woods: Oh, so most people voted against the EU constitution due to the confusing an non-transparent wording? They wanted people to vote on a worded document and yet didn't have the worded document in view for the public to see what they were voting on?
Andre: Crudely said, this is one reason indeed. One can imagine such a document to be riddled with legalistic/ bureaucratic jargon which would the most apt of constitutional lawyers argue a point for days on end in the High Court. A pamphlet was produced, (sort of an EU Constitution for Dummies) but this was so confusing, so badly thought through even some politicians interviewed on radio and TV contradicted eachother on its meaning. It turned out to be a real farce. woods: This political powerbase. Was this move and centralization first inherent in this constitution whereas before this, the EU was a way to make economic activity easier? Was this political powerbase thus also voted against when the constitution was voted against? Or am I mixing up events? Andre: No you're not, but let me unravel: for simplicity's sake: first there was the European Economic Community (EEC) which sought to regulate economic activity in an easier way within Europe (then consisting of 9 countries). This is what I spoke of in my previous post. But, of course the thing grew, other countries saw benefits (and lots of subsidies, so lots of countries joined) going their way to help improve their local economic base. Soon the benefits and succes of this economic co-operation was taken up by Int. PoV's to look at other areas of co-operation e.g.a joint stance on immigration,drugs,police powers, criminality ,emissions etc etc. Now with the expansion of these issues, problems started to arise because most countries had their own social/intellectual patterns regarding these issues. Where they overlapped there was no problem but, where there was disagreement or down right opposition ( eg the tolerant soft-drugs laws in Holland are opposed by virtually every other EU country) problems could arise and (staying with Holland for a minute) the 'person in the street' saw these hard won (sometimes over a period of 20-30 years) PoV's threatened. Now, woods, you may imagine that each European country has their own cultural traditions, habits and peculiarities... and language of course, that's what makes a country what it is. That is, they all have things to share, protect and lose. So, to continue, the success of the co-operation at the economic level was taken as a basis for developng this further and creating a EU proper. A huge bureacratic system was already in place to formulate policy on aforementioned issues (including immigration/drugs/police powers/privacy laws etc, etc), the EU forced its new monetary system on its citizens (I'm exaggerating a bit because its is damned handy when you go on a holiday somewhere with your euro's without confusion of franks or lires or peseta's and exchange rates etc) and, as said, wanted the whole lot organised within one politically strong EU complete with Constitution. This was rejected. And, as Bodvar correctly points out re Ireland, that country has benefitted tremendously under the EEC arrangement but have rejected the EU (political/constitutional)arrangement. A number of countries see it as a threat to their own...achievements and... call it... national identity. As an aside I strongly believe in a strong EU. If only to make a strong stand against US hegemony. The US has always had the upper hand because of their 'divide and rule' tactic to get 3/4 of Europe 'on side'. This has for many Europeans been a frustrating experience.(Yes, I know that you guys were there in '45 but does that mean eternal servitude on our part?) I'll repeat what I mentioned before somewhere: The best way to thank your teacher is to criticise him/her). Poor Belgium, country of nothing, wonderful people, hundreds of different brews of beer, incredibly friendly, historically magnificent, birthplace of the greatest chansonnier ever, Jacques Brell...votes officially, as only country in Europe, against the American invasion of Iraq. "We will destroy you through economic sanctions, Bush said". Pathetic really. I am at present not convinced that the light comes from within ( having followed some of your posts of late...like an online version of CNN). Hope this clarifies woods Andre Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
