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These are older articles, but interesting to say the least.



EU Enlargement and the Transatlantic Relationship

Ambassador Dr. Günter Burghardt
Head of the European Commission Delegation to the United States

The Executives’ Club of Chicago
11 March 2004


Introduction

It is a great pleasure to be with you today in Chicago, a city with longstanding economic and family ties to Europe. Chicago has a famous history of immigration from all parts of Europe in continuous waves during the past centuries. Many residents of Chicago have familial bonds with the new EU Member States of Central Europe, and Poland in particular, where my own ancestry is also based.

The soon to be realized enlargement of the European Union and its implications for the transatlantic relationship are indeed very happy reasons to return to the Executives’ Club, following my last visit in 2001. I wish to thank again Kaarina Koskenalusta for her kind invitation. Kaarina has already witnessed the accession of her native Finland to the European Union in 1995, and I know that she has done much to encourage transatlantic understanding in this important city. She will now see Hungary, the country she represents, join the EU as well. I am also grateful to Charles Sheehan, Consul General of Ireland, which currently holds the EU Presidency—as capably as before—for his assistance in coordinating my visit, and to John Estey, President and CEO of S&C Electric Company, for serving as chair of the international committee.

We have much to discuss because EU Enlargement is truly a historic step for Europe, with many benefits for the transatlantic relationship.



EU Enlargement: State of Play

On May 1, 2004, only a few weeks from today, ten new countries will join the EU as fully-fledged members. From the Baltics to the Mediterranean, the eight Central European countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Slovenia) and two Mediterranean island states (Cyprus and Malta) will increase the EU’s population by more than 80 million, from 370 million to over 450 million, expand its territory to one-and-one-half million square miles and nearly double its official languages from eleven to twenty. In comparison, the United States has a population of around 290 million with a territory of 3.7 million square miles and English as its common if not official language.

To give you some idea of the magnitude of what EU enlargement means politically, imagine a United States not just of the current fifty states, but of ten sovereign nation-states stretching from Canada’s Arctic Circle all the way down to the Panama Canal. I would not wish to upset our hostess with such a federalist vision, having noted that the formidable Margaret Thatcher is her heroine. Nor would I presume to make a direct comparison between the US and the still undetermined outcome of the EU’s ongoing constitutional process. That process is itself a consequence of enlargement, addressing the logical concerns that the political institutions of an EU extended to twenty-five would come to a grinding halt, and aimed at keeping the process of European unity resolutely on the path to a "sui generis" federation of nation-states. Whatever terminology one wishes to use, however, the EU represents much more than a Free Trade Area Ã* la NAFTA or the recently concluded CAFTA between the US and Central America.

To be comparable, NAFTA and CAFTA together would have to require that all members are part of a fully-fledged customs, economic and monetary union evolving toward political union. They would negotiate all trade agreements, be they bilateral, regional or in the WTO, as one block. All members would be subject to the same anti-trust and internal market rules. And these rules would be administered by a supranational authority, perhaps in the shape of a Guatemalan anti-trust czar headquartered in Quebec. All members would also subject themselves to the ultimate jurisdiction of a Joint North and Central American Court, interpreting disputes based on a body of supranational law. That Court might still have headquarters in Washington, but with only one American among the ten justices, and perhaps a Mexican jurist presiding as Chief Justice. The North and Central American House of Representatives, naturally based in Miami, would include three times as many seats for Mexican delegates as for those from California.

This may seem totally outlandish to most Americans, but these and many other steps toward a more unified regional political and economic entity are precisely what the enlargement of the European Union entails. With entry into the EU, the ten new members will be represented in all the European institutions through Commissioners at the European Commission, directly elected Members of the European Parliament and their governments will have seats and votes in the European Council of Ministers, the ultimate decision-making body of the EU. They will immediately be part and parcel of the decision-making process, enjoying the same rights and obligations as the existing fifteen.

The fact that the new members represent some 20% of the existing EU population, with only 5% of the actual GDP of those already there, also indicates the magnitude and challenge of the undertaking. With enlargement, the gap in income distribution within the EU25 will rise by about 20%—twice as much as the increase when the EU took in Greece, Spain and Portugal in the eighties. Much work has been done to prepare the new members for accession—the EU has already spent the current dollar value equivalent of two Marshall Plans on the accession process, with more "structural" funding planned to assist new members to improve their infrastructure and administrative capacities.

Beyond the 1 May enlargement to twenty-five members, negotiations are continuing with Romania and Bulgaria with a view to these countries joining in 2007. This year the Commission will also make a recommendation to the European Council on Turkey, assessing whether progress made in its reform process will allow negotiations on accession to start sometime next year.

These prospective further enlargements raise many additional challenges. Let me illustrate that in the area of agriculture. The ten new members joining on May 1 have in total four million farms, as compared to nearly seven million in the current EU15, for a total of eleven million farms in the EU of twenty-five. By comparison, there are only a little more than two million farms in the US. An EU of twenty-seven, with Romania and Bulgaria, adds another five million for a total of about sixteen million farms.

Similarly, the numbers of people working in the agricultural sector will grow considerably, from four percent of total working population in the EU15, to five-and-one-half percent in the EU25, and seven-and-one-half percent in the EU27, again adding Romania and Bulgaria. The comparable figure for the US is a little more than two percent.

In dealing with these challenges, financial support within the Common Agricultural Policy in the EU of twenty-five will stay at about today’s level for the EU15, while structural funding will be devoted to creating employment and sustainable economic development in rural areas.

The door to eventual membership is also open to the Balkan countries. For Croatia, the process has already started, and if Zagreb manages to meet the political criteria fully, negotiations on accession may start soon. Macedonia would also have recently presented their application were it not for the tragic air crash that took the life of President Trajkovski.



Political Impacts of EU Enlargement

That is a thumbnail overview of the current state of EU enlargement. What will this mean for the future of Europe and the transatlantic relationship?
In a political context, EU enlargement is a historic step towards the long cherished goal, on both sides of the Atlantic, of a Europe "whole, free, at peace and growing in prosperity," as articulated by successive US Presidents. After generations in which internal conflict in Europe posed one of the most serious security threats to the United States, the Western alliance and world peace, the unification of Europe by consent is a major strategic prize for the US as well as Europe. EU enlargement ensures that the democratic transition in Central and Eastern Europe is irreversible. Projecting security and political stability east and south, the EU serves not only its own security and geopolitical interests, but those of the United States too.

The prospect of EU accession for Cyprus and eventually Turkey is also contributing significantly to the easing and possible resolution of disputes in the Eastern Mediterranean, a longstanding security concern for both Europe and the US. We have indeed seen very hopeful progress recently in Cyprus, bringing the possibility of a negotiated solution to a situation that since 1974 has often seemed intractable.

The enlarged EU, in the context of the EU’s developing Common Foreign and Security Policy and European Security Strategy, will enable Europe to become an even more effective international partner of the US in tackling regional and global problems of mutual concern, from stabilizing the Balkans and the Caucasus to dealing with instability in the wider Middle East and beyond, and tackling terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and international crime.

As more and more countries seek closer and deeper relations with the EU, and the question is raised of how far Europe’s frontiers extend, full membership cannot be the only response on the menu. That is why we have developed a “European Neighborhoodâ€