University of the East Manila

UE Political Science College of Science and Arts

GROUP OUTPUT FINALS

POLITICS AND GOVERNANCE IN EUROPE

SUBMITTED TO :
Dr. DE TORRES

DATE:
DECEMBER 17, 2021
 POLITICS

First, the Politics of Europe was outlined by the Elcano Policy, a group of political analyst who
create a book entitled “Europe in 2030: four alternative futures” in 2017. The book was divided to four
contributions which highlights the possible futures of European politics. The first contribution outlines
the nightmare scenario: a divided, ‘free for all’ Europe, in which the continent falls prey to penetration
from several external actors as well as to the reverberations of intra-European competition. What
happens if Europe fails? How does a Europe in which nation states have largely ceased to cooperate,
and the EU and NATO either wither away or become irrelevant, look?. (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). The
second contribution takes a radically different point of departure: a united Europe. In this scenario, the
EU succeeds in becoming both the key player in European geopolitics as well as a significant force or
pole in the world (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). The third contribution is a ‘rebirth of the West scenario’,
in which the transatlantic framework remains the organising factor of both European geopolitics and
Europe’s doings beyond Europe. It outlines a future in which the US and the UK emerge again as the
leaders of a united West, and as the main focal points of European politics (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.).
The fourth and final contribution presents a ‘strong China’ scenario, in which the mechanics of Chinese
penetration in Europe are unpacked (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.).

But then our group focuses on the first contribution because we would like to highlight the crisis
that was happening in EU, which is the growing Euroscepticism because it remains a significant political
current, following the Brexit and it becomes a headline all over the world. Other countries as well who
is part of the EU is still weighing whether they can prosper with or without the membership of EU.
Moreover, the first contribution which is “A Divided Europe” was divided into four subparts as well.

“The end of the West” is the first sub part wherein the transatlantic ‘special relationship’ had been
long brewing, and eventually came to ‘fruition’ in the 2026 (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). In the years
before, Americans had become increasingly unwilling to invest in Europe’s protection. Europeans
contributed to America’s disenchantment by failing to pay more for their own defence (Elcano Policy
Paper, n.d.). Repeated calls from Washington for Europeans to ‘do more’ largely fell on deaf ears,
despite some symbolic gestures (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). For refusal of Europeans to support the
US when tensions with China mounted in the early 2020s led to much anger in Washington (Elcano
Policy Paper, n.d.). US commentators spoke about ‘a stab in the back’, and called for disengagement
from an ‘utterly useless alliance’ (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.).

Second sub part is “The failure of the European project” In parallel to NATO, the European ‘project’
had failed as well (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). What led to the EU’s downfall was not another crisis of
the joint currency but the spill-over effects from the war zones in the Southern neighbourhood and the
Sahel (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). Mass poverty and mass migration had led to even more instability in
the region, with elites in most countries being neither willing nor capable to build stable, inclusive states,
and instead looking after the interests of their families and clans (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). Regional
and outside powers were also pursuing equally short-sighted ad hoc policies oriented towards very
narrow goals, and this led to conflicting strategies (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). The European powers
could not agree on a joint strategy to deal with these crises and challenges or with the growing migration
pressure from the South (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.).

Third sub part is the “Rise of a multipolar global order” By 2030, ‘global governance’, ‘rules-based
order’ and ‘liberal order’ have disappeared from the lexicon of international politics (Elcano Policy
Paper, n.d.). Leaders and opinion-makers have adopted the ‘realist’ vocabulary that defines
international politics more or less as a shark-tank where only the strongest survive ruthless competition
between states in an anarchic environment (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). Early promoters of this view
have been, besides some US foreign-policy analysts, the governing elites in Russia and China (Elcano
Policy Paper, n.d.). These elites were seeking to purge the international order of all its liberal and
democratic features, as they threatened their hold on power (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). What they
aimed at was ‘to make the world safe for autocracy’, as a prominent Russian political expert with links
to the Kremlin described it. Russia and China, however, tried to maintain some elements of the UN
system to bolster their great-power status (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.). And they put some effort in
keeping large parts of the international economic system intact in order to be able to sell commodities
(Russia) and to trade internationally (China) (Elcano Policy Paper, n.d.).

Last sub part is “A weak Europe in a multipolar world” during the 2020s Europe failed to keep
the multilateral order alive – an order based on the idea of mutually beneficial cooperation between
states that accept each other as equal, and of the integration of their societies. ‘A noble dream’, as a
recent history of the EU has put it, ‘but obviously tied to a specific historical period and geo-political
constellation, the Cold War, when American dominance ended centuries-old European competition and
monopolized defence and strategic leadership in its own hands. Once the US withdrew from Europe,
power moved back into intra-European relations as the defining feature, and with it the old distrust and
competition that many had hoped Europe had overcome forever’.

To sum it all, the growing Euroscepticism led us to an idea that the first contribution of Elcano
Policy is being evident in todays era, the End of the West gives an information on how America would
not have any more relationship with the EU in 2030 because they are not getting any solid partnership
within the EU interms of battling against the China, this would result to NATO disappering and the EU
surviving only in name, they become vulnerable and fragile fior external actors because of the
withdrawal of US. The failure of European project, is just simply a notion of truth that EU countries, after
the withdrawal of US, would pursue their own interest and would never participate anymore in any joint
strategies, ad hoc policies is the prevalent future and it would just addressed a temporary problem and
not be effective in the long run, this would cost a lot of failure in European countries. The rise of
multipolar world would challenge the existing liberal order, or the global governnance in 2030, because
of the US do not want to be the leader anymore, this would give the Russia and China a chance to
spread their own ideologies, and Europe is one of their targets because of the vulnerability following
the spread of own interest and greed on power. This would result to a weak Europe in multipolar world,
because they become dependent to other powerful countries like China and Russia, they cannot
sustain their own economy anymore, and another crisis was predicted by the Elcano Policy. The future
of European Politics is really diverse, and many aspects shall be considered, but one thing is for sure,
future is waiting for European Politics and they should taking measures to the existing issues nowadays.

ECONOMY

All over the years under the regime of communist’s governance, different regions in Europe
began to embrace more democratic ideals and giving merchants, traders and craftsmen voices be
heard in governance. This development of liberalization was accompanied with economic policies and
activities lead to an open economic and trading into power houses bringing much wealth to the cities
and the European nations specifically. Moreover, as nation states solidified in Europe, monarchs
consolidated their political power establishing more controls and regulations over their economies and
over international trade (King, 2008) Many have suffered from all kinds if economic from all kinds of
economic restrictions, tax burdens, and trade policy was protectionist resulted free trade were
dissipated by nationalism and frequent wars. Going back to history, we can analyze how free trade
started in Europe in which divided by different parts (Pirenne,1937). The first part was the collapse of
the Roman Empire. During the Fifth Century, there was no unifying political body to maintain control
and integrate the different regions of the old empire. Under the Romans, trade for luxury goods had
been facilitated by Roman infrastructure (particularly roads) and military control. After the fall of the
empire, long distance commerce was greatly curtailed. Second, Champagne Fairs, in the Champagne
region of France, Charlemagne established administrative centers in the towns. Several factors led to
the success of these fairs. First of all, the locations were convenient. They were located in an area that
lay between economic regions of northern Europe and Italy, making it a good meeting point for traders
from the north and the south. They linked the two European trading regions together with the linkage
of Europe to the East Civilization that resulted to the significance of their role in economic renaissance
of Europe. Third, the Burges and Antwerp, Bruges and the surrounding region produced high quality
textiles, and also had a tradition of hosting periodic trade fairs which were more regional in nature.
opening up an inlet from the North Sea that came close to the Flemish city of Bruges. created a new
economic opportunity for Bruges, access to the sea and sea trade. Bruges was also a commercial
financial center. One of the first stock exchanges was developed in Bruges by commodity traders The
merchants of Bruges also developed one of Europe’s most sophisticated money markets. As a result
of the international trade and financial commerce, Bruges was a wealthy, cosmopolitan city (with many
foreign nationals residing in the city) that was equal to or better than Venice (Morren,1984). Lastly, the
Northern Italian city-states of Venice, Genoa, Florence and Milan achieved a high degree of commerce
and trade. These cities’ democratic social orders, which developed out of Christian ideals and a focus
on commerce, led to innovative commercial enterprises and organizations, and established them as
leading trading centers in the Mediterranean. To help facilitate their trading ventures, set up banking
houses in the key trading centers where they did business. These banking houses were outpost
branches for the main banking/trading group, and facilitated a great deal of international trade. The
expertise, capital, and enterprise of these Northern Italian city-states acted as a catalyst for trade in
other regions of Europe and beyond. In addition, with regards the Mercantilism and trade, in order the
accomplished this positive trade balance, proponents of this economic viewpoint advocated significant
government involvement in regulating trade. They saw the government’s role as maintaining policies
that would encourage exports and discourage imports. As modern nation-states began to take shape
and many adopted mercantilisms as their economic philosophy. This time period saw a large increase
in international trade due to accounting and transportation advances turned international trade into an
economic competition among nation-states, protectionism for their trade ruled till the day.

Furthermore, the establishment of European Union founded economic and political union
among member states which created after the second world war aiming the Europe to be competitive
worldwide and fostering economic cooperation and avoid conflicts. The EU has delivered more than a
half-century of peace, stability, and prosperity that helped raise living standards and launched a single
European currency which is the euro. In which for the sake of brevity, they have called the euro area
or by its legally and accurate name the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). This promotes European
integration and one of the strongest tangible symbols of the common identity and shares the values of
Europe. It provides sound, sustainable public finances that helped the governments save money said
the European Commission. (European Commission,2011).

Protectionism and Tariff Policies Return, European nations, the domestic producers suffered and
people began to question the wisdom of lower import tariffs for grain and free trade policies. Germany
precipitated a round of protectionist actions by passing the Tariff Act and soon after other nations
followed suit. Tariff actions and counter-actions by the various European powers trended toward
escalating protectionism and political friction. Increasingly, European powers scrambled for colonies to
support their domestic economies and to assist their economic nationalism. Protectionist sentiments
prevailed over free trade sentiments, and again a number of nations raised tariffs on imports, Demand
for goods was further reduced by the depressed, global, economic situation, further shrinking markets
for internationally traded goods (Kahler, 1985).

To conclude with the economic aspects, throughout their history provides the essences for
themselves of protectionism, shocked by the ruled and the wisdoms of lower tariffs, and the current
existential crisis of the European Union, the future with regards of their EMU needs a deepen reforms
and stability that if shocked will happened and another financial crisis happened the main question will
be how far does the Euro currency can stand. Until now, whether or not to carry out such reforms has
largely been a national prerogative. But in a union, as their clear common interest. Euro area countries
depend on one another for growth. And, more fundamentally, if a lack of structural reforms leads to
permanent divergence within the monetary union, this raises the specter of exit – from which all
members ultimately suffer. Building a genuine economic union is sharing more sovereignty in the area
which is different how does nationalism and protectionism goes however means more than governing
themselves but rather governing together, shifting of coordination to common decision making. Lastly,
the European Economic Community founder President Jean Claude-Jancker said “Today, the Union is
mired in a deep existential crisis, and its future is very much in doubt.” and the only paths and can set
out is by carrying on with the current agenda, focusing just on the single market, allowing some
countries to move faster than others toward integration, according to him.

SOCIAL

The general thought to this aspects’ affluence is to further Europe’s progress through change.
Europe needs to change in order to persist in a changing world. Europe must become stronger internally
in order to be strong externally.

The Future of Europe: Present Health Crisis

Their response have included vaccination, treatments, testing and planning. But today, Europe
and the world are getting shook again with the recent variant of the virus, which is the Omicron. And
the statistics of Europe today only continue to increase each passing day. Europe’s covid response
have provoked academic and scientific opinions from people, some say positives but most turn to how
badly Europe have been handling this crisis. European Response in a nutshell: A new study looks at
how the United States and countries in the European Union handled the initial wave of the COVID-19
pandemic; Researchers said the U.S. government did not mandate restrictions on states while the
European Union did not have the authority to require restrictions on individual countries; Experts say
the United States and Europe instituted different types of lockdowns. They also note the politics in the
United States is more divisive than in Europe.

Triggering Future Challenges

• Pandemic Prevention and Control

The current corona pandemic clearly shows that components of health policy need to be more
closely coordinated at European level. Elements of a common pandemic policy would at least include
a substantial strengthening of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC)5,
clearly defined necessary supply chains of necessary medical materials, coordination of testing
capacities.

• Corona Recession and Debt Sustainability

Beyond the immediate health policy tasks, the fight against the economic recession caused by
the forced standstill is currently beginning. In contrast to the global economic crisis following the
collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, Europe is entering this new crisis not entirely inexperienced in
monetary and financial policy. Nevertheless, the combination of globally symmetrical supply shocks
and the ensuing depression in demand is presenting European economies and their common political
governance with a new quality of as yet unforeseeable challenges.

• Migration Flows and Refugee Crisis

Following the EU enlargement in 2004 and 2007, large differences in income and standards of
living between the new Member States and the EU-15 prompted an impressive surge in intra-European
migration. First, strong migration arose from the eight countries that joined the EU in 2004 to Ireland
and the United Kingdom, which, together with Sweden, had opened their borders immediately, without
a transitional period. Then, there was extensive migration from the Member States that joined in 2007
- Bulgaria and Romania - to Italy and Spain. Finally, with the Eurozone-crisis starting in 2010, people
moved from southern Member States – Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece – to northern Member States
– especially, Belgium, France, Germany and the United Kingdom.

• Global Terrorism

Since the September 11 attacks, America and Europe have been confronted with transnational
Islamist terrorism. The tactic of global expansion has been and continues to be used by various groups
(including ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah) as a revolt against the claimed hegemony of the secular
world powers. The response to the terrorist attacks through war, the partly still poor integration of
Muslims in European societies and the diffusion of communication systems like Twitter and Facebook
have exacerbated the threat of terrorist attacks.

• Climate Change

Climate change has already caused the average surface temperature on Earth to rise by more
than one degree Celsius since the Industrial Revolution. This development will have serious
consequences for human health, biodiversity and resources, ecosystems, and many social and
economic sectors, including agriculture, tourism and energy production.

Highlighting the Impact of Climate Change in Europe - NOW and AHEAD

The draft IPCC report — due for release next year — predicts a ferocious century of climate impacts,
particularly in poor countries. The broad findings of the draft are likely to be the same in the final
published report, but some numbers and the language used by the scientists might be changed as the
report is reviewed by governments over the course of this year.

Climate change is already happening: temperatures are rising, drought and wild fires are starting
to occur more frequently, rainfall patterns are shifting, glaciers and snow are melting and the global
mean sea level is rising. To mitigate climate change, we must reduce or prevent the emissions linked
to human activities.

In europe’s case, first, Europe’s north will struggle with floods and fires, even with warming at
the lowest end of expectations — the Paris Agreement limits of 1.5 or 2 degrees above the pre-industrial
global average. But the south will be hammered by drought, urban heat and agricultural decline, driving
a wedge into one of the European Union’s biggest political fault lines. The case is, the world is nowhere
near on track to limiting the global temperature rise to the 1.5 degrees Celsius required by the Paris
Agreement, the international treaty negotiated at the United Nations Climate Change Conference
(COP21) in Paris in 2015. In fact, latest predictions show that globally, the climate is set to get on
average 2.4 degrees C warmer compared to the pre-industrial era, unless emissions of greenhouse
gases are drastically cut. But not all parts of the world are set to be hit equally. Europe, in fact, has
already passed the 1.5-degree C threshold and is currently 2.2 degrees C warmer than it was before
the industrial revolution, Samantha Burgess, deputy director for climate change services at the
European Earth observation program Copernicus, said last Nov. 2 in a briefing at the UN Climate
Change Conference (COP26) that was concluded in Glasgow, Scotland. Despite the disappointments
of COP26, it’s important to acknowledge the momentum the climate movement has gained. Denialists
are in retreat, while all governments are under pressure to strengthen their climate targets and actions.
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PS5A

PORTILLO, AERON PAUL M. (BLACK)

GO, ALYSSA. (BLUE)

DELOS SANTOS GENEVIEVE. (GREEN)