NATIONS WILL TRADE SOME SOVEREIGNTY FOR TRADE, BUT NOTHING ELSE:

From Dream Into Nightmare (Alan Sked, 02.11.2011, The European)

So the European Ideal is now faced with a reality check. Do Europeans actually think of themselves as citizens of one country? Do they actually believe they have common ethical, social and political standards? Do they want to share their savings and their salaries with one another? Do they actually trust one another to follow the rules and not to cheat? Would a fiscal union be a solution to Europe's problems or an economic suicide pact?

Some of us see Europe as a state system rather than a single state. We believe in common values as aspirations but recognize that Europe is a diverse community of historical actors with different political and social cultures and that this diversity should be tolerated and respected. We see the attempt by bureaucrats in Brussels to create plastic, assembly-line citizens for a plastic Union as un-European and unrealistic.

We liked EFTA which allowed Europe's natural units--nation states--to trade freely without a suffocating blanket of central regulation.

We still believe that Europeans can coexist peacefully and in prosperity outside a straightjacket of federal law.

Posted by oj at November 7, 2011 6:04 AM
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