If the EU is to succeed, national referenda on European issues must not be allowed. As experience has shown once again with the Irish episode, and as I will attempt to argue, national referenda on EU issues have an extremely corrosive effect which, if not checked, will ultimatey lead to EU's own demise.I start out with Euroliberal's proposal below. I found it a very stimulating idea. It is no secret that I like to read Euroliberal on EU and several other issues. Behind his colourful language, he seems to me very knowledgeable on European issues which he can express with extreme clarity of thought. He is most likely a jurist from the old Coimbra Law school: you can disagree with him because you can never claim you did not understand him.
It is clear to me, though, that his proposal regarding EU referenda whose originality he does not claim for himself is based on the assumption, and only makes sense under the assumption, that people see themselves primarily as EU citizens, rather than as citizens of several different countries. For only then it seems reasonable to organize referenda on EU issues along the lines that are used to organize referenda on national issues.
Yet the European Union has not been able so far to make the idea of European citizenship prevail over that of national citizenship in people's minds - as the Irish referendum clearly shows. Furthermore, the political idea implicit in the EU project is, for the time being at least, that of a Union of states, not that of a Union of citizens, that is, of a state itself. It then follows that democracy at the European decision-making process means a democracy of states, not a democracy of citizens, thus excluding any form of direct democracy such as referenda.
In each country citizens elect their governments and national parliaments. It is these representative bodies that should participate, to the exclusion of citizens themselves, in the EU decision-making process through some form of democratic rule (v.g., one state one vote, or votes being proportional to the population of each state). The important point here is that there should be no room for direct citizens' intervention in this process. If citizens of a particular country are willing to affect EU decision-making their only way is to elect a different government or national parliament of their own.
The EU has often been accused of being some kind of a politicians' club. I strongly believe it has to be so, in the sense that its matters must be decided by elected politicians only, if the EU is to survive and be effective. I do not know whether or not it is feasible to negotiate a pact or adopt a rule among EU member-countries so as to make it illegal for any country to submit to national referenda any sort of EU issues. What seems clear to me is that if the EU continues to allow national referenda or any other form of direct democracy to permeate its political decision-making process, it is doomed to paralysis and ultimately failure.
Yet the European Union has not been able so far to make the idea of European citizenship prevail over that of national citizenship in people's minds - as the Irish referendum clearly shows. Furthermore, the political idea implicit in the EU project is, for the time being at least, that of a Union of states, not that of a Union of citizens, that is, of a state itself. It then follows that democracy at the European decision-making process means a democracy of states, not a democracy of citizens, thus excluding any form of direct democracy such as referenda.
In each country citizens elect their governments and national parliaments. It is these representative bodies that should participate, to the exclusion of citizens themselves, in the EU decision-making process through some form of democratic rule (v.g., one state one vote, or votes being proportional to the population of each state). The important point here is that there should be no room for direct citizens' intervention in this process. If citizens of a particular country are willing to affect EU decision-making their only way is to elect a different government or national parliament of their own.
The EU has often been accused of being some kind of a politicians' club. I strongly believe it has to be so, in the sense that its matters must be decided by elected politicians only, if the EU is to survive and be effective. I do not know whether or not it is feasible to negotiate a pact or adopt a rule among EU member-countries so as to make it illegal for any country to submit to national referenda any sort of EU issues. What seems clear to me is that if the EU continues to allow national referenda or any other form of direct democracy to permeate its political decision-making process, it is doomed to paralysis and ultimately failure.
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