Europe is in crisis – this is something not only political elites and professional observers agree upon. The consciousness of this crisis has by now reached broad swathes of the general public. The symptoms are clear: mass protests against governments whose austerity policies result in deep cuts for the middle and lower classes; capital flight to supposedly safe havens such as Switzerland and, among the wealthy, a shift in investment towards real estate; the revival of national stereotypes in a search for scapegoats to explain the fact that wealthier EU nations are having to support their poorer cousins; and, last but not least, a spreading fatigue regarding Europe, if not a rejection of any kind of European political community altogether.
Those are, as mentioned, the symptoms of the crisis – yet what is at its core? Is it a crisis of debt, a banking, a Euro crisis? Whatever the answer may be, all concerned agree that to overcome this crisis it will be necessary to reduce economic imbalances. Put under pressure by the budget crises of some EU countries, EU institutions as well as governments of member countries have rather reacted one-sidedly by imposing increased budgetary controls on EU members as well as by greater co-ordination of economic and budgetary policies. However, no matter what anti-crisis policies may be put into place, hidden beneath their purely technical, economic surface there will be momentous political decisions. Already today, the conditions connected with the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) have sparked social conflicts in some member states that are, on occasion, highly polarising – and this will continue to be the case. Such conflicts will inevitably become transnational in character, thus heightening the peril that the economic crisis will turn into acrimonious battles over financial resources between European peoples.
Europe’s democracy issue
The diversity of historical experiences, political cultures and, last but not least, economic frameworks within the EU can only be made productive through political discourse – and here ‘political’ has to mean ‘democratic.’ Democracy in Europe is predicated on the existence of institutions, processes, and a moral atmosphere that enable and encourage citizens in member countries to debate on how they, who are at once foreigners and citizens within a multi-national framework, want to structure their political order. At the beginning of the 21st century, this is the single most important issue facing European democracy.
The preconditions thereof do not need to be invented; they already exist, if only to a certain extent. The most important among them is that the members of the EU’s different countries are citizens – and that in a twofold sense: As nationals of their respective EU member countries they are citizens of democratic states; at the same time they are EU citizens – and not just actors in a free market – thus forming a supranational union of citizens. According to Eurobarometer’s latest poll, almost two-thirds of all citizens of EU member states think of themselves as EU citizens. However, among the lower social classes, this percentage is below 50%. To them, the EU’s open borders appear to threaten their social status as guaranteed by national welfare mechanisms. Such concerns should make us more conscious of the fact that within Europe civic and social solidarity are inextricably linked.
Today, these twofold roots of citizenship are confronted with a crisis situation in which the effort to establish economic governance within the EU and tight austerity policies in the member states are subject to political controversy within member countries as well as transnationally. What had sustained European integration for a long time – the “permissive consensus” of European peoples, as proposed in the past by political and administrative elites – is no longer able to play this role and has given way to an equally hazy, growing sense of discontent. The Eurobarometer polls of the last two years attest to this clear albeit not dramatic change. During this time period, the percentage of EU citizens who trust the Union has declined from 48% to 41%. In not less then ten countries, among them the heavyweights France, Great Britain, and Germany, the doubters outnumber those who belief in the EU. It is no surprise then that for the last EU parliamentary elections in 2009 voter turnout was just 43% – less than for any national election in member countries.
Avoiding catastrophic failure
All of this conveys the fundamental meaning of the term crisis: A crisis is the culmination of a situation of inadequate order to a point where it becomes necessary to make decisions towards radical change; it is a moment of uncertainty, of success or failure. Constitutions can face situations that make fundamental transformation necessary in order to avoid catastrophic failure. For this, US constitutional expert Bruce Ackerman has coined the term “constitutional moment,” and such a constitutional moment arrives once a novel situation forces us to put a new issue onto the political agenda. Today’s issue is the politicisation of European democracy. It is driven not only by the material sacrifices already exacted or looming as means to counter the crisis, it is also driven by the growing tendency of establishing non-treaty structures – that is: extra-constitutional structures – under the aegis of a French-German directorate.
Today, for the EU it is less possible than ever before to solely define itself via its economic benefits. The Union will have to politicise the economic crisis and encourage its citizens to become an active part of a solution. For this it needs the courage to transform the competition between political alternatives – the cornerstone of every vibrant democracy – into a European phenomenon. This will require political spaces and institutions enabling debate on European issues and a battle of ideas that will empower citizens to participate in political decisions. In order to achieve this, we do not have to start from scratch. There are numerous proposals for institutional innovations: greater participatory and control rights for the EU Parliament and national parliaments; greater direct democracy; the formation of European political parties; and transnational ballots for European elections in order to boost the emergence of a truly European public.
Political approaches that ignore the European dimension of crisis management fall not only behind the European political project but they are also doomed to failure. While it is true that greater European democracy will not immediately solve the EU’s present crisis, it is also true that without greater democracy it will remain utterly intractable.
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Ulrich K. Preuß is Professor Emeritus at the Hertie School of Governance and Freie Universität Berlin.