Europe,

towards an
“Ever Closer Union” ?

A comparison
between Italy and the UK

Giovanni Brauzzi,
University of Birmingham,
13 March 2008
 AN EVER CLOSER UNION

• The dream

• Some nightmares in Europe

• The reality today

 The Dream
• Ventotene Manifesto (1941)
• Zurich Speech (1946)
• Schuman Declaration (1950)
• De Gasperi Proposal (1952)
• Messina Conference (1955)
• Rome Treaty (1957)
 Ventotene Manifesto (1941)
• …The dividing line between progressive and reactionary
falls along a very new and substantial line: those who
conceive the essential purpose and goal of struggle as
being the ancient one, the conquest of national political
power, and who, although involuntarily, play into the
hands of reactionary forces, letting the incandescent
lava of popular passions set in the old moulds, and thus
allowing old absurdities to arise once again, and those
who see the main purpose as the creation of a solid
international State, who will direct popular forces
towards this goal, and who, even if they were to win
national power, would use it first and foremost as an
instrument for achieving international unity.
• …The foundation must be built now for a movement that
knows how to mobilize all forces for the birth of the new
organism which will be the grandest creation, and the
newest, that has occurred in Europe for centuries; in
order to constitute a steady federal State, that will have
at its disposal a European armed service instead of
national armies; that will break decisively economic
autarkies, the backbone of totalitarian regimes; that will
have sufficient means to see that its deliberations for
 Zurich Speech (1946)
• I wish to speak to you today about the
tragedy of Europe.
• Among the victors there is a babel of jarring
voices; among the vanquished the sullen
silence of despair.
• Yet all the while there is a remedy which, if it
were generally and spontaneously adopted,
would as if by a miracle transform the whole
scene, and would in a few years make all
Europe, or the greater part of it, as free and
as happy as Switzerland is today.
• What is this sovereign remedy?
• It is to re-create the European Family, or as
much of it as we can, and provide it with a
structure under which it can dwell in peace,
 Schuman Declaration (1950)
• World peace cannot be safeguarded without the
making of creative efforts proportionate to the
dangers which threaten it.
The contribution which an organized and living
Europe can bring to civilization is indispensable to
the maintenance of peaceful relations.
• Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a
single plan. It will be built through concrete
achievements which first create a de facto solidarity.
The coming together of the nations of Europe
requires the elimination of the age-old opposition of
France and Germany. Any action taken must in the
first place concern these two countries.
• By pooling basic production and by instituting a new
High Authority, whose decisions will bind France,
Germany and other member countries, this proposal
will lead to the realization of the first concrete
foundation of a European federation indispensable to
the preservation of peace.
 De Gasperi Proposal (1952)

• In May 1952, at the negotiations for the Treaty

establishing the European Defence Community, Italy
obtained the insertion of a clause (art. 38) envisaging
the future creation of an European Political Authority.
• The idea, developed in consultation with Altiero
Spinelli, was that a sort of European army needed the
guidance of a truly European political leadership.
• De Gasperi, thanks to the support of Schuman and
Adenauer, was able to speed up the initiative, so that,
on 10 September 1952, the ECSC Council of Ministers
transformed its Parliamentary Assembly into an Ad Hoc
Assembly tasked to prepare, within 6 months, a draft
Treaty establishing a European Political Community.
• The initiative did not survived the rejection of the EDC
 Messina Conference
(1955)

• The governments of the Federal Republic of Germany,

Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands
believe the time has come to take a new step on the road of
European construction. They are of the opinion that this
objectives should be achieved first of all in the economic
sphere.
• They believe that the establishment of a united Europe must
be achieved through the development of common institutions,
the progressive fusion of national economies, the creation of a
common market, and the gradual harmonization of their social
policies.
• Such an agenda seems indispensable to them if Europe is to
“Gentlemen, you are trying to negotiate something
preserve the standing which she has in the world, to restore
you will never be able to negotiate. But if negotiated,
the influence and her prestige,
it will not beand toAnd
ratified. improve
if ratified, it steadily
will not work”.the
living standard of the population.
The British observer at the Messina Conference
 Treaty of Rome (1957)
“…AN EVER CLOSER
UNION AMONG THE
PEOPLES OF EUROPE...”

“The neglect since 1975 by the “Europeans” among us to

address ourselves to the large issue at stake about the
destiny of Europe was a mistake. We should have insisted,
forcefully and loudly, that we have agreed, by the terms of
the preamble to the Treaty of Rome, to associate ourselves
with an organisation whose long-term aim was explicitly to
achieve “an ever closer union” of the European peoples.
We should have discussed what this grand phrase, “ever
closer union”, meant. We had accepted, after all, the
“acquis communautaire”, the accumulated wisdom and
aspirations of the six founding nations, before we joined”.
Recent
nightmares
for Europe
 Bruges Speech (1988)
• If you believe some of the things said and written about my views
on Europe, it must seem rather like inviting Genghis Khan to
speak on the virtues of peaceful coexistence!
• Had it not been for that willingness to fight and to die, Europe
would have been united long before now—but not in liberty, not in
justice.
• The European Community is one manifestation of that European
identity, but it is not the only one.
• We Europeans cannot afford to waste our energies on internal
disputes or arcane institutional debates. They are no substitute
for effective action.
• To try to suppress nationhood and concentrate power at the
centre of a European conglomerate would be highly damaging and
would jeopardise the objectives we seek to achieve.
• We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in
Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a European level with a
European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels.
• Let Europe be a family of nations, understanding each other
French and Dutch Referendums (2005)
 Tabloid Jingoism
The Sun, 12 Dec 2006
999 crew on way… after break
PARAMEDICS are being forced to finish tea breaks before attending 999 calls under barmy EU
rules. Ambulance staff warned patients could die after the dozy diktat comes info force today. The
rules mean London crews can only get called out in the last ten minutes of their half-hour tea
breaks. If there is a road traffic accident, or a heart attack or stroke victim collapses outside their
station, they still cannot go to help.

The Daily Mail, 21 November 2007

EU votes on sex partner survey
A census demanding details about women’s sexual partners is today being voted on by MEPs today.
The Euro survey will go to every household if it gets the go-ahead. But opponents say women
should protest by claiming to have had 1,000 lovers or be virgins.

The Daily Telegraph, 7 February 2003

Free-range farms will be forced to stamp every egg
The future of hundreds of specialist free-range and organic egg producers is under threat because
the European Commission has ordained that, from next year, every egg must be stamped with its
home address.
 The “ever closer union” today

How difficult is
to ride a bicycle
“sur place”

Is it the end of the road ?

“It is time to move on from institutional

changes. We expect no change in the
foreseeable future so that the Union will
be able to fully concentrate on other
challenges ahead”. British PM Gordon Brown
The challenges
ahead
• Implementing the Lisbon Agenda
• Completing the Enlargement
• Completing the Single Market
• Energy, Environment and Climate Change
• CFSP and ESDP
 THE ITALIAN PERCEPTIONS
OF EUROPE

• The background

• The constitutional framework

• The challenges today

 How best to safeguard
NATIONAL INTERESTS
in the presence of:

•Few commodities
•Limited energy sources
•Aging and shrinking population
•No way of keeping gates closed
•Cultural and institutional pluralism
•Universal vision
•Lessons from old and recent past

The Smartest Option

PURSUING NATIONAL INTERESTS
THROUGH MULTILATERAL FORA
 THE CONSTITUTIONAL
FRAMEWORK

Art. 11 of Italian Constitution: Italy

rejects war as an instrument of
aggression against the liberties of other
people and as a means for settling
international controversies; it agrees,
on conditions of equality with other
States, to such limitations of
sovereignty as may be necessary for an
international order aimed at ensuring
peace and justice among Nations; it
promotes and encourages international
he limitation of sovereignty which
, for every country, the price of the
articipation in an integrated
ternational system, becomes less
nternational
nerous the more a country is able
o contribute genuinely to the definition
of the policy of international fora
 National Interest in
International Fora :
Italian priorities
• Being part of the leading group in
the European integration process

• Strengthening transatlantic relations

• Avoiding marginalisation at the UN

 European challenges for Italy
• Remain in the Euro zone mainstream
• Implement the Lisbon Agenda
• Digest the new European Social Model
• A common front against organized crime
• Tackle aggressively climate change
• Avoid exclusion within the leading group
• A single voice in world affairs
• Keep momentum in the integration process
 THE BRITISH PERCEPTIONS
OF EUROPE

• The background

• The constitutional peculiarities

• The challenges today

 The background
Britain as Europe’s rescuer:
“A determination to plan for a future beyond victory has helped to
sustain the British spirit throughout the war and has produced the
spectacle of a nation with its life in peril nevertheless carrying through
domestic reforms of unparalleled magnitude” What Britain has done
1939-1945, issued by the Ministry of Information. 1945.

Britain as a global hub:

“If you looked at the post-bag of any English village and examined the
letters coming in from abroad, ninety per cent would come from way
beyond Europe” Anthony Eden, early Fifties.
“Europe remained a speculative venture, all right for other
countries, quite unlikely to come to anything, and, in any case, a
project that could never dent the immortal verities that sustained
the independent British state” Hugo Young, This Blessed Plot, London
1998.
 The British
constitutional
peculiarities
• An unwritten constitution.
• No to Hitler and Charlemagne
• …and also to Napoleon and to the Pope.
• “No need for change, things are already
going badly enough”.
The challenges today for the UK
• Being in and out simultaneously
• Leading role in global issues
• Key importance of a strong national
footprint
• Can the UK afford the
Swiss/Norwegian model ?
• Is a global perspective still possible
without the European approach ?
 Different perceptions
UNITED
ITALY
KINGDOM
Pooling of sovereignty expansion of limitation of
opportunities prerogatives
European seat in the expansion of limitation of
UNSC opportunities prerogatives
European Charter of expansion of limitation of
Fundamental Rights opportunities prerogatives
European Court of Justice expansion of limitation of
opportunities prerogatives
I
The
Groucho
Marx
Syndrome

I SENT TO THE CLUB A WIRE

STATING: PLEASE ACCEPT MY
RESIGNATION. I DON'T WANT TO
BELONG TO ANY CLUB THAT WILL
ACCEPT ME AS A MEMBER.
 Some quotations from the lecture of
the President of the Italian Republic
H.E. Signor Giorgio Napolitano
"IS THERE A FUTURE
FOR EUROPEAN INTEGRATION?"
London, LSE, 12 October 2006
•The question now is whether the political will is there in our
countries to continue that process of integration…
•Modern politics and economics have not just a national or global
dimension. There exists also a European dimension as shaped and
brought into operation by the integration of our countries in the
Community of Six and now in the Union…
•Demand for Europe has been growing and is now heard
throughout the world. We have a duty to respond to this call…
•Your country, with its own sensibility deriving from its own
history - but then the history of every European nation is different
from all others' - contributed decisively to the birth of the
European ideal. First by standing up heroically against Nazi
fascism during the Second World War. Then by pointing - as
Winston Churchill did in a prophetic speech - to the prospect of a
"regional organisation of Europe" to be undertaken without delay :
"If we are to form a United States of Europe, or whatever name it
may take, we must begin now“…
•The endeavour goes on. It is not over and Europe still needs the
United Kingdom as a source of equilibrium on the continent and as
an inspiration for its civil and democratic future. We are about to
 CONCLUSIONS
• Europe needs the UK
• and the UK needs Europe
• Europe needs the world
• and the world needs Europe
• Italy needs the UK, Europe and the world
• and has something to offer to all of them