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Journal of International Relations and Development
A Cause of Conflict? The Implications of Decision-making Changes for the EU's Eastwards Enlargement
by Heather Field
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Introduction
THIS ARTICLE AIMS TO PROVIDE AN ACCOUNT OF SOME OF THE REMAINING IMPEDIMENTS TO THE EUROPEAN UNION’S EASTWARDS ENLARGEMENT AND HOW SOME OF THEM ARE BEING DEALT WITH, IN THE CONTEXT OF DIFFERING THEORETICAL EXPLANATIONS AND CONSTRUCTIONS OF ENLARGEMNET AND INTEGRATION WHICH FOCUS ON RATIONAL MATERIAL FACTORS ON THE ONE HAND AND SOCIALLY CONSTRUCTED IDEAS, NORMS AND VALUES ON THE OTEHR. Material factors are here taken to include direct and indirect financial and welfare benefits, including those which may come from budgetary transfers, trade, economic growth, increased employment, and from the reduction of risk in terms of economic downturns, environmental damage, crime, and national security. They are also considered to include national political influence, since this can be used to prevent losses and obtain benefits. Ideas are considered to be concepts, plans, notions and interpretations, which may be of a negative or positive nature where human welfare is concerned. Norms are taken as representing standards and accepted practices, but in the context of European integration as to be standards which countries, their populations or others consider desirable or seek to maintain or attain. Again, in the context of European integration the values of the European Union (EU) or its member-states are assumed by their respective populations as being positive and desirable.
The article endeavours to show how the contentious nature of decision-making changes in the context of the prospective eastwards enlargement of the EU is related to the importance of national interests in both the more concrete traditional sense, and in terms of norms and ideas. The need for changes to the decision-making system to accommodate enlargement has been recognised in practice through changes made at the 7-11 December 2000 Nice summit and Intergovernmental Conference meeting. It attempts to relate the impact of the changes to a number of areas where alterations in decision-making arrangements in preparation for eastwards enlargement have the potential to lead to significantly different outcomes from those that would arise without such changes. The specific areas involved include agriculture, the removal of restrictions on the sale of land, the introduction of the free movement of labour, and issues relating to gender equality, culture and the media. The summit did not address resolutions which Gogova (2001:3) describes as ‘conflict based on the economic characteristics of new and old member states,’ but these issues had been partly resolved by reforms made to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and to structural or regional funding.
Since the collapse of the communist bloc at the end of the 1980s, and of the Soviet Union itself in 1991, there has been slow progress in accepting countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) into the EU. The only exception to this has been the German Democratic Republic (GDR), which became part of a unified Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) in 1990. 1
The eastwards enlargement of the EU has been seen as taking place in a number of stages, with different groups of countries being accepted once they meet all the requirements. Some basic requirements as to economic and political conditions, respect for human rights, and meeting conditions of European identity and democratic status were set out by the 1992 Lisbon European Council meeting (Sjursen 1997). More specific conditions for membership were laid down for the opening of accession negotiations by the Copenhagen European Council in June 1993, including (European Union News 1998:2):
Leading applicant-countries in this context include the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovenia, and Estonia. Complaints from Slovakia and other applicant-countries that the existing enlargement procedure with its divisions into an advance group and a second-round group of prospective applicants could lead to a ‘New Yalta’ and division of Europe (Friis 1998:6)led to an individual screening process being introduced for each applicant from 31 March 1998. This allowed Slovakia to be selected from the earlier group of prospective second-round entrants, with Lithuania, to continue scheduled negotiations, leaving Bulgaria, Latvia and Romania outside the possible first group of entrants.
There have also been moves by the EU to offer special association agreements to Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, and now with political change there the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia or its possible successor states Serbia and Montenegro (Field 2000a). In addition, Cyprus and Malta are possible first- or second-round entrants. Their entry, in addition to that of the CEE applicant-countries, could bring the total number of EU member-states to thirty-two. 2
Decision-making Issues
THE EU’S DECISION-MAKIGN SYSTEM HAS REQUIRED MAJOR CHANGES IN ORDER TO ACCOMMODATE ENLARGEMENT AND ALLOE IT TO FUNCTION IN A REASONABLE MANNER. There has been an extension in qualified majority voting (QMV) to a further twenty-nine policy areas (New Europe 2001). These areas include reform of the CAP, the abolition of restrictions on freedom of establishment, competition policy reform, the reform of state aid rules, co-ordination of economic policies, employment guidelines, establishment of joint research and development undertakings, establishment of a breach of fundamental rights in a member-state, and the conclusion of binding international agreements with respect to the Common Foreign and Security Policy and Justice and Home Affairs. However, there are some important specific exceptions. QMV was not extended to the areas of taxation and social security (New Europe 2001).
A number of specific sensitive issues have been excluded where QMV has been extended to the general areas in which they are located. For example, there is to be QMV for judicial co-operation in civil matters, but with the exclusion of family law. There is to be QMV with respect to the facilitation of citizens’ exercise of their rights to move freely, but not where passports and social security are concerned. While QMV will apply to trade in services and the commercial aspects of intellectual property, one of the exceptions made to this excludes situations where a trade agreement would exceed EU internal competencies such as those requiring harmonisation of EU laws, which in practice covers cultural, audio-visual and educational services, health and social services (Duff 2001).
Only in six areas were the extensions of QMV matched by a commensurate extension of the European Parliament’s right of co-decision, to amend or reject legislation. In the case of measures laying down common rules on asylum policy, a power of co-decision was given to the Parliament with unanimity continuing to be required in the Council, but the co-decision will only apply after effective external border controls have been put in place following agreement on a unanimous basis in the Council (Duff 2001). The President of the Commission is also given new powers over the commissioners, including to allocate portfolios and to sack commissioners, with the approval of the other members of the commission. These changes are in line with Mazzucelli’s (2000) indications that necessary changes included an extension of qualified majority voting to new areas, and reforms to the European Commission.
The most important change from the point of view of the EU’s eastwards enlargement is the increase in the voting weights of larger member-states, relative to smaller states. An extension of the existing imbalance in favour of small states would have resulted in the situation following enlargement to an EU of twenty-seven states where the twelve new members would had added some 22 percent to total population but received 34 percent of the votes in the Council of Ministers. With further enlargement to thirty-two states, the seventeen new members would have added some 26 percent to the population of the EU but received 40 percent of votes in the Council (Field 2000b). Of the applicant-countries, only Poland could qualify as large, but its population size is still less than half of that of Germany, while Romania is medium sized with a population roughly a third larger than that of the Netherlands. All the others are small states in population terms. That the new entrants should receive such an enhancement of power in terms of votes was unacceptable to the existing members because it would have allowed them to exert undue influence on decisions. This was a particularly fraught issue given that, with the exception of Cyprus, their GDP (gross domestic product) levels range from around half the current EU average to a fifth or less, that gross contributions to the EU budget are based upon a percentage of gross national product (GNP), and that current EU programmes are such as could be used to allow substantial financial transfers to the new members after accession.
Calculations based on figures in Duff (2001) and in Field (2000b) indicate that the change to the voting weights made by the Nice summit means that the new entrants in an EU of twenty-seven member-states will have around 30 percent of votes in the Council, more than their anticipated share of the EU’s post-enlargement population of around 22 percent but around a seventh less than that which would otherwise have applied. The new qualified majority threshold will be 258 of 345 votes, effectively raising it from 71.3 percent of votes to 74.8 percent and hence increasing the ability of states to act in coalition to block legislation they dislike. However, a double majority of population as well as votes will henceforth apply, as when challenged the approval of legislation must be found to have been undertaken by 62 percent of EU population, as opposed to the present informal level of 58 percent (Duff 2001:5; Dinan and Vanhoonacker 2000:1).
The changes agreed upon at Nice will facilitate enlargement, and mean that the problem created by the failure to agree on suitable changes in time for their incorporation into the Amsterdam Treaty has now been overcome. Where representation in the European Parliament (EP) is concerned, the Nice outcome gives some applicant-countries lower representation than might be expected on the basis of population size relative to certain EU members. The Czech Republic and Hungary will each receive fewer seats compared to Belgium and Portugal, twenty compared to twenty-two, in spite of there being more Czechs than Belgians or Portuguese, and more Hungarians than Portuguese.
Does a difference in the distribution of voting weights result in changed outcomes? Prior to the 1995 enlargement, the smaller member-states of Denmark, Greece, Ireland and Portugal, were significant net budgetary recipients. In 1993 net transfers to them amounted to ECU thousand million 0.4, 4.1, 2.4, and 2.5, respectively, being equivalent to 4, 6 and 7 percent of GNP respectively of the last three countries (Wennerlund 1995). While Luxembourg and Belgium were not substantial net recipients, or recipients on a regular basis, they receive benefits from EU institutions being located in their countries. The 1995 enlargement brought in relatively wealthy Scandinavian countries, and Austria, and the earlier situation of most smaller states being net beneficiaries ceased to apply.
Whether greater weights in the decision-making system result in larger national benefits for EU member-states depends on the extent to which self-interest and "rational choice" motivations such as the ability to benefit from net budgetary transfers apply, or norms and ideas more generally, such as the idea of a wider Europe and the inherent desirability of greater integration. A further issue is what the interests of the applicant-countries are, and how these correspond or conflict with those of the EU’s existing membership.
Two independent approaches or "realities" can be said to exist with respect to the eastwards enlargement of the EU. One approach to the EU’s eastwards enlargement relates to norms and ideas such as those of a wider, more unified and more integrated Europe, with such norms and ideas being socially constructed and open to change following communication with further subjects. The other approach is the rationalist or materialist one, which may be regarded as equivalent to liberal intergovernmentalism and focuses on the material benefits and costs which may accrue to states, their populations, and segments of those populations, consequent to enlargement of the EU. These benefits and costs may for example be in monetary or welfare terms, in the employment situation, or with respect to less measurable and tangible variables such as the level of societal cohesion or of national security.
The EU member-states tend to support enlargement, but their populations do not necessarily. When enlargement Commissioner Günther Verheugen expressed his personal opinion that he was in favour of a referendum in Germany on enlargement, the idea was quickly criticised by Germany and other member-states (Singh 2000). Less than a third of the populations of France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and Spain supports enlargement, and less than half of those of Ireland and Sweden, according to 1999 surveys (Mazzucelli 2000:5).
National Interests
THE STRONGEST CASE PUT FORWARD FOR THE EXISTEMCE OF CLEARLY-DEFINED NATIONAL INTERESTS AS A MOTIVATION IN EU MEMBER-STATE’ POLITICAL ACTIONS IS THAT OF MORAVCSIK (1998). This demonstrates the importance which national interest, and especially that of the major member-states, played in agreement upon major decisions on issues such as agriculture and economic and monetary union (EMU). It follows substantial earlier literature on, for example, the impact of the CAP on different member-states’ policy stances, of the related issue of net budgetary transfers through the EU budget, and other EC and EU policy outcomes which resulted in financial or other costs or benefits for member-states (Andrlik 1981; Hendriks 1989, 1991; Field and Fulton 1994; Grant 1995; Keeler 1996). Field (1999a) discusses more recent developments and trade-offs of this nature with respect to agriculture and trade liberalisation.
Moravcsik’s approach is supported by the earlier analysis of Garrett and Weingast (1993) and the evidence they provide. They see European integration as having been aimed at securing economic benefits for individual states, and cite the example of the construction of the Great Belt Eastern Bridge between Denmark and Sweden. In spite of a British-French consortium’s tender to build this being more competitive, the Danish government decided to give the contract to a domestic contractor. The British/French consortium took the issue to the European Commission, which threatened to prosecute the Danish government through the European Court of Justice. In order to prevent such action, the Danish government agreed to pay costs and damages to the losing consortium. In other words, Danish national industry objectives triumphed over European ones, but at a cost to the Danish government and taxpayer. However, they note that in addition to narrow national interests (Garrett and Weingast 1993:204) ideas have also been considered important in the context of European integration.
Wendt (2000:166; 1999) acknowledges that material issues have effects that are independent of ideas. For example, they can impose physical limits as to what is possible, and they can help to define what the physical limits of possibility are. He provides two examples from World War II. He sees Germany’s invasion of Poland as being the result of ideas, but being made possible by the material advantage of Germany. The second example is of ideas overcoming the limitation which physical constraints should logically have represented, in that the Polish cavalry charged the German tanks. Smith (2000:151) describes Wendt as wanting to defend a thin or moderate constructivism both against those who would reject constructivism outright as postmodernism and those who feel it needs to be taken further. Wendt’s approach can hence be seen as spanning both that of national interests, and the focus on ideas and norms of the social constructivists. National interests which have assumed an importance at the EU level have often been related to material issues, such as the benefits or costs of particular policies, the impact of trade agreements or legislation on industries and employment, and more abstract issues like the extent to which EU arrangements might undermine social cohesion.
Ideas, Norms, and Social Constructions
THIS PART OF THE ARTICLE CONSIDERS THE THEORETICAL CONTEXT IN WHICH THE ISSUE OF EU ENLARGEMNET AND INTEGRATION ARISE. One of the issues here is whether the adoption of a social constructivist approach as opposed to a rationalist one makes a difference in the consequent understanding of issues, explanations of these, and the importance attached to different factors.
Certain European social constructivists have stressed the importance of ideas and norms and social constructivism in the context of European integration (Friis 1998; Diez 1999; Marcussen et al. 1999). In Marcussen et al. (1999) a strongly constructivist position is taken which argues that for instance the relative lack of Europeanisation of the United Kingdom compared to Germany and to a lesser extent France is due to the failure of political elites to adequately manipulate national identity in favour of this. Europeanisation is taken here as meaning both the adaptation of institutions and culture towards common European as opposed to national standards, and a willingness to accept such changes. Ladrech (1994:69) saw it as essentially a process of political change, but it has come to imply wider processes than this. Marcussen et al. (1999:625-7) implicitly reject the idea that national and popular attitudes towards European integration and Europeanisation are or should be influenced by the perceived or experienced costs and benefits of this process or of integration into Europe. They say that they are trying to work out the way in which interest and identity interact rather than promoting a conflictual account of their impact (Marcusseen et al. 1999:672). However, Moravcsik (1999:670), in his evaluation of this and other contributions, sees them as attempting to rewrite the history of integration on the basis of ideational shifts, as opposed to the series of economic opportunities identified by most other analysts.
In doing so, Marcussen et al. (1999:625-7) could be considered as constructing an implicitly negative view of resistance to Europeanisation in the United Kingdom by associating it with historical factors, past eras, and resistance to change, and ignoring possible economic and social explanations. The authors do not mention the strong cultural ties that the United Kingdom has outside Europe, or of the extent to which there is identity regionally- and class-based as in "two nations". The absence of such a discussion is perhaps surprising when the article is compared to an earlier sole-authored paper (Risse 1998) by one of its authors which focuses more closely on EMU. In this earlier publication (Risse 1998:20), the author acknowledged the paper’s reliance on elite discourse analysis and stated that ‘this paper’s central weakness is probably its exclusive focus on elite discourses.’ In it, Risse (1998:9) mentions the United Kingdom’s cultural ties outside Europe, though he dismisses them with the comment that ‘national myths about colonial history and the special relationship with the United States’ preserve those long-gone "glorious days of the British empire".
Marcussen et al. (1999:614) argue that there has been little Europeanisation of Anglo-Saxon exceptionalism over the past fifty years. This article and an earlier one, Risse (1998), adopt a historical institutionalist perspective which appears to accord no importance to material national interests. A critical view of the consequences of this is that as a result the British are written off as being in effect Colonel Blimps still attached to a colonial past, as resistance to Europeanisation is ascribed only to norms and ideas and not to more material factors.
In reality, British interests in terms of additions to national welfare have continued to require closer global links rather than Europeanisation, although it might be argued that this is itself the result of national and policy choices. British success stories have in numerous cases continued to be based on non-Europeanised characteristics. These successes include larger Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inward and outward flows than any other member-state, so that the United Kingdom’s stock of investment as at 1991 amounted to ECU 153.3 billion of inwards investment out of a European countries total of ECU 478.4 billion, while its stock of external investment was ECU 163.0 billion out of a European total of ECU 549.7 billion (Dent 1997:270). They also include the United Kingdom’s high rating in, and at times dominance of, international popular music (Kallionemi 1998; Mlinar and Trček 1998) 3 and its position as a significant supplier of tertiary education to the world market. These situations bring both financial benefits and global cultural influence, and indicate alternative aims and influences to those of Europeanisation. The focus in both Risse (1998) and Marcussen et al. (1999) on history as a source of identity and of British resistance to Europeanisation may therefore lead to erroneous interpretations and value judgements. This is because it ignores "cool Britannia" and the extent to which modern popular British identity draws strength from national achievements in the global arena in areas such as popular music, fashion, and film and television programming, including the substantial use made of British actors and characters in Hollywood products. The danger arises that if the history of integration is seen only as a set of ideational shifts, the concerns of ordinary people over their own welfare, wage levels and employment prospects could be seen as something which may be disregarded, and emphasis instead placed fully on the views of elites and their ability to influence opinions.
The above example illustrates the problems which can arise from focusing exclusively on ideas and norms in an attempt to explain resistance to Europeanisation. Reference to more material considerations may allow a better identification of explanatory factors, given that for example (Greenhalgh 1998:84) the overseas earnings of British popular music exceed those of the steel industry. Consideration of current national interests, allowing these to be identified rather than re-defined, appears to have allowed New Labour to overcome the ‘problems with national identity constructions’ which Risse (1998:6) asserts it has had.
Whether it is ideas or material considerations that are considered to be legitimate reasons for the slowness of Europeanisation or resistance to it could be of some consequence for the CEE applicant-countries. For example, Behnke (1998:12) is critical of what he describes as Democratic Peace theory in which the West is the sole accepted site of civilisation and culture and which posits a hierarchical relationship between the West and the countries that are to be recipients of its values and culture.
Diez (1999:598) argues that the role of language has been largely neglected in studies of integration in Europe. As Smith (1999:686) states, the form of constructivism Diez proposes is more persuasive than others published in the same collection, including that of Marcussen et al. (1999). One of the points made by Diez is that the different terms used by member-states for the then EC, which included Common Market in the United Kingdom in the 1960s but Gemeinschaft or Community in Germany, reflected differing national constructions of the EC. The words used for the entity also influenced actual constructions of it.
Pierson (1996) describes historical institutionalism as focusing upon norms and ideas. In this perspective, integration is a path-dependent process producing a ‘fragmented but discernible multi-tiered European polity’ (Pierson 1996:123) The historical institutionalist view is seen as being in contrast with the intergovernmentalist one of the EU as interstate bargaining. It is argued that the intergovernmentalist view focuses on the "grand bargains" or treaties while historical institutionalism is better able to take into account day-to-day policy making and change.
Friis (1998) appears to accept that national interests can be important in the determination of national attitudes towards the EU’s eastwards enlargement, but stresses that in practice countries may not know what these are. She argues that the majority of governments participating in the December 1997 Luxembourg summit on eastern enlargement of the EU entered this phase while they were still seeking to establish what their preferences were. Eastern enlargement is very much an "unknown" and hence it was possible for such a situation to arise, but this is not the case for the general run of policy problems and areas. Where the latter are concerned, governments are able to use data on trade, industrial production, employment and so forth to determine where the national interest lies. In addition, governments receive representations from interested parties and groups which assist them in determining where political as opposed to purely economic or social interests may lie. Political interests may reflect the need to assist particular groups, regions or sectors in order to reward political support or to court it.
Davis (1999) defines the historical institutionalist approach as one which stresses that actors may not always, or even often, be aware of what their own self-interests are. This is considered to be due to the situation that their identities and interests change over time. Friis’ (1998) position is hence consistent with historical institutionalism.
However, there are many examples of actions taken due to the motivational influence of norms and ideas in fact being consistent with self-interest. German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer told the German parliament that the full achievement of European integration is not only a task or burden (Verpflichtung) for Germany, but is even more so something which is in the interests of the future of Germany (Fischer 1999:5). 4 Hedetoft (1997:251) sees German "moral supranationality" as being consistent with the German national interest, serving to guarantee a greater German input into European decision-making. Similarly, Davis (1998) shows how Germany’s pursuit of aid under the EU’s Phare scheme for Poland was consistent with German interests because expenditure was significantly directed towards German-Polish border areas.
The area of media and culture is one in which considerable rhetoric has been devoted to justifying measures in terms of norms and ideas, and the vague concept of "protection of culture" 5 . An outcome of this has been the requirement that applicant-countries for membership apply 51 percent European content television programming rules (Field 2000c). The self-interest nature of such requirements is evident from the conflict which resulted over this with respect to Albania’s application for membership of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Albania is not yet a formal applicant for EU membership, but applies rules with regard to imports of television programming and films such as will be required as a condition of membership. Its membership of the WTO was blocked for months by protests by the United States and counter-disputes from the EU over the application of such rules. 6
Requirements for EU membership which relate to human rights and the treatment of minorities can clearly be seen as reflecting norms and beliefs which are based on principles. However, when the issue of the Romany in the applicant-countries is considered, for example, it becomes obvious that the issue is also one of self-interest where the EU’s existing members are concerned. Firstly, some of the EU’s member-states, for example France, Greece and to some extent Germany, do not necessarily always recognise their own minorities as specific and separate groups which hence require special treatment. The Romany are a disadvantaged minority in most of the applicant-countries. Their attachment to the territory and national identities of the countries concerned tends to be low, reflecting their situation as a transnational minority, and their level of education and training limited. As a consequence, there has been a tendency for groups of Romany to move westwards into EU countries and seek political asylum. An exodus of Romany from Slovakia resulted in the United Kingdom reintroducing visa requirements for Slovaks in October 1998. Similar situations led to the reintroduction of visa requirements for Slovaks by Iceland in 1998 and Finland, Norway and Denmark in 1999. 7
Ideas, Norms and National Interests
THIS SECTION OF THE ARTICLE CONSIDERS HOW THERE MAY BE A CLOSE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN IDEAS, NORMS AND INTERESTS ON THE ONE HAND AND MORE MATERIAL NATIONAL INTERESTS ON THE OTHER WHEN IT COMES TO THE EU’S EASTERN ENLARGEMENT. As already indicated, norms such as the need to guarantee and defend human rights, to aim for greater equity and hence provide financial assistance to the applicant-countries because of their relative poverty, and to protect European culture from outside influences, are all norms which involve concrete benefits for some or all of the existing member-states.
An important idea or norm behind enlargement is that of a "moral obligation" on the part of the West to help the countries of CEE. Coffey (1995:96-97) sees this as arising partly from the West’s earlier encouragement to them to overthrow communism. Put simply, it could be said to reflect the situation that self-interest encourages the rewarding of those who have been of assistance, since this may be deemed to encourage others to be of assistance in the future.
Such norms and ideas are not on their own justifications and motivations for moves towards enlargement. One of the interests driving enlargement is business, and its desire to obtain the maximum security and profitability for its investments in CEE. By 1996 German companies had invested over DEM 12 billion (USD 5 billion) in CEE and had over 200,000 on the payroll there (Jungnickel 1996). Germany has been the main EU investor in the CEE countries, competing closely with the United States as the main source of investment overall. Current FDI levels in the CEE applicant-countries appear to be very roughly around USD 100 billion, the greater part of which has come from the EU (Field 1999b; Field and Goodman 1999:230-1). The desire of German business for security and profitability for its investment in CEE has resulted in strong support for early enlargement from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the main representative party of business in Germany. As Chancellor of Germany and head of a CDU government, Helmut Kohl mentioned the year 2000 to the Polish parliament as a prospective entry date for Poland into the EU, though he had to later back down and claim that he had only said that by then the Poles would know their prospective date of entry (The Economist 1995). This backing down was presumably because he had received neither general German approval, nor that of the EU, for such an assurance with regard to the date of entry.
O’Brennan (1999) suggests that the situation where moves towards eastwards enlargement are proceeding, even though it is not clear that they are in the interests of the existing EU states, demonstrates that normative principles are having an influence here. However, it could also be argued that these moves reflect the influence of the business lobby and its interests, and its ability to persuade states to follow courses of action that may be contrary to the best interests of the population in general. This ability tends to vary according to which state is under consideration, and whether the party or parties in power are representative of business rather than labour. However, in Germany both the previous CDU government, which may be regarded as representing business interests especially, and the present Socialist (SPD)/Greens coalition with its closer ties to labour and environmentalists, support eastwards enlargement even though a majority of the population does not.
With regard to the applicant-countries themselves, the main justification for membership is the self-interested pursuit of better living standards, such as has been their hope and goal ever since the collapse of communism, as indicated in Ezkenazi and Nikolov (1996). The interests of applicant-countries in achieving this focus strongly on a number of major issues and areas, some of which appear to be strongly contested by the EU.
One of the most contentious of these is the introduction of the free movement of labour, as is required under the provisions of the Treaty of Rome. It seems likely that a derogation will be given from this for a period after enlargement takes place. The EP has indicated that it is seeking that such a derogation be imposed (Shelley 2000). The anticipated difficulty with the free movement of labour provisions is that these would lead to a flow of labour and persons westwards, although the impact will vary from state to state (Field 1996). This would tend to drive wages down for less skilled and unskilled positions, for example in the garment industry (Field 1998a). It would also tend to increase pressure on welfare expenditures on education, low-cost or subsidised housing facilities, and income assistance for lower income families. There is a risk that enlargement will reduce social and political cohesion within the EU (Holman 1998:2). The budgetary implications for EU countries could be negative, while the additional taxation revenue would be outweighed by the additional cost of providing social services. The influx of workers might compensate a little for the increasing burden of the number of retired people relative to that of workers in the EU. However, the relatively low levels of investment in the education and training of most of the workers who would currently wish to move into the EU from the applicant-countries suggests that their long-term total cost to EU welfare state systems will outweigh their contribution to them.
Wage differentials remain high, with wages in Poland being around a fifth of those in next-door Germany. There is a tendency for official forecasts and estimates of labour flows to be based on purchasing power parity (PPP) comparisons, not comparisons of wage rates. However, there will still be a strong incentive for parties who are without family ties or able to leave dependants behind to make comparisons on the basis of wage rates, not these rates deflated for differences in purchasing power. This is because individuals can to some extent choose to live in poor-quality or crowded accommodation in the receiving country, yet make outgoings on for example family expenses or property purchase in the low-wage and low-cost country. They may hence see movement as desirable, even if there is no apparent difference in wages once these have been deflated by the relative costs of living, as indicated by Field (1996). 8
There is a class perspective within the EU with respect to the application of the free movement of labour provisions. Lower-level workers are concerned about the impact on wage levels and competition for jobs. They, and welfare recipients, are concerned about the impact on the availability of social services and the provision of welfare. The converse perspective is that business views a reduction in real wage levels and greater competition in the labour market as desirable. It might also be argued that an influx of relatively young people from CEE will mitigate the current greying of the workforce in the EU. However, whether it in fact assists in lessening the fiscal and economic burden of this will depend upon relative wages earned and taxes paid compared to total demands on state welfare and insurance systems (Field 1998b:7-9, 20). It is not therefore a foregone conclusion that an influx of CEE labour would reduce the overall burden if it reduces the age profile.
Agriculture and the associated issue of sales of land are also issues on which there is a clear divergence of interests between the EU and the CEE applicants. Agriculture constitutes a problem area from a number of standpoints. While less than 5 percent of the workforce of the existing EU is employed in agriculture, a greater percentage is employed by it in all the applicant-countries. This proportion ranges from less than 10 percent in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary to a quarter or more in Poland and Romania. In Poland the agricultural sector was only partly collectivised under communism, resulting in many owner-occupier smallholders who are reluctant to move elsewhere to find alternative employment or to see any reduction in agricultural subsidies. The applicant-countries have substantial capacity to increase output in agriculture, given their land areas and relative lack of inputs to date. This was recognised at a relatively early stage of the post-communist transition and of EU membership negotiations by studies such as that of Leetmaa, Madell and Smith (1997). The EU responded to the situation through cuts in the support prices of major commodities, with income compensation to mitigate the impact.
Agriculture is a sector with significant political influence in most of the prospective new member-states, through for example minority parties in parliament and governing coalitions and through its influence on majority parties, as has also been the case in the EU. For example, in Hungary the Independent Smallholders’ Party has been a significant political force since it gained 48 seats in the 386-seat parliament, in view of the 148 seats of the winning party, Fidesz, and the 134 seats of the reformed communists. Its actions in coalition government with Fidesz have included overspending the agricultural budget and attempting to ban all dairy imports (The Economist 1999). Its initiatives resulted in the institution of a subsidy scheme for smaller-scale producers and a ban on private individual’s land holdings of over 300 ha. Fewer than three percent of producers have holdings in excess of 10 ha.
The extent to which political influence is exercised by these farm lobbies will depend upon the influence they are able to wield in the countries concerned, and in turn upon the influence given by the new EU voting arrangements and weights to these countries. The reduction of a quarter made by the latter clearly reduces their ability to influence policies and decisions in the EU compared with the situation if no changes had been made. The new arrangements also reduce the extent to which acting as a single bloc can allow them to influence legislative changes.
In response to pressures from the agricultural lobby, the Hungarian government sought a derogation from the EU which would allow it to maintain the ban on land sales to non-Hungarians for some ten years after EU entry. Land prices in Poland and Hungary remain much lower than in Germany and most of the EU. However, the EU seems unlikely to agree to any restriction on land sales. Sales of property appear to have been a less controversial issue than those of agricultural land.
The prospective new member-states have for their part had problems with EU subsidised exports of agricultural products flooding markets, and with the situation that their products have had difficulty competing on home markets in some areas where competing EU products have offered greater variety, longer shelf life, more attractive packaging and so forth.
The question of whether income assistance will be extended to agriculture in the CEE countries has become conflictual. Commissioner Franz Fischler had earlier argued against this, in view of the costs and because CEE farmers have had major support price reductions which make such compensation justifiable. Pressure from Poland appeared to lead to a softening of the EU’s line on this issue. However, the EP has indicated that it would not support CEE farmers being made eligible for the full income assistance and compensation payments (Shelley 2000).
Class, Gender and Other Perspectives
IN PRACTICE, THE POSITIONS OF BOTH EXISTING EU COUNTRIES AS WELL AS THE APPLICANT-STATES ARE ALSO DETERMINED BY FACTORS OTHER THAN NATIONAL INTERESTS, SUCH AS NORMS AND IDEAS AT THE LEVEL OF THE MEMBER-STATE. These include issues that cut across member and applicant-states, like class and gender.
Class is an important perspective given the situation that it is EU and Western business which is investing in the applicant-countries. Holman and van der Pijl (1996) and the Amsterdam school view the European "bourgeoisie" as seeing new opportunities from enlargement, and hence supporting it. There is a conflict between the interests of business, which seeks early enlargement and introduction of the free movement of labour provisions, and that part of the EU’s population which would be negatively affected by an influx of workers from CEE, for example the lower-paid and welfare recipients.
Gender is another cross-cutting perspective. Differences in gender equality, and the level of commitment to this, have been raised by feminists and for example the EP’s Women’s Committee as a factor to be considered in approving admission to the EU (European Voice 2000). Communist regimes promoted the involvement of women in the workforce and in the party and hence politics.
However, there are now lower levels of representation of women in the applicant-countries in politics than in the EU, except with respect to certain member-states such as France and Italy, and the post-communist transition has tended to be disadvantageous with respect to the position of women in the workforce and in areas of society in general. The average proportion of female representation in the national parliaments of the twelve applicant-countries for EU membership was 10.5 percent in 1999, well below the EU average of 18.6 per cent, which only Lithuania and Estonia exceeded. There has been a substantial decline in the level of female representation in the parliaments of the applicant-countries during the post-communist transition, with the level in Hungary for example falling to 8 percent from an earlier level of 30 percent in 1980 (Hunter 2000). The EP’s Women’s Committee has called upon the applicant-countries to appoint ombudsmen to deal with their poor records on gender equality, which is seen as being an attitudinal problem as well as a legal one (European Voice 2000).
Gender equality is an ideal of the EU, and a norm achieved in some member-states. Self-interest makes it a concern of women in the EU, and especially in those member-states with relatively high levels of gender equality such as Denmark, Sweden and Finland, as they have more to lose in terms of their relative status. In an enlarged EU in which the overall situation of women is less equal than the present one it is very likely that there would be less pressure to improve the situation of women.
Conclusions
REFORMS AND CHANGES TO THE EU’S DECISION-MAKING SYSTEM WERE MADE BY THE NICE SUMMIT, AND CONSTITUTED A NECESSARY PRE-REQUISITE FOR EASTWARDS ENLARGEMENT. This is because of the prospective impact of the previous arrangements in an EU of twenty-seven to thirty-two or more member-states, even if the first eastwards enlargement is to include only those countries best prepared for membership. Failure to change the weighting system of votes would have given the prospective CEE new members a greater disproportionate influence on decision-making relative to their population size, and possibly made enlargement less acceptable to EU electorates.
The new member-states are likely to at least partly adopt the norm that they should not allow the smooth functioning of the EU’s business to be impeded by their desires to further national concerns. However, this is unlikely to prevent the pursuit of national aims by the new members in areas of particular importance such as agriculture. Commonality of interests might encourage the new members to act as a bloc on at least some issues, for example agriculture and the free movement of labour.
While ideas and norms are important in encouraging such steps as eastwards enlargement of the EU, these often go hand in hand with national interests and are not in conflict with them. Where this is not the case, the norms or ideas being pursued may in fact reflect class or sectoral interests rather than a national interest as such, for example those of German business or of the agricultural sector. In conclusion, it is difficult to separate norms and ideas as motivational factors from national interests, and where they can be this may reflect the influence of specific sectors or classes rather than an intentional pursuit of norms and ideas which transcends national interests, as the Amsterdam School would argue and as has arguably been the case with the strong support of the CDU in Germany for an early enlargement. Ideas and material interests hence reflect two independent but valid views of the EU "reality", between which there are often connections.
Both views need to be taken into account in considering attitudes towards Europeanisation and integration, and support for or resistance to these. There is a need to ensure that resistance to these processes is not erroneously attributed to historical or other factors as a result of only one of these views being taken into account.
The changes to the decision-making system leave a number of issues still to be resolved before enlargement can proceed, including the free movement of labour, freeing up of sales of agricultural land, minority rights, and gender equality. Whether the first of these continues to be considered problematic will depend upon relative growth rates and the level of economic prosperity achieved in the applicant-countries in comparison to the EU. The others require changes in the policies and legislation of some of the applicant-countries. One of the difficulties here is that the standards sought are not necessarily equivalent to those applied by the existing members, but this is not to say that they will be relaxed.
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Endnotes
Note* Heather Field, PhD is Senior Lecturer in Contemporary European Studies at the School of Humanities, Faculty of Arts, Griffith University, Nathan, Queensland 4111, Australia. E-mail: H.Field@mailbox.gu.edu.au. Back.
Note 1: This did not involve the addition of a new state to the then European Communities (EC), but simply an extension of the EC’s territory. The difficulties experienced with the incorporation of East Germany into the FRG are a cautionary tale in terms of the possible difficulties of the EU’s eastwards enlargement. However, they have also been due to a currency union being undertaken at an exchange rate that would depress economic activity in the East, and to the extension of FRG sectoral minimum wages and social security benefits to the former GDR. Back.
Note 2: It is unlikely that there will be progress towards Turkish membership in the foreseeable future, given that the question of Cyprus and Turkish troops in the northern half caused major problems even for the negotiations over any partnership relationship with the EU (Kassandra’s Notebook 2000). Ukraine holds EU membership as a long-term goal (Taylor 2000), but poverty and corruption remain impediments to this. As recognised at the Nice summit, enlargement even to thirty-two member-states constitutes a significant challenge for the EU’s decision-making system. Back.
Note 3: Of a total of 210 big popular music hits in the past twenty years, 90 (43 percent) were British, while 83 (40 percent) were American, with 37 hits or 17 percent coming from elsewhere (Mlinar and Trček 1998:87). Back.
Note 4: Die Vollendung der Europäischen Einheit is nicht nur eine historische Verpflichtung; sie liegt vielmehr auch im Interesse der Zukunft unseres Landes.’ Back.
Note 5: For example, as president of the EP Culture Committee, Luciana Castellina stated that a vote in favour of tighter quotas on television programming imports represented ‘… not a victory over the United States but a victory for our own culture’ (Buonadonna 1996). After stepping down as president, former European Commission president Jacques Delors said that the electronic media in Europe needed ‘incentives and patronage’ (Delors 1997:1). Back.
Note 6: Albania succeeded in becoming the 138th member of the WTO on 11 September 2000 (Transitions online 2000), but the United States’ concern is that these rules, and their application by prospective members of the EU, reduce the market for United States television programming and films in Europe. Back.
Note 7: The situation of a group of Romany from Hungary which has moved to Strasbourg to apply for asylum and lodge a case against Hungary with the Court of Human Rights there (Kosztolanyi 2000) illustrates the problem. It is unlikely that this group, the Zamoly Romany, will be granted asylum, as this would imply that Hungary is failing to meet the human rights standards required for admission to the EU. In their case, the bulldozing of their substandard and dangerous housing had resulted in the group being accommodated in the local community centre and then wooden shacks, and getting into conflict with local people, resulting in the death of one of the latter. Earlier promises from the authorities that houses would be purchased for them elsewhere were not honoured. Proposals that the stone housing which had in the meantime been erected for the Romany in Zamoly be sold, and a subsidy added to the proceeds to allow housing to be purchased elsewhere, were refused by the authorities. As the group’s spokesperson indicated, it is not a matter of indifference to the EU or in its interests to receive a population movement of 600,000 to 700,000 relatively poorly educated individuals (Kosztolanyi 2000:8). From the Romany point of view, there is a fear that the free movement of labour provisions may be restricted in the enlarged EU so as to apply to qualified people but not the relatively unskilled Romany. Back.
Note 8: Existing studies and projections tend to be based on purchasing power parity (PPP) comparisons, in other words on wages net of the difference in living costs between the two locations. Such a methodology may be reasonable when assessing the attractiveness of say emigration to the United States or Australia. It is not a valid methodology where the labour supplying and receiving countries are close to each other, or where there is a tradition of breadwinners leaving dependants behind and taking up employment in other locations or countries. Back.