Digital Chosunilbo: A European Treaty Wounded: A European Union Disoriented-by John Palmer

Digital ChosunilboA European Treaty Wounded: A European Union Disoriented-by John Palmer

The rejection of the treaty is not the beginning of the end for the European Union as a whole or for the euro the single European currency. Such an implosion of the Union will not happen. The process of European integration which touches so many areas of our collective public and private lives has evolved to the point where some unstoppable unravelling of post-Second World War European history is almost unimaginable. When EU Member States agree to cooperate more closely with each other or to take decisions together on the basis of shared sovereignty they do so because there are some challenges too great for individual governments to respond effectively by acting alone. Too many European politicians have, for too long, used “Brussels” as a euphemism for some phantasmagorical “other” which has to be confronted, countered, bypassed or undermined as a threat to national interests. The EU has been used too often as a scapegoat by national politicians when policies which they decide are necessary but which may be unpopular domestically are blamed on Brussels.