EUROPE, A SUPER STATE OR A STATE OF MIND?

Turkey is beginning to negotiate membership of the European Union. Why should we care? No region has had as much impact upon the world over the past 1,000 years than Europe, that creative expansionist two fingers that stick out of the land mass, the fist, of Asia.

In less than 100 months, the European Union has expanded by 10 new members. A new multinational currency has successfully been introduced. Europe has the first-ever multinational Parliament directly elected by the people. Remarkably, leaders have agreed to a European-wide constitution, which has yet to be agreed by member states. A huge hurdle. Half of all National laws now originate in Brussels, the ‘capital’ of this new Europe. Europe now has a larger population and GNP than the United States of America, an economic giant but a political and military midget..

Last week, history took a great step after hesitating for over 40 years. Turkey has at last been given the green light. During the past 4 decades of shadow negotiations, the EU has demanded radical changes to Turkish law and customs. This has slowly resulted in improvements in human and property rights. The required political and economic reforms necessary to raise Turkey’s standards and harmonise its laws and norms will be painful. Most don’t expect the formal negotiations to conclude in a decade. Turkey has a population of nearly 70 million, 18% live below the poverty line, 33% of the workforce work in agriculture, the average income is not even a quarter of the average income in Europe. The genius and generosity of the European model is how the rich nations of Europe have extended a financial hand to the poorer nations who, upon joining, receive massive adjustment subsidies. Before joining the EU, Ireland was one of the poorer marginalized countries in the region, now it’s one of the richest. Same is true of Spain and Portugal a decade ago. All have prospered with the subsidies, advantages, privileges and opportunities in a wider, free European market. Turkey’s accession will be costly, many billions of dollars will flow east. Countries that have been net winners, that is, got more money from Brussels than they pay in, are nervous. One country at any time can veto membership, or more likely, keep pushing up demands and stall negotiations. Turkey’s membership opens a deeper primitive fear, Turkey is 99.8% Muslim. Some Christian religious and political leaders, dismayed that the proposed new European Union constitution made no mention of their Christian heritage, have been blunt about a Christian Europe being swamped by 70 million Muslim Turks. France has 6 million Muslims, and 2 million Turks already live in Germany. These fears run deep, centuries-old, back to the siege of Vienna, with the dreaded Turks at the gates of Christendom. The great European project, its wider membership and deeper institutions, must be agreed to by all Parliaments, or in some places, by referendum. Revolution by evolution. Turkey’s membership could help both sides of the argument. The argument is between those who see a European super state, a United States of Europe, and those who see Europe as just a free trade arrangement with weak, overarching political institutions that have no real deliberate power, a sort of United Nations of Europe.

Turkey’s membership, with eventually the second largest number of members of the European Parliament and a bigger voice in the election of a proposed European President than the U.K. or France, is curiously welcomed by some Euro-sceptics. This, they say, will stop the political integration of Europe but build a wider economic union. Turkey’s membership is supported by those who see it as a bridge to Islam, with Turkey as a model for a democratic secular Islamic state. Her formidable military power and active membership of NATO is a positive. Over 70% of Europeans would like a future Europe to be a military power to balance the U.S. Demographics point to the EU becoming an old people’s home .... Italy’s population will shrink by 35% in 50 years. Turkey is a very young country, there’s a fortunate synergy. History does not stand still, ten years is a very short time in the scheme and scale of things. Just preparing to apply for EU membership has resulted in better governance, better economic, social and environmental outcomes in Turkey. Already Turkey’s risk premiums on debt have fallen sharply on news of this progress. Good luck to the Turks and the new Europe, it will impact on us all.