LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Tausch on Pierre Moscovici's "How hubris is leading the EU to its nemesis"
Summer 2009
Sir,
Articles such as Pierre Moscovici’s suggest the time has come to offer a bold way out of the European Union’s current impasse. So why not go for a fully-fledged democratic United States of Europe as a first step towards global democracy? Offering such an easy solution to a complex problem might be unpopular in many quarters, but the authors of the U.S. Constitution of 1787 had already resolved the essence of the crisis presently afflicting the EU. How? By realising that you need two parliaments – not one – to bring together the smaller and larger components of a federation.
The perennial quid pro quo of European decision-making since the 1980s would have been entirely unnecessary if the EU had been bold enough to consider creating a real democratic federation. The present European Parliament could become the future European House of Representatives, and the present Council an elected European Senate. Voting for the House of Representatives would be based on population weight, while the Senate would be composed of two elected representatives from each member state. Senators could hold office for six years, with one third of them being elected every two years. With a clear separation of powers and an elected European President at the helm, such a Europe would gain the democratic quality of the U.S.
I am under no illusions that such political medicine would be hard to swallow, especially in countries like France which has always been more centralist than many other political systems around the globe. But please tell me – why not try it, after so many debacles since the 1980s?
|
You need to be logged in to rate and comment on articles.
Click the log in or register button in the top right corner of this page.
|
|
|
| |