?

22 Pages Posted: 2 Aug 2009 Last revised: 18 Sep 2009

See all articles by Charles Wyplosz

Charles Wyplosz

University of Geneva - Graduate Institute of International Studies (HEI); Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

Date Written: 2005

Abstract

The fifth enlargement of the EU has now brought together twenty five countries, a massive success. But success has its price: twenty-five countries do not cooperate as six used to. The result is a general impression that the undertaking is being diluted and that national interests prevail over the common good, which means less willingness to take the next integrative step.

This paper argues that this perception is largely misguided. The EU-25 group is considerably more integrated than the EU-6 ever was. Dilution is not a necessary consequence of enlargement, rather enlargement is bringing to the fore a number of institutional failures that were present all along.

This paper takes a politico-economic view of the link between enlargement and deepening. After a broad review of the task allocation principles, it concludes that enlargement and deepening are not substitutes but complements. It produces evidence that enlargement is not increasing preference heterogeneities within the union, but that it leads national governments to preserve more forcefully their own powers, often against the wishes of their own citizens. The result is an inability to reform the decisionmaking process that has become unwieldy as the result of enlargement.

The issue, then, is how to restore the EU's ability to run its affairs. The European Constitutional Convention has made little headway. Other solutions that go beyond current debates are examined. "Pioneer clubs" raise many unresolved issues. More promising, maybe, is the idea that the acquis communautaires should be once and for all decisions. By lowering the stakes of both sovereignty transfers and qualified majority voting, allowing changes in both directions between shared and national competencies could encourage governments to accept more daring reforms. Strengthening the legitimacy of union-specific institutions (the European Parliament or the Commission Presidency) would create a counter-power to deal with national governments' natural tendency to defend their own prerogatives.

Keywords: European integration, enlargement, constitution

Suggested Citation

Wyplosz, Charles, Has Europe Lost Its Heart? (2005). CASE Network Studies and Analyses No. 293, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1441906 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1441906

Charles Wyplosz (Contact Author)

University of Geneva - Graduate Institute of International Studies (HEI) ( email )

PO Box 136
Geneva, CH-1211
Switzerland
+41 22 908 5946 (Phone)
+41 22 733 3049 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://heiwww.unige.ch/~wyplosz

Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

London
United Kingdom

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
84
Abstract Views
716
Rank
533,175
PlumX Metrics