Ideas on Europe Blog

These days, my bedtime reading consists of books on the EU referendum: The Brexit Club, Bad Boys of Brexit, Unleashing Demons and (currently) All Out War. All have provided another level of understanding to what happened over the past year or two, confirming some suspicions and challenging some assumptions.

Most strikingly so far has been the strategising that took place. From the Tate plot, to the Parliamentary manouvering on the Referendum Bill to the failed coup against Dominic Cummings, there are repeated instances of political actors working two steps ahead of their opposition.

Given the success that such an approach has had, and given the lack of apparent strategising going on in government on Article 50, this post tries to imagine what the two critical groups in Brexit might do, now and in the future. To be clear, I am not suggesting that this is what they are actually going and any examples I provide should not be taken as implementations of such ideas; instead, the intention is to scope out what the path ahead looks like at a critical juncture in British politics, where much feels contingent and open to change.

Let’s start by looking at those who have made most of this strategic approach to date, those pushing for a hard Brexit.

Harder still

The underlying situation is well-placed for hard brexiteers: they have the momentum from the referendum and own much of the media debate. However, David Cameron’s resignation immediately after the referendum meant that progress to Article 50 has become stalled.

The priority objective here has to be to get to Article 50 as soon as possible. This matters because it locks the UK much more firmly into leaving and because it opens up much more chance of making that departure a full one.

To tackle this last point first, Article 50 has a timetable and an extended number of veto players, anyone one of whom can block the conclusion of a negotiated deal. Failure to reach a deal means that the UK leaves after two years with a rupture. Either that is the objective, or it prompts the kind of crisis talks that lead to a deal in which the UK might have more opportunity to secure the trade-based relationship that many hard brexiteers want. In any case, the absence of agreement moves the UK very firmly – and possibly permanently – into the hard Brexit position.

Hence, getting to Article 50 matters. This means stamping hard on any sign of delay by the government, as well as calling out any and all who question any aspect of the situation, even if they are nominally ‘friendly’. Thus the various court cases might not question whether notification or Brexit should happen – only how – but by ramping up public dissent it makes it much more difficult for anyone to leverage those cases into further diversionary or limiting action.

Likewise, Parliament becomes a battleground, with a hard core of hard Brexiteers able to deprive the government of its majority, possibly to link up with an acquiescent Labour party in inflicting defeats on any area of policy that might cause Theresa May to think hard about defining them. Within the Tory party, that power also potentially extends to raising a challenge to their leader more directly, by triggering a leadership contest. While more of a nuclear option, it does have weight behind it, made more credible by the copious demonstrations of willingness to unleash havoc.

In short, the hard brexiteers probably do best by being unrelenting in their criticism of anyone who doesn’t cleave to the view that Brexit is quick and simple, pushing as hard as possible to get to Article 50, and then being unhelpful in finding a basis for cooperation, so that exit occurs on hard (ie. no) terms.

Whoa, Nelly!

If hard brexiteers might to push on being obstructive, then those that still want to fight for no brexit have a very different challenge.

For them, the referendum is a big, unavoidable problem and there is no easy way around it. So let’s assume that they will not directly challenge it. This opens up two lines of action, one short-term, the other longer.

In the short-term, the priority would have to be killing the momentum of the process. Cameron’s non-notification on 24th June opened up a big opportunity, but now it needs more work.

The logical first port of call is the Supreme Court next month. While neither party in Miller & dos Santos looks like changing their basic argument, the involvement of representation from the Scottish government and (possibly) the joining of the defeated Northern Irish action mean that there is scope for new elements to be introduced. To pick a recent idea, arguing that Article 50 notification needs not only the Act required by the High Court but also repeal of the 1972 European Communities Act would throw a huge spanner in the works, as this latter might mean years of legal unpicking before notification can happen.

The fall-back would be Parliament and efforts to expand the notification bill not only to improve oversight but to add further hurdles to getting to notification – such as the agreement of devolved assemblies – or the requirement for a second referendum to approve the final deal. Again, there are enough no-brexiteers in Tory ranks to cancel out the government majority, so work on getting Labour on-side would have to be a priority. Here, repeals would need to be multi-faceted, speaking to values and ideas that will resonate strongly with the leadership, i.e. not simply the benefits of EU membership.

Delaying notification is central in all of this, since it opens up the longer-term perspective, namely to effect a change in wider circumstances that make over-turning the referendum more feasible. That might include economic costs becoming more obvious, but also allowing more political events to accumulate. To take the most recent example, a Trump administration might be willing to cut a quick trade deal with the UK, but if that doesn’t happen then it makes the brexiteers’ argument about being a global player more difficult. Likewise, elections in France and the Netherlands in the first half of 2017 open up paths to more radical change within the EU that might render leaving moot.

Really?

Both these paths – hard brexit and no-brexit – are difficult and problematic. There is much to question about them and I’d have serious doubts about the viability of either.

However, the middle path – that of a managed brexit – is little easier. There have been some good pieces of late about how to strategise this, but that does not disguise the many pitfalls and bear-traps that exist. Perhaps the value of thinking more radically is that it exposes these, so that we might have more of a chance of getting to a sustainable future policy position.

The post How to win at Brexit appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

In the wake of populist successes in the UK and the US, Viviane Gravey examines the prospects for a Front National victory in the upcoming 2017 French presidential election. She argues that, while the institutional structure of French politics would limit the room for manoeuvre of Marine Le Pen, it is ultimately the responsibility of other political actors to provide convincing alternative leadership, rather than solely rely on the checking power of institutions.

As the 22nd session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 22) in Marrakech draws to a close, it is becoming increasingly clear that credible monitoring and transparency procedures are urgently needed. Otherwise national pledges to address climate change in the spirit of the 2015 Paris Agreement will not build sufficient global trust.

The 2015 Paris Agreement marked a shift towards countries making emission reduction pledges known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and a new Transparency Framework (Article 13). This framework requires regular progress reports on pledges to address climate change. While the quick ratification of the Paris Agreement is a sign that the international community is eager to make progress, setting up a strong and effective transparency framework will likely require hard and sustained work for years to come.

Our new research, published today in Climate Policy, shows that the long term success of the Agreement depends on the availability of well-designed and functioning monitoring and review mechanisms. The EU has one of the most advanced climate policy monitoring systems in the world – but it still encounters persistent challenges that, crucially, could jeopardize the implementation of the Paris Agreement if these challenges persist within the EU and potentially also in other countries and regions. We show that the EU’s current approach to monitoring climate policies – largely borrowed from monitoring greenhouse gases, which is a vastly different task – has not supported in depth learning and debate on the performance of individual policies. Other important obstacles include political concerns over the costs of reporting, control, and the perceived usefulness of the information produced. The international community should therefore draw on the EU’s valuable experiences and also difficulties in monitoring climate policies in order to develop the practice further.

A vital part of the implementation of the Paris Agreement will hinge on whether political actors can muster the leadership in order to successfully navigate these monitoring challenges at the international level. Monitoring is probably the most underestimated challenge in implementing the Paris Agreement. In the past, it has been seen as a technical, data gathering task. We show that it is anything but a mere reporting exercise. Implementing more advanced monitoring at the international level will require substantial political efforts, resources, and leadership. In order to justify investments in monitoring and evaluation to the public, care needs to be taken to ensure that monitoring information is used effectively to evaluate and improve policy, rather than as a weapon to lay blame when things slip.

A key strength of the Paris Agreement is that so many countries are part of it and are willing to engage. Disengagement or even withdrawal could therefore imperil the whole Agreement and have grave ramifications for the set-up of a strong monitoring system. The EU’s experience shows that recognising the role of public policies in the NDCs should thus be seen as one step in a long journey to deeper understanding of what climate policies achieve and how policies can be improved.

Image credit: CGIAR Research Programme (Creative Commons)

The post Lessons from European Climate Monitoring Crucial for Paris Agreement Success appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Finding reliable figures on the budgets and finances of the United Nations (UN) system is not easy, unless you know where to look for them. I’ll try to present some of this below and also bring you up-to-date on my research on budgeting and resourcing in international organizations.

First, a lot of the older UN budget data has been gathered by the Global Policy Forum, especially thanks to the help of Klaus Hüfner.

On the websites of the UN System Chief Executives Board for Coordination (UNSCEB), basically the body where the heads of all UN agencies and body coordinate, there are all kinds of UN system financial data, including in reusable (csv) formats for the years starting in 2010. Note that this data is annual although most UN budgets are biennial or, in some cases, even longer.

The UNSCEB (and its predecessor called ACC) have also been issuing reports on the financial situation of the UN system since the early 1990s, with the oldest reports including data going back to 1983. The latest report for the budget period 2014-15 has just been published at the end of October, and the figures above are from this report.*

My own research project in which we study UN budgeting and budget administration continues. We have just published a chapter titled “Changing Budgeting Administration in International Organizations” in the edited volume “International Bureaucracy” and are working on a special issue following our workshop on “Resourcing International Organizations” here in Munich. More is to come on the United Nations in the coming weeks and months.

If you also work on budgeting of international organizations or the questions related to resource matters in the UN system, in regional organizations or in other types of IOs, you can join our panel “Budget Formulation, Budget Administration and the Politics of Resourcing International Organizations” at the ICPP in Singapur in June 2017 (deadline of the CfP is in January).

* Note that this data does not represent budgets or expenditure but revenues that include government and private voluntary contributions made to the various UN organizations. In some of them, voluntary funds make up a large chunk of the money available (e.g. ~80% in WHO). I’ve added the figures for 2014 and 2015 for the chart.

The post The budget of the United Nations (UN) system: latest figures and research appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Remember The Day of the Jackal? This thrilling movie released in 1973 and featuring Edward Fox as enigmatic contract killer, is based on the failed attempt to assassinate Charles de Gaulle on 22 August 1962 by the paramilitary underground organisation OAS (‘Organisation de l’armée secrète’), composed by extreme right-wing activists who considered the Evian Treaty, signed in March 1962 in order to pave the way to Algerian independence, an act of high treason.

The fanatics who machine-gunned de Gaulle’s legendary Citroën DS fortunately missed the General. But they seriously injured the young Fifth Republic, profoundly handicapping her for life. What they did was provide de Gaulle with an unexpected, most welcome opportunity to modify the constitution under the pretext of ‘protecting’ the country. (Any resemblance with current Turkish presidents purely coincidental).

And he seized it quickly, because he felt that the conditions under which the Fifth Republic had been tailor-made to his personality in the first place – the need to put an end to the Algerian crisis – were no longer provided.

Only one week after the incident he announced a constitutional revision in his Council of ministers and notified public opinion in a press release that he was actively ‘preparing to take the necessary initiatives’ in order to ‘ensure, under all circumstances and without losing any time, the continuity of the State’. And on 12 September – just returned, by the way, from a triumphal visit to Germany where he laid the foundations of the path-breaking Elysée Treaty signed a few months later – he registered a television address that was broadcast on 20 September, informing the French population that it was time to ‘protect the country from crises and partisan ploys’, reminding them that ‘all this pain, the tears and the blood’, had created an ‘exceptional bond’ between the French people and himself, and that, for the sake of those who would one day have the heavy task to succeed him, he would submit the election of the president ‘by direct universal suffrage’ in a forthcoming referendum.

De Gaulle thus managed to push a constitutional reform that was anti-constitutional in itself! As the vast majority of observers and even the Conseil d’Etat pointed out, constitutional changes had to be decided and discussed in both chambers of the parliament, a provision de Gaulle simply dismissed (any resemblance with current British prime ministers purely coincidental). The Assemblée nationale did what it had to do: it adopted a vote of no confidence, obtained a large majority for it on 5 October and … as a result, was dissolved right away by de Gaulle (one of the convenient prerogatives of the French president), with new legislative elections announced for after the referendum.

If one is to believe Alain Peyrefitte in his book C’était de Gaulle (Vol. 1, Paris: Fallois-Fayard, 1994), the President was fully aware of the implications, telling his young secretary of state ‘What we are going to do is at the limits of legality. I even believe we crossed the line. (…) If we win, we will be able to say it’s legal because the people wants it.’

‘YES, it’s YOU who will elect the President of the Republic’

On 28 October 62.25% of the French electorate approved the new electoral process. The referendum was promptly ratified by the Conseil constitutionnel which showed a total absence of democratic backbone at this historical occasion.

What an incredible manipulation of constitutional provisions and public opinion! And what a massive vote of defiance against the ‘establishment’, which had been against it in closed ranks: all major politicians, trade unions, media, intellectuals and academics had warned against it – to no effect whatsoever. Is it exaggerated to say that in 1944 de Gaulle had promised the French he would make their country ‘great again’, and in 1962 he more or less told them ‘I am your voice!’ (Any resemblance with…).

Given his historical achievements, one can only have the greatest respect for Charles de Gaulle. His courage and determination, his moral and political legitimacy are undeniable. But that does not change the fact that, very clearly, the high art of demagogy is not reserved to shabby opportunists and ruthless cynics. There are moments when it finds a masterly application in the hands of uncontested heroes and great statesmen.

In de Gaulle’s case, the move was motivated mainly by his profound distrust of parliamentary democracy, with its litany of partisan spirit, unsatisfying compromise, tedious negotiations and fragile coalitions. In 1946 already, in his famous speech in Bayeux, he insisted on the need for ‘national arbitration above the political contingencies’ and made it clear that ‘it is from the Head of State, placed above the parties, that the executive power must proceed.’ In 1962, he got his will.

De Gaulle’s manoeuvre did not actually change the scope of power of the French President. It did not have any major immediate impact either – de Gaulle was of course re-elected in 1965 – and it may even be argued that the direct universal suffrage indirectly paved the way for political changeover in 1981: would there ever have been a Socialist in the Elysée if the President had always been chosen by the electoral college like in 1958?

But the long-term heritage for French politics is devastating: more than half a century later the poor Fifth Republic is more than ever held in the firm grip of de Gaulle’s plot of 1962. The presidential election has become a self-locking, seemingly unbreakable padlock for French democracy (and someone seems to have thrown away the key). Several posts of this blog will deal with the concrete consequences of de Gaulle’s historical constitutional ‘rape’, as former French premier Paul Reynaud famously commented at the time.

Fortunately the French are able to laugh about the padlock themselves. In the hilarious spy movie parody OSS 117: Lost in Rio, Jean Dujardin as secret agent Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath, on mission in Rio de Janeiro in 1967, refuses to consider Brazil a dictatorship, despite the arguments of his young colleague from the Mossad. And when she objects, asking: ‘But what do you call a country which has as head of state a former military with full powers, a secret police, one single television channel, and where all information is controlled by the State?’, he pauses for a moment and declares solemnly: ‘I call this la France, Mademoiselle. And not just any kind of France. The France of the General de Gaulle.’

Today France has more TV channels than it needs and information is certainly no longer under control. But the electoral padlock is still shut.

Albrecht Sonntag
@albrechtsonntag

This is post # 3 on the French 2017 election marathon.
Post # 2 here.
Post # 1 here.

The post France 2017: How the padlock was shut appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

A week after the Paris Agreement entered into force, the United States have elected Donald J. Trump as their 45th President – a man who famously described climate change as “created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” His stance on climate change, his strong support for coal and pledge to “lift the restrictions on American energy” have raised fears about his likely actions once in office, and their impact on international efforts to combat climate change. Critically, while he is most vocal against climate change he is no strong supporter of environmental policy in general. While he has backtracked on completely shutting down the US Environmental Protection agency (EPA) he is promising to ‘refocus’ its work:

“The Trump Administration is firmly committed to conserving our wonderful natural resources and beautiful natural habitats. America’s environmental agenda will be guided by true specialists in conservation, not those with radical political agendas.  We will refocus the EPA on its core mission of ensuring clean air, and clean, safe drinking water for all Americans.  It will be a future of conservation, of prosperity, and of great success.” GreatAgain.Gov

In this blog post, I attempt to make sense of the challenges facing environment and climate policy in the US – and beyond – by reflecting on past efforts to undermine and roll-back environmental regulation in the United States of America.

Donald J. Trump is not, by far, the first Republican to run for office on an anti-EPA, anti-climate change action platform. Ronald Reagan made removing environmental ‘over-regulation’ one of his key campaign objectives in the 1980s. Newt Gingrich led a Republican victory in the 1994 Congressional elections on the basis of his opposition to environmental action and its cost. And finally, George W. Bush’s reluctance to act on climate change saw him pull the US out of the Kyoto Protocol in the early 2000s.

What can we learn from these previous deregulatory attempts and their partial failures?

First, that environmental policy is not just made in Washington D.C. – for example, Klyza and Sousa argue the US ‘Green State’ is not only influenced by federal legislation (both environmental and non-environmental) but also by state-level action, by court cases, by implementation of both federal and state policies, by administrative decisions made by the administration and finally by self-regulation from industries.

Second, that these different sites are where policies can both be made and unmade. There are thus many ways in which one can weaken a given policy. It is possible to roll-back a policy, or remove it entirely through legislation. But when doing so is not possible, as Reagan, Gingrich or Bush all found out when failing to weaken Clean Air or Clean Water programs in Congress, there are other tactics. Politicians and others may pursue what Judith Layzer calls “low profile challenges”.[1] They can for example, target the implementation agency – which is often the EPA in the US (air, water pollution) or the Interior Department (for biodiversity) or the Energy Department (for renewables). Congress can also defund specific programs. The President can further appoint anti-regulation, climate-deniers to the head of the EPA – as Donald Trump is expected to do. The President can alternatively use executive orders – as President Obama did repeatedly – to bypass Congress and push for more ambitious environmental policy. But what one President can adopt by executive orders, another can rescind – as Donald Trump is expected to do. It is also possible to use the courts by for example by encouraging businesses to litigate, or refusing to appeal when these businesses win against the EPA.  Conversely, this also means that, despite Republican control of Congress and the Presidency, other sites remain open for environmental policy expansion – in some states, such as for example California, more ambitious climate policies could be adopted now.

Third, that policies are more than a series of specific instruments but are underpinned by narratives and weakened or strengthened by public perception. Over the last 40 years, US Conservatives have reshaped how we think about environmental policy – not just in the US, but in the EU and globally. Layzer contends that US Conservatives have thus “created a storyline that undermines the environmental narrative by discrediting environmentalists and furnishing a principled basis for disputing their claims”.[2] Examples of such principled opposition include calling for the respect for property rights (v. habitats protection), pointing to the costs of environmental action which increases tax burdens on the poor (rarely compared to its benefits), rejecting the precautionary principle as not based on ‘sound science’, or conversely rejecting said ‘science’ as conducted by scientists as ‘in it’ for the money.

Trump and his current attacks on the Paris Agreement are not just a US story but matter to the entire world – as evidenced by Chinese calls for continued US engagement in the Paris Agreement. But Trump’s victory should not be considered in isolation. When it comes to the environment, it marks in many ways the next step in decades of a US Conservative challenge to environmental policy. This challenge has already been successful in reframing what makes a ‘good’ environmental policy; and has rapidly moved from the fringes of US politics to the global mainstream of environmental politics – think for example of the Regulatory Fitness Checks conducted by the European Commission, or efforts to cut environmental ‘red tape’ by UK governments.

In conclusion, reviewing past challenges to US environmental policy shows that US Conservatives and the Republican Party have often failed to dismantle legislation through Congress – but have been much more effective at limiting administrative capacity for implementation (through cutting budget, nominating anti-regulatory advocates to the EPA). They have further been successful at reshaping how environmental policy, in the US and also globally, is perceived, even when out of office, stressing its cost, the ‘red tape’, the losers of regulations and casting doubts on the role of science. Under the Trump Administration, pro-environmental actors need to be fully aware of these different battle grounds – inside the legislature, inside the administration, across the different states and courts – as well as the battle of ideas. Shut out of Washington, it now falls on pro-Environmental actors to not only oppose and report on the future administration challenges to the environment, but also to redefine how they think and speak about environmental policies.

[1] Judith Layzer (2012), Open For Business: Conservatives’ Opposition to Environmental Regulation, MIT Press p. 334

[2] Ibid, p.333

The post Donald Trump v. The Environment: learning from past attempts to dismantle environmental policy appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

The historic victory of Donald Trump in the US 2016 presidential election has been readily compared with the UK’s vote to leave the European Union – a ‘Brexit effect’ that some would suggest to have emanated from the UK, migrated across the Atlantic and impacted on the US. The notion that the UK has that much influence on the US, or the world more broadly, is rather bemusing. However, a similar kind of self-styled populist, anti-establishment surge has clearly manifested itself in both contests.

The French are still numerous to consider voting both a right and a duty (‘un devoir citoyen’, as they say). This is probably why turnout – despite a wide-spread feeling that nothing ever changes – has been remarkably stable over the decades, especially at the presidential elections. Even the lowest participation ever (71.6% in the 1st round of the 2002 election, the one that famously saw Jean-Marie-Le Pen qualify for the runoff, precisely because many Socialists didn’t bother) is higher than what has been registered in the UK since the turn of the century (between 59.4% and 66.1%). And the decisive 2nd round consistently mobilises around 80% of the electorate (between 79.7% in 1995 or 2002 and 83.9% in 2007), which is above the turnout for the last four German Bundestagswahlen (only 71.5% in for Angela Merkel’s third victory in 2013) or even Spain (66.5% in June 2016, down from 69.6% in December 2015).

It remains to be seen whether the voters’ motivation will be as high this time around. For various reasons people may be tempted to spend the four spring Sundays concerned doing other things than walking to one of the over 50,000 polling stations across the country. One of these reasons is the introduction of primaries.

Things used to be fairly simple: you went to the 1st round of the presidential elections in order to vote FOR a person of your ideological preference among a large choice of candidates. Then you went to the 2nd round in order to vote AGAINST the candidate you disliked most. A month later or so you obeyed the new president’s dearest honeymoon wish to bestow him (no ‘her’ so far) with a stable majority in the parliament. Ever since the alignment of the presidential and the legislative elections in 2002, this is how it has happened.

But now, the Americanisation of French politics has led the traditional parties to organise open presidential primaries, presumably with the objective to appear ‘closer to the citizens’ or ‘give people a say’ (any resemblance to referenda in other countries is purely coincidental). The Socialists introduced them at the end of 2011, with two women among the six candidates. It turned out to be a rather successful television event (which is what politics seems to be about nowadays), drawing a 5-million audience. And it fitted surprisingly well with the Socialists’ internal tradition of bringing different sensitivities to a formulation of a common denominator (most often the lowest, but that’s compromise), and compensated for the unexpected ‘dropout’ of frontrunner Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

For Les Républicains, whose first-ever primaries are scheduled end of November, it will be major upheaval. The very idea of having to choose between seven candidates (including only one woman) is in stark contradiction with the Gaullist tradition of the strong, inevitable, providential leader, who engages in a direct dialogue with the French people. During the first debate on 13 October, it was almost touching to watch just how physically difficult it was for Sarkozy to share speaking time with six opponents. It is also not sure to what extent the candidates will be capable of campaigning against each other without totally damaging the one among them they will have to defend and promote over the long months of the presidential campaign.

All primaries have been designed as ‘open’, which means that anyone can vote, provided he/she signs a declaration of sympathy for the ‘values’ of the party concerned (which does not commit you to anything) and a modest fee of couple of Euros. Needless to say that for Les Républicains this opens the door to distortion of the vote by citizens from the left or the extreme right eager to crown the candidate that suits their own agenda best. Under these conditions, it is unsure to what extent loser’s consent will at all prevail. The eternal candidate of the ‘Centre’, François Bayrou (18.6% in the first round of 2007, and still 9.1% in 2012), declined to take part himself and declared his support for Alain Juppé, while announcing he would run against Sarkozy if ever he emerged as winner, which was a serious topic at the second TV debate on 3 November.

The discrepancy between the intention of the primaries – choose a party’s best candidate for the highest office – and their real impact should be troubling for all French citizens. Given the very peculiar circumstances this time around – with the future winner of the Socialist primaries having next to no chance to make it beyond the first round and Marine Le Pen almost certain to be in the run-off without having to campaign particularly hard (and probably having a really good time watching the TV debates) – the winner of the ‘Right and Centre’ primary will most likely be the eighth President of the Fifth Republic.

All this means that the ‘primaries’ really deserve their name, as they turn all the following elections, presidential and legislative, into ‘secondaries’. Which does not mean the ensuing presidential campaign between January and May will be meaningless. Quite the contrary: it will highlight once more all the pitfalls of the system, offering one more diagnosis of everything that is unhealthy about the Fifth Republic and the current state of French politics. As for the therapy, it’s unfortunately not even sure the patient wants to be healed.

Albrecht Sonntag
@albrechtsonntag

This is post # 2 on the French 2017 election marathon.
Previous post here.

The post France 2017: The primaries and the secondaries appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

The EU is no stranger to inter-institutional repetition. As was made famous in the referendum debate, it has many presidents (for instance, leading the European Commission, European Council, European Parliament, European Central Bank and the Eurogroup). So it has also been in the EU’s preparation for the Brexit talks. Over the summer, Michel Barnier (Commission), Didier Seeuws (Council) and Guy Verhofstadt (Parliament) were all appointed as the EU’s Brexit negotiators.

Today’s High Court ruling in Miller/dos Santos has provoked a flurry of reaction, across the board. To read the comments of some Remainers, this is the first step to reversing the referendum result and building a new, pro-EU consensus in the UK. For Leavers, it’s being called a travesty of democracy and justice.

As someone not (usually) prone to hyperbole, both positions strike me as unhelpful and wrong-headed. So let’s unpack a bit what’s what.

The case was launched on the basis that since leaving the EU would remove certain rights from the claimants, this needed the approval of Parliament, rather than just the executive submitting Article 50 notification. Both they and the Government took the position that starting Article 50 meant that the process was unstoppable (a view I’d disagree with).

The ruling has very much taken the line of the claimants and would seem to leave them with the whip hand when this goes to the Supreme Court, as the Government has indicated that it will appeal. A quick reading of the summary points to the limitations of royal prerogative powers and the centrality of Parliamentary sovereignty.

So what?

The case was only about the process by which Brexit happens: while some had talked in the immediate aftermath of the vote of taking the position that the referendum was only advisory, and that Parliament (with its large majority of pro-membership MPs) could overturn the result, that has very much faded…

There are various reasons for this. Most obviously, there has been a shift in political sensibilities now that there has been some reflection, and the idea that Parliament would sanction asking people for their opinion and then ignore it seems to fly in the face of popular democracy. Moreover, about 70% of constituencies had Leave majorities, so those thinking to be re-elected would be given a very big stick to their opponents.

Thus, even if the Government does lose its appeal, the result will be one where Parliament has to give its approval, which it will almost certainly so do. With a Supreme Court ruling possible by Christmas, that leaves enough time for a vote, even for an entire Bill. The latter would involve the Lords, who might delay a bit, but ultimately would be bound by the Parliament Acts, unless they wanted to shorten the path to their own reform.

There is a possible complication, should the Supreme Court decide to make a referral to the EU’s Court of Justice. This might be necessary if the reversibility of Article 50 became an issue, perhaps because the Government changed its position. However, even here the expedited process now available would allow for a three month turnaround, so the end-March deadline set by Theresa May is still possible. Which is good, because the thought of having to delay because of an ECJ ruling already drives Leavers wild with anger.

Of course, the irony in all this is that the entire case is about ensuring democratic oversight and control, the very agenda advanced by Leave. The key decision has already been taken, by the people in the referendum. Parliament cannot reasonably stand in its way, and the ECJ cannot do anything that impinges on the UK’s sovereign rights.

What might now change is the nature of the process.

Parliament might now get a vote, but it will also get a voice. It’s not hard to imagine pro-Remain Tories working with the opposition to demand much closer scrutiny and approval processes in the negotiations: the very ‘running commentary’ that has been so frequently held back. While the impact of that scrutiny might be weakened by the continued failure of the Labour party to work actively in holding the government to account, it is still something of value for the UK.

So the destination remains the same, but how we get there might be about to change.

The post What the High Court ruling does (and doesn’t) mean appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Before the next Tour de France starts on the 1st of July from the banks of the Rhine, the entire country will embark on a seven-month election marathon, beginning with three primaries, one of which (the Greens’) is already half-way through, with ‘the Right and the Centre’ to follow in November and the Socialists (or what’s left of them after five years in power) finishing by 29 January. These will kick off the all-pervasive campaign for the presidential election on 23 April and 7 May, which in turn will be followed by the legislative elections on 11 and 18 June, all held in the traditional two-round voting system.

Over this period, a politically interested French citizen may thus direct his or her Sunday afternoon stroll at least eight times towards a polling station (nine if he or she’s among the 17,146 individuals registered for the Greens’ second round next Sunday). Chances are that he or she will be sucked up by the media tornado before the end of winter into a highly personalised campaign that will end up becoming frenzied in spring, especially between the two rounds of the presidential election. The catharsis of 7 May will in all likelihood be followed by a collective hangover and a feeling of utter disappointment and fatigue, reinforced further by the almost meaningless duty of voting in June.

Until then, the French citizens will have been reminded on an almost daily basis by politicians, media experts and the inevitable ‘declinists’ that the principles they thought their Republic firmly anchored on, are all severely threatened. ‘La liberté’ is under attack by the never-ending state of emergency apparently necessary to fight ‘the war’ against home-bread terrorists. ‘L’égalité’ is being torn to pieces alongside with a beloved ’social model’ that is perceived to be crumbling and an education system that reveals itself ever more incapable of respecting its own meritocratic promises of social mobility. Even ‘la fraternité’ is no longer what it used to be, with public services deserting rural areas, refugees being welcome in very small numbers and certainly not in my backyard, and the eternal identity debate setting up one ethnic or cultural community against another. Not to mention ‘la laïcité’, which has never been understood outside France and is now increasingly under siege at home.

The journey to next summer will be a hard one. In the state the country is currently in, this will be more than a typical election drama with its usual dose of hypocrisy, hyperbole, and hysteria. Rather, the next months will very painfully reveal the severity of the systemic crisis France finds itself it, probably the most important one since 1958. And, contrary to 1958, with no providential saviour in store and hardly any light at the end of the democratic tunnel.

If you consider France hopelessly ‘has-been’, in irremediable decline, and no longer of relevance to what happens on a European level, please simply ignore this blog. If you think that a dispirited, disheartened and depressed France is a problem for Europe (even without subscribing to the ‘Domino’ theory), you might be interested in following this blog’s musings about why France seems so irremediably stuck in a stagnation that increasingly feels like a ‘Groundhog Day’ treadmill.

Contemporary French political culture is the result a highly complex historical process. We teach our students the concept of ‘path-dependence’, but for the French case study we might as well invent the neologism of ‘path-imprisonment’.

This blog is a modest attempt to accompany the country’s journey over the next seven months with a regular series of comments and reflexions on how France found itself imprisoned, how imprisonment is denied (and sometimes almost celebrated against better evidence), how key individuals position themselves with regard to the system, and what the (more than slim) chances are something might actually change for the better in the next legislature.

It is possible that despite all efforts to uphold a minimum of academic objectivity, these election chronicles may be tainted with a tinge of sadness. Bon voyage, malgré tout.

Albrecht Sonntag
@albrechtsonntag

The post Ref: France (2017), Campaigns, Elections, Hangover (forthcoming). appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

The Swedish minister for climate Isabella Lövin wants to ban fossil fuel cars from 2030. According to several newspapers, the ban should be EU wide and the idea is supported by Norway and the Netherlands. Indeed the Danish newspaper Information[i] reports that the German Bundestag recently adopted a resolution to stop sales of fossil fuel cars by 2030.

An EU wide ban on fossil fuel road vehicles (.i.e. cars, lorries, scooters and motorcycles) will put the EU back on track as a climate leader. Transport has been overlooked by the climate and energy agenda. Importantly, it remains one of the main sources of emissions. Moreover, last year’s Volkswagen scandal demonstrates the length to which car manufacturers have gone to avoid technological innovation to produce low emission cars. However, there are several challenges to banning the sales and use of fossil fuel road vehicles.

The ban on fossil-fuel road vehicles will increase demand for renewable transport fuel, which will put pressure on current energy supply, thereby influencing EU’s 2030 climate and energy targets. According to Eurostat, transport account for 33 per cent of overall energy consumption, and road transport account for 82 per cent of overall transport energy consumption. Furthermore, 94 per cent of all road vehicle rely on fossil fuel and 90 per cent of this is imported. Converting this high volume of fossil fuel into alternative energies by 2030 will be a challenge, especially as electrical and biofuel cars do not have the same reach. In other words, renewable energy cars cannot drive as far as fossil fuel cars and refuelling stations for renewable transport fuels are not readily available over longer distances. According to Eurostat, renewable energy passenger cars represent about 5 per cent of all passenger cars driving on the European roads[ii]. Thus, investment in energy supply and renewable transport fuel is necessary if the EU is to ban fossil fuel road vehicles in 13 years.

The EU transport policy white paper from 2011 aims to curb emissions by 60 per cent (1990 level) by 2050 for the EU to achieve its overall 2050 target of 80-95 per cent reduction for the whole economy, thereby achieving a low carbon economy without curbing mobility [iii]. Transport growth without emissions growth can only be achieved through an increase in the number of renewable fuel vehicles and stronger legislation to reduce emissions from traditional fossil fuel vehicles, something the car manufacturer and certain member states have resisted[iv].

Currently, transport account for around 25-30 per cent of emissions (CO2, GHG and NOx) in the EU and about 70 per cent of this comes from road transport[v]. The Commission’s mid-term report on the implementation of its 2011 Transport white paper recognises the lack of progress towards a decarbonised transport sector. The Commission argues substituting oil is more costly in transport compared to other sectors and “overall GHG emissions from the transport sector in 2013 were higher by 20% compared to 1990”[vi]. Continued transport growth clearly puts pressure on the EU to reform the transport sector as a whole and especially road transport, which represent 72 per cent of all transport in the EU[vii].

Achieving a decarbonised transport sector requires real commitment by member states, who needs to invest in renewable energy supply to ensure the EU achieves its 2030 climate and energy targets. Technological innovation to make renewable fuels better and cars have a longer reach, thereby enabling people to drive further in their electrical cars. Moreover, refuelling stations have to be interoperable so electrical cars can drive out of the city and visit other cities in other EU member states. This requires manufactures to work together to create standardized technologies, which enable vehicles to re-fuel/charge in any EU member state.

Member states need to make renewable fuel road vehicles more attractive to buy and use for example through tax incentives. However, taxes from fossil fuel used by road vehicles are a revenue for national budgets, and to create a decarbonised transport sector, national governments must find alternative sources of revenue. In short, banning the sale and use of fossil fuel road vehicles is complex.

Finally, the introduction of a ban on fossil fuel cars by 2030 requires the support from road vehicle manufacturers and energy producers, who need to deliver in order for the EU to achieve its goals of decarbonising the transport sector. Such an ambitious goal requires cooperation between countries to put pressure on the transport sector as a whole. Thus, neither Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands nor Norway will be able to achieve a decarbonised transport sector by 2030 without the support from the other EU member states. This leaves a central question; will the Swedish climate minister be able to convince her colleagues in the Council, the Commission and the Members of the European Parliament? and how will the industry interest groups respond to the proposal?

[i] https://www.information.dk/telegram/2016/10/svensk-klimaminister-forbyde-benzinbiler-2030?utm_source=emailet%20artikel&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=send%20til%20ven

[ii] http://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/indicators/proportion-of-vehicle-fleet-meeting-4/assessment

[iii] https://ec.europa.eu/transport/sites/transport/files/themes/strategies/doc/2011_white_paper/swd(2016)226.pdf

[iv] http://www.euractiv.com/section/transport/news/eu-parliament-backs-tougher-car-emissions-limits/

[v] https://ec.europa.eu/transport/facts-fundings/statistics/pocketbook-2016_en

[vi] Page 18 https://ec.europa.eu/transport/sites/transport/files/themes/strategies/doc/2011_white_paper/swd(2016)226.pdf

[vii] https://ec.europa.eu/transport/facts-fundings/statistics/pocketbook-2016_en

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Which is exactly what we have now.

In America they have a saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. So why does Mrs May want to fix something that isn’t broken?

Mrs May says it’s because that’s what the British people want. Well, that’s a moot point.

Yes, 17 million people voted for Britain to leave the EU – but that’s 17 million out of a population in Britain of 64 million.

And two of the four countries that comprise our Union of the United Kingdom – Scotland and Northern Ireland – don’t want Britain to leave the European Union at all.

What’s strange is that Mrs May also didn’t want Britain to leave the EU. In a keynote speech during the Referendum campaign, she said:

“I believe it is clearly in our national interest to remain a member of the European Union.”

And as revealed in an exclusive report by The Guardian, during a private and secretly recorded meeting with Goldman Sachs a month before the Referendum, Mrs May warned that companies would leave the UK if the country voted for Brexit.

What’s more strange is that, including herself, 70% of Mrs May’s Cabinet – 16 out of 23 members – voted to Remain in the EU. All of them said during the Referendum that leaving the EU would be bad for Britain.

So now they’re going to take Britain on a path that they all claimed just a few weeks ago would be against the interests of the country.

During Prime Minister’s questions last week, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn compared the Prime Minister’s plan to those of Baldrick, from the comedy series Blackadder, who said that his “cunning plan” was to have no plan.

Continued Mr Corbyn:

“Brexit was apparently about taking back control, but the devolved Governments do not know the plan, businesses do not know the plan and Parliament does not know the plan. When will the Prime Minister abandon this shambolic Tory Brexit and develop a plan that delivers for the whole country?”

Mrs May replied:

“We are going to deliver on the vote of the British people. We are going to deliver the best possible deal for trade in goods and services, both with and operationally in the European Union. And we are going to deliver an end to free movement. That is what the British people want and that is what this Government are going to deliver for them.”

Well, that’s the other thing. The British people didn’t vote for “an end to free movement”. That wasn’t on the referendum ballot paper. The only choice was to ‘Remain’ a member of the European Union, or to ‘Leave’.

Mrs May is assuming that all the people who voted for ‘Leave’ did so for the same reasons. But to guess answers to questions that were never asked, is effectively to undermine the entire function of democracy.

Many who voted for ‘Leave’ didn’t necessarily want an end to ‘free movement’, either for themselves, or for our European neighbours.

And most definitely many who voted for ‘Leave’ did not want to end Britain’s full and privileged access to the EU Single Market, where just under half of Britain’s exports go to, and just over half of Britain’s imports come from.

We know it’s possible to leave the European Union and still be part of the EU Single Market – the world’s biggest, richest marketplace, and the source of considerable wealth for Britain and Britons.

After all, Norway and Switzerland are not members of the EU, but are still part of the EU Single Market. Voluntarily. Because much of the wealth of those countries is also intrinsically linked to the Single Market.

However, it’s not possible to enjoy being part of the EU Single Market without also accepting free movement of people.

Mrs May is being arrogantly presumptuous in claiming that Britain voted against ‘free movement of people’ (even though we never had a vote on that).

But by ending ‘free movement’, as she has now promised to do, it will be impossible for Mrs May to deliver on her other promise of delivering “the best possible deal for trade” with the EU.

She cannot have one, without the other.

Britain currently has the “best possible deal for trade” with the EU Single Market. We cannot possibly get any better, either in or out of the EU. We have the best now.

Instead of getting the best deal, Mrs May is going to end the best deal.

• Nobody in Britain voted for Mrs May’s new administration, which UKIP’s Roger Helmer, MEP, claimed this month has adopted “about 90% of UKIP’s programme”.
• Nobody in Britain voted to end ‘free movement of people’.
• Nobody in Britain voted to end Britain’s privileged access to the EU Single Market.

But that’s what Mrs May says that the British people want, so that’s what Britain is getting.

Democracy. RIP.

___________________________________________________

• Is Britain sure about Brexit?
• Mrs May takes control, without a ballot or a bullet
• It’s not undemocratic to challenge Brexit
• List of the latest articles by Jon Danzig

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What does Brexit mean for the UK?

The results of Brexit has been shocking to say the least because the polls were revealing a tougher battle, with hopes that the United Kingdom would choose to remain in the European Union. But the 23 June result was a clear signal that the 52-48 win for the Leave camp, has highlighted many underlying problems with UK: Scotland and Northern Ireland overwhelmingly voted to remain in the United Kingdom, but the slim margins for England and Wales decided it for the UK that it should opt out of the European Union.

Many Britons are greatly worried that remaining would mean millions of Turkish people could soon cross shores and end up in the United kingdom; indeed, immigration was a key concern-point that in all likelihood has influenced votes in favour of leaving the EU for the country because people would forsake freedom of movement if it meant that immigration numbers from Europe could be brought down. The economic status quo of Britons wishing to remain was inclusive of middle classes and the youth. It is widely expected that Turkey will soon join the European Union, and another major concern in the aftermath of the Brexit is how the economy is expected to perform – there might be a further downturn than the days leading upto the referendum.

Financial markets felt the impact of Brexit immediately, followed by shaky stock market performances, as international markets experience a frenzy of sorts that is set to affect United Kingdom, much like China, but this is not relative to the Eurozone because the UK leaving the EU is only going to affect it in a minor sense. In addition, the UK lost it’s AAA credit rating, which is expected to spike up government spending, so it is hoped the latest Tory cabinet reshuffle, which has brought in a whole host of ”Tory Leave” figureheads into the spotlight, from Boris Johnson to Liam Fox, manage to maintain the single market at least, with the European Union.

Export figures are expected to increase for the United Kingdom as the economy manages to steer through troubled waters to next year, and this is happening as manufacturing exports peak but exports for capital goods suffers. There is no denying that export trade with the EU will get tougher for the UK post-Brexit, and a significant portion of the trade for it was with the EU so it is hoped that trade barriers will now be individually established with fellow European nations, as well as selected nations all over the globe. Trade deals between the UK and European countries should be redrafted to include possibilities of trade for the country following Brexit, and a country elsewhere that would also be a relatively good and faster option, given what’s in the pipeline about trade for the EU, is Canada.

A very small percentage of people in the United Kingdom are against the idea of welcoming skilled workers into the country; in fact, for skilled workers the most demand is for professions such as IT, science, business and medicine (which would classify it as pro-migration topics for the United Kingdom) and less for engineering but most Britons are against the idea of creating a safety haven for refugees in the country. It is a growing worry that despite the scrapping of freedom of movement that membership of the EU had granted the UK, the country will be unable to meet it’s migration targets; most European citizens in the United Kingdom are expected to not be affected by it but it is anticipated that fresher such prospective candidates (and vice versa) will be governed by a new set of rules. It would be important to note that figures for net European migration to the United Kingdom had consistently been on a high for the period of 2013-2014, and the British identity is a lot more important to Britons than the European identity, which in the context of the United Kingdom, seems dispassionate and remote.

The post The Aftermath of the Brexit appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

After decades of debate on where – and whether – to expand airport capacity in south-eastern England, the UK government announced two days ago that it would favour building a third runway at Heathrow Airport. This option, highly criticised on environmental grounds (notably due to the air pollution caused by road transport to the airport) has been presented by Prime Minister Theresa May as key to show the world that the UK is ‘open for business’ after Brexit.

Brexit is not just a handy justification for expanding Heathrow: it will also make it easier, although still highly complicated, to build the third runway. While political obstacles to expanding Heathrow remain –  from local authorities affected and divisions within the Conservative Party – Brexit is likely to remove the principal legal obstacles to the plan.

Three important hurdles to Heathrow expansion stem from EU law, and all three could be eased or even removed after Brexit, once the ‘Great Repeal Bill’ is enacted.  Plans for this ‘Great Repeal Bill’ were presented last month in the run-up to the Conservatives Party Conference as a legal copy-pasting exercise aiming to “end the authority of EU law by converting all its provisions in British law on the day of exit from the bloc.” This focus on ending the authority of EU law over the UK appears to indicate a choice for a ‘Hard’ Brexit, out of the European Economic Area. Such a Brexit would give the UK the opportunity to rewrite broad swathes of its (formerly EU-based) environmental legislation.

The first obstacle to expansion takes the form of EU air pollution targets. These have been at the heart of the rival case from Gatwick Airport. While the latest Heathrow plan argued expansion would not increase pollution due to efforts to increase the use of public transport, Transport for London and the then-Mayor of London Boris Johnson appeared less-than-convinced. Critically, once the ‘Great Repeal Bill’ is passed and EU law is ‘copy-pasted’ across to UK law, it will be much easier to weaken existing targets. This is because it is difficult to dismantle policy in the EU — a political system in which decisions require large majorities to be made — which means that decisions, once made, tend to stick. This makes the EU particularly suited to addressing major environmental challenges as it provides legal certainty allowing public and private actors alike to plan ahead. Conversely the UK is characterised by sharp changes in policy directions from one government to another. Concerning the environment, Heathrow’s expansion is a case in point: it was supported under Labour, shelved under the Coalition government, and put back on the agenda by Theresa May’s government.

But would the UK government really weaken current air quality rules? While the move may prove unpopular – and, as EU targets already fall short of most recent World Health Organisation targets, would increase health hazards linked to air pollution – outside of the EU the government would be free to weaken these pollution standards. And even if bluntly easing the pollution standards proved too unpopular, the ‘Great Repeal Bill’ offers further opportunities to pave the way for the third runway.

A second obstacle to Heathrow’s expansion is EU planning law.  Land use planning is one of the least Europeanised area of UK environmental policy, which means that the UK government has retained a high degree of initiative. Recent UK governments have used that control to gear planning regulation towards increasing competitiveness and development and not environmental protection. European legislation on Environmental Impact Assessment and Strategic Environmental Assessment has offered some safeguards which could now be weakened, despite a number of international agreements, as these lack the ‘bite’ of EU legislation. EU law binds member states: not complying with the law opens countries to law suits in both domestic and EU courts, as well as potential fines and levy imposed by the European Court of Justice.

A third obstacle to Heathrow’s expansion is thus the very nature of EU legislation and the legal remedies it opens for civil society to hold governments accountable, as exemplified recently by Client Earth with great success against the UK government concerning its clean air plans for London. The decision to expand Heathrow will face multiple legal challenges, many focusing on whether the expansion breaches environmental law.  But after Brexit, meeting environmental targets and respecting environmental rules will become a moral, not legal duty. Removing the ‘EU’ nature of the air pollution or planning standards would effectively close down a legal remedy route for civil society which had allowed holding the UK government accountable.

In conclusion, Brexit and the proposed ‘Great Repeal Bill’ could make the arduous journey toward Heathrow expansion easier for the UK government. Transferring EU policy into UK law makes it both easier to repeal and safer to ignore. But Brexit is not yet around the corner – why then, announce a decision to expand now? By doing so, the May government ensures Heathrow’s most vocal opponents can still use the strength of EU environmental law to attack the decision. In an interesting twist of fate, key opponents to Heathrow’s expansion such as Zac Goldsmith (who stepped down as an MP in protest of the decision) or Boris Johnson, strongly supported the Leave camp. A Hard Brexit, which appears increasingly more likely, will eventually remove the strong EU rules and legal remedies that may help Heathrow expansion opponents block the plan. Hence in order to defeat the third runway expansion, it is now in the interest of key ‘Leavers’ to make sure Brexit and the ‘Great Repeal bill’ is not enacted before all legal challenges against the expansion are exhausted. Sometimes, taking back control is not all it is cracked up to be.

The post Heathrow expansion in the shadow of Brexit appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Anyone in hope of elucidation on Brexit this week will have been a bit disappointed, even by recent standards.

With submissions to the High Court providing no killer arguments either side – and both sides firmly stating that any loss will be challenged up to the Supreme Court and an immigration debate that has sunk to the level of whether someone looks like a child or not, there has not been much advance in our understanding of what might happen, or how.

To underline the point, a discussion this morning at Chatham House on public opinion pointed to further issues.

Put briefly, the British public doesn’t really know what it – collectively – wants from Brexit, except that it wants something substantially different from what currently exists in the UK-EU relationship.

Immigration is important, but less so when placed against assorted trade-offs, and immigration control might be just part of a bigger competence issue about the ability of a government to make decisions for itself. And all of it might collapse or change radically when confronted with some concrete proposition.

This matters for a variety of reasons. Most obviously, if people were voting to take back control, then that becomes very difficult if there’s no consensus about what that control might be used for.  It also complicates matters for a government that is now committed to triggering Article 50, but with no fixed agenda of objectives. And in the end it will mean that a sizeable chunk of the population is going to end up disaffected by how things have turned out, to the detriment of the democratic system as a whole.

But let’s step back, before we end up catastrophizing some more. Politics is always a contingent and conditional process, a series of best guesses about the present and the future. Yes, the scale of the contingency is greater on this occasion, but the principles remain the same. So let’s try to sketch out a muddling-through path for Theresa May.

The starting point is probably the inchoate nature of public opinion. If we assume that people will follow May’s lead, because she seems to know what she’s doing and she has the confidence of her government, then the priority then becomes keeping that confidence. Thus, any Article 50 deal will need to keep backbenchers onside, rather than any particular voter demographic.

Following on from this, we might assume that the public’s attention is limited and will be swayed – in part, at least – by broader concerns over whether one’s job is secure, or the volume of immigration is falling (which it might, given the fragile state of the economy). It’s not such a stretch to suggest that the government might take the view that as long as they look like they are on the Brexit case, people will give them a broad pass.

Based on these assumptions, two paths offer themselves.

The first is the semi-permanent transition. Here, the UK keeps its Brexit wishlist short, when making its notification, focusing on a stronger brake on free movement. The EU27 then take that as a lead and offer a simple deal under Article 50, with the bare minimum of elements. This includes budgeting, staff pensions for UK nationals in the institutions and re-location of EU agencies out of London, as well as a mechanism to set in train a new negotiation for the relationship. In short, the UK becomes a member in all but name, losing representation and voting rights, but with a clear process from moving to a new relationship.

Because that new negotiation will be very big and complex, it will also be slow, with the capacity to last at least a decade. The government would defend itself by saying it had secured formal exit and a limit of immigration and was working now on getting the best deal for the country, and would then largely hope that this would bleed the eurosceptics’ blood. In time, attention would drift and a solution favourable to the UK and EU27 would emerge in its own time, away from the heat of recent years.

The problems are obvious: flashpoints could occur at any stage, and carrying the process out over more than one Parliament would risk some other government taking it somewhere unexpected (or unwanted). In particular, the meagre majority that the Conservatives currently enjoy make it easy to force matters on the Cabinet, which itself is split in various exciting ways.

Also problematic would be that limiting the size of the Article 50 deal to a bare minimum also limits the UK’s leverage, since it pushes the new relationship into a period when it is formally a third state, rather than a member state.

Which leads nicely to the second option, namely the Article 50 splurge. Here, the government puts everything into its Article 50 requests and tries to do it all in one go. This cuts down the transitional problems, maximises what influence the UK has over matters and cuts the backbench grumbles to a minimum.

It also makes any discussion about extension of Article 50 more viable, especially if there is seen to be good progress in resolving issues. Path-dependency suggests that the EU27 will not want to throw away two years of negotiation unless it looks fatally flawed, especially if the rest of the political agenda continues to demand their time. It cuts out the need for transitional arrangements, because the UK would remain a member state until its conclusion.

Which is the obvious flaw in this.

To return to the start of this, the big question is going to be what can be sold by May to her party and (then) to the public. At the moment, the betting would have to be on the former being more of a problem than the latter. As Daniel Korski’s very frank piece today underlines, not having a strategy and a vision can come at a very high price.

The post The Great British Muddle Through appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

In recent years, the UK government has not been particularly adept at negotiating in the EU (see the Fiscal Compact) or navigating the politics of Brussels (see the appointment of Jean-Claude Juncker as European Commission president). Satisfaction with David Cameron’s EU renegotiation was also relatively low on both sides of the referendum debate.

A finais do pasado mes de setembro finou Shimon Peres (Premio Nobel da Paz, Ex Presidente de Israel e Ex Primeiro Ministro por tres ocasións). Dito motivo provocou, entre outros feitos, un gran número de artigos xornalísticos falando da súa relevancia histórica[1].

Mais analizando ditos artigos ponse o acento especialmente nalgúns elementos da súa vida, resaltado a “súa contribución á Paz”[2]. Pola contra, moito menos era mencionado o seu pasado en Haganá[3].

É interesante observar como ao longo do tempo aqueles grupos, como Haganá, que eran considerados terroristas maioritariamente, na actualidade son considerados “organización defensiva hebrea, que operaba bajo las órdenes de la Agencia Judía para Israel, entre 1920 y 1948, predecesora, junto con otras organizaciones paramilitares, del actual ejército israelí conocido como las IDF o Tzahal” (Fuentes y Pellicer, 2016)[4] [5].

¿Cal pode ser a razón deste cambio? Benjamin Walter (2007) dinos “con quién se compenetra el historiador universal nacionalista. La respuesta suena inevitable: con el vencedor. Pero los amos eventuales son los herederos de todos aquellos que han vencido […] Quien quiera que haya conducido la victoria hasta el día de hoy, participa en el cortejo triunfal en el cual los dominadores de hoy pasan sobre aquellos que hoy yacen en la tierra”.

En definitiva, algúns grupos ou Estados que en determinada época foran considerados terroristas, co paso do tempo deixan de selo por diversas razóns e son aceptados como membros efectivos do escenario internacional en pé de igualdade cos demais Estados[6] [7].

No caso español as cousas sucederon doutro xeito. Primeiramente, cómpre destacar que a inclusión de diferentes nacións dentro dun Estado normalmente da lugar ó predominio dunha nación sobre as demais. O conflito é que o que podería ser unha alternativa teórica admisible (o Estado plurinacional), na práctica normalmente conduce a situacións no que o Estado beneficia a unha das súas parte e discrimina a outras. Mentres que todos os individuos son considerados cidadáns, existe unha discriminación á vez derivada do feito de que o Estado intenta inculcar unha cultura e valores comúns co obxectivo de acabar creando unha soa nación[8].

Ante esta falta de coexistencia entre nación e Estado, hai dúas saídas posibles. O Estado pode ter éxito e acabar absorbendo as diferentes nacións, o que supón a eliminación das culturas minoritarias e rematar sendo un perfecto Estado-nación (véxase Francia). Ou ben, non acabar conseguindo acadar o seu obxectivo e activándose un sentimento de ataque por parte das minorías ante un Estado alleo, o que provocaría que “no son las naciones las que crearon los Estados modernos, sino los Estados modernos los que crearon las naciones, tal como las conocemos” (Palti, 2002). Neste contexto, as minorías nacionais elaboran estratexias de rexeitamento, que pasan pola resistencia cultural e/ou a loita armada.

España é un bo exemplo de dificultade de homoxeneización nacional e que conta cunha resistencia tanto cultural como armada. No caso de Euskadi a resistencia foi dobre debido as accións de ETA. Nos casos de Galicia e Cataluña a resistencia foi e é principalmente cultural. Mais durante os anos 70 e comezo dos 90 foran activas en Cataluña as organizacións Terra Lliure, o Exèrcit Popular Català, o Front d’Alliberament de Catalunya  e o Arxiu. En Galicia, o Exercito Guerrilheiro do Pobo Galego a pesar de pequenas accións esporádicas ou de pouco alcance, demostra como en Cataluña que existía espazo para accións violentas. Recentemente, cabe aínda mencionar que a Audiencia Nacional acusou a outro pequeno grupo galego de terrorista, Resistencia Galega.

¿Que pasa entón para que estas organizacións non se consoliden e entren en decadencia? A resposta é complexa, pero poderiamos afirmar que as novas iniciativas destes grupos para prolongar as súas dinámicas de protesta conducen a unha espiral de violencia-represión-desalento. O pesimismo abre unha fase de apatía tanto sobre o contido das acción como sobre a súa lexitimidade. Deste xeito, os menos que van quedando vanse radicalizando e illando, e a súa utopía decae. Así, comezan a primar formas de protesta máis convencionais integradas no novo contexto político-social (Tarrow, 1991). Prodúcese pois o esgotamento dos movementos polo fracaso da súa estratexia, pola presión do Estado, ou porque obteñen un éxito parcial ou total das súas reclamacións que se institucionalizaron, ou poden converterse nun movemento diferente (Raschke, 1994).

Xente como Shimon Peres non cometeu ditos erros e por iso non son terroristas, senón liberadores nacionais…

“La nación como problema. Los historiadores y la cuestión nacional”, Elías Palti, Bos Aires: FCE, 2002, p.15

“Sobre el Concepto de la Historia. Conceptos de la Filosofía de la Historia”, Walter Benjamín,  La Plata: Derramar Ediciones, 2007, pp. 68-69

“Sobre el concepto de movimiento social”, J Raschke, Zona Abierta, 69, 1994, pp. 121-134

“Struggle, Politics and Reform: Collective Action, Social Movements, and Cycles of Protest”, Cornell Studies in International Affairs/Western Societies Program, Occasional Paper, S Tarrow, Cornell University, Ithaca: Center for International Studies, 21, 1991, pp. 41-56

[1] Ó día 01/10/2016 ascendían en Google News a 2.580.000 (procura “Shimon Peres”)

[2] Ascendía (“Shimon Peres + Peace”) a 351.000

[3] (“Shimon Peres + Haganah”) 2.620

[4] A modo de indicador, pódese observar que na biblioteca da Universidade de Georgetown as publicacións de “Haganah + terrorist” aumentan no período 1921-1960 de 625 a 2924 no que vai de 1990 á actualidade, isto é un multiplicador de 4,67. Contra isto “Haganah liberation movement” ascende de 27 a 783, ou sexa, un multiplicador de 29,00.

[5]http://www.seguridadinternacional.es/?q=es/content/setenta-a%C3%B1os-del-atentado-del-hotel-rey-david-de-jerusal%C3%A9n#_ftn6

[6] “En 1993, la mayoría de estos artículos [periodísticos] asocian [el terrorismo] con los musulmanes […] (especialmente Libia[non posteriormente á morte de Gadafi], Irak [non trala execución de Hussein] […] Virtualmente ningún artículo en el NYT o en el WP asocia tal acto con otros actores o lugares de la violencia política en el mundo (por ejemplo, El Salvador), como una forma de exclusividad tópica y léxica que en sí misma expresa una posición ideológica” http://segundaslenguaseinmigracion.com/L2ycomptext/Anlisisideolgico.pdf

[7] Fatah, anteriormente considerado terrorista, é agora visto como un actor relevante nos procesos de negociación.

[8] “Nationalisms”, M Guibernau, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996

The post ¿Shimon Peres, terrorista ou liberador?: leccións para Galeusca appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Might we see a renewal of the Community method which has retreated somewhat since the banking and euro crisis? If this is not achievable, does this mean there are limitations to free movement of services in the single market that cannot be avoided and will this confirm a turn towards differentiated integration?

Start-ups (formerly unicorns and now decacorns) of the so-called ‘sharing’ economy like Uber and Airbnb have become enormously popular and vehicles for high-value venture capital. Uber, for example, is reported as having received a $3.5 billion investment from the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund making its potential capitalisation at $70 billion equal to that of Daimler and more than BMW, GM and Honda.

‘Sharing’ in these cases is a misnomer. There is little or no element of ‘sharing’ (as in lending/borrowing, or ‘what’s mine is yours’). On the contrary, these are new forms of profit-seeking by mass exploitation of consumer needs or preferences made possible by Information and Communications Technology (ICT) platforms, that would have been familiar to the robber barons of the nineteenth century. Hence their attractiveness for venture capital. While this may be so, some see the new services as a welcome and overdue response to ‘regulatory capture’ by private monopolies in which the state has an interest in preserving.

Why does it matter – now? Two concerns are becoming apparent and are demanding the attention of public policy. The first is the negative environmental and societal externalities caused and which go unpaid by them (e.g. C. Crouch, R. Mejia, European Parliament).

The second, is the incoherent response to them by national jurisdictions. In some EU Member States (MS), such as the UK, Ireland and some Baltic members, these services are permitted or lightly regulated, whereas in others (the majority) they are either completely banned (in the case of Uber) or heavily restricted, although they operate widely ‘under the radar’. This matters because free movement of services and the right of establishment is one of the four pillars of the single market, itself the engine and most tangible expression of EU integration since the Treaty of Maastricht. While this inconsistency has latterly become of concern to the EU institutions, namely the European Commission (EC), the European Parliament (EP; 2015 and 2016), the Committee of the Regions and the European Economic and Social Committee, it has attracted little if any scholarly attention.

It was precisely in order to establish the ‘rules of the game’, that the Services Directive was approved by the co-legislators and transposed into national law throughout the EU by 2009. Its gestation was, however, highly contested politically (recall the storm over the Polish plumbers at the time of the original, ill-fated Bolkestein directive and the final version was the result of an intense compromise, with more areas of economic activity categorised as services being excluded than included). There is also lack of clarity over what is a single market competence and what is reserved for MS authority. Is Uber a taxi service, hence excluded under ‘Transportation’ (although the Treaty is not specific) or is it, as Uber claims, ‘merely’ an IP-enabled information service and therefore should not be excluded. A preliminary ruling sought by the government of Spain is awaited from the European Court of Justice (ECJ). Treatment under national regulations must in any case respect the principles of non-discrimination, proportionality and necessity when exclusion is justified for ‘overriding reasons of public interest’ (ORPI).

A briefing by the EP’s Transport and Tourism Committee acknowledged a ‘European’ dimension to regulating Uber and similar ‘transportation network companies’ rather than leaving it to individual MS, proposing that:

The first novelty brought by TNCs into the legal landscape is that they have a clear European dimension in an area where Member States were traditionally strongly opposed to European legislation. TNCs, as providers of information and communication technology services, are covered by European provisions on free movement of services and freedom of establishment, and their services are a part of the Digital Single Market’  . . .  Therefore, European institutions have the competence to bring together the fragmented response to TNCs which is happening at the national level. This could be done through legislation, regulatory actions or the judiciary.

In June 2016, the EC published an ‘Agenda for the collaborative economy’, setting out guidelines for MS to follow. These guidelines are described as ‘non-binding’ and under them, MS are invited to review their legislation to ensure that it is in conformity with EU law, which, as suggested, is by no means clear. Only ‘in the last resort’ should these services be banned.

The EC has little power of implementation or enforcement. It has suggested that the aforementioned response of the MS will be monitored, that it will defend its stance as guardian of the Treaty at the ECJ and that it will bring forward amendments, if required, to the Services Directive and to the Mutual Recognition Regulation.

Two fertile areas of research are raised by these developments. First, looking backward, why are there such differences in the regulatory position of MS towards the sharing or collaborative economy in general and, specifically, the P2P for-profit model? For these, interesting approaches of socio-economic ideologies and institutional path dependencies which overlap with the Varieties of Capitalism  typology could be employed (e.g. Hall and Soskice, Hanké et al.). Issues of autonomy, sovereignty, legitimacy and trust are also important and there are rich literatures through which to view all of these.

Looking forward from now, how might a regulatory approach emerge which is consistent with the free movement of services pillar? Will the EC’s ‘framework’ guidance, the promptings of the EP and the rulings of the ECJ be sufficient? Wallace (Chapter 4) identified a number of policy modes in the classic Community method, among them a Regulatory mode and Policy Coordination, with which she associated the EU’s flexibility and resilience in dealing with policy diversity among member states. Might we see a renewal of the Community method which has, it is argued, retreated somewhat since the banking and euro crisis of recent years? If this is not achievable, at least in the near term, does this mean there are limitations to free movement of services in the single market that cannot be avoided and will this confirm a turn towards differentiated integration, a hypothesis that has long been proposed (e.g. Howarth and Sadeh, Leruth and Lord) and might also be increasingly observable in other areas of what have been considered to be of common interest?

The post How does differentiated integration affect or is affected by policy responses to the disruptive innovations of the ‘collaborative’ or ‘sharing’ economy in the EU’s single market? appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Presented below is the text of the Presidential order of the President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Junker to the Commission (College, DGs, etc), providing that no negotiations with Great Britain are to take place in relation to its exit from the EU (Brexit) before an official notification of TEU article 50 is received, obtained exclusively by Alexandros Kyriakidis and EU & Democracy.

This is the “Presidential order” (as referenced by the European Commission President Jean-Claude Junker), stipulating “no notification, no negotiation” in relation to Brexit.

You may also view the original on Scribd here.

Brussels, 28 June 2016
Dear Colleagues,
Further to last week’s referendum in the United Kingdom, there is a need for the Commission to be clear and certain in the process that we can now expect to take place. While we expect the United Kingdom to honour the democratic choice of its
people as soon as possible, we also will not agree to any negotiation, formal or informal, before we receive a notification on the basis of Article 50 of the Treaty on the European Union.

I have asked Alexander Italianer, Secretary-General, to coordinate centrally all Commission actions, initiatives or responses related to the follow-up. to the UK referendum. In my Cabinet, this process will be followed by Richard Szostak, my Diplomatic Adviser.

All Directorates-General and services of the Commission are asked to strictly respect the principle of no negotiation without notification and the central role of the Secretariat-General. This covers requests for appearances in the other institutions or bodies, questions from the European Parliament, opinions and inquiries from national Parliaments, intended visits by Commissioners and officials to the United Kingdom, all related correspondence and queries and requests for access to documents. This is, of course, not an exhaustive list and I invite you to remain vigilant and to flag any other issues that may be of relevance.

In the meantime, the work of the Commission will continue and our agenda of priorities and our work programme will be rolled out with determination, in close cooperation with the European Parliament and the Council. We will also continue to make sure that EU law is applied and implemented in the 28 Member States.

Yours sincerely,

[signature]

Members of the College
Cc: Heads of Cabinet, Directors-General

The post BREXIT EXCLUSIVE: The Presidential Order by Jean-Claude Junker for no Brexit negotiation before TEU Art. 50 Notification appeared first on Ideas on Europe.