Even when European finality is attained, we will still be British or German, French or Polish. The nation-states will continue to exist, and they will retain a much larger role at the European level than the Länder have in Germany. And in such a Federation the principle of subsidiarity will be constitutionally enshrined.
These three reforms – the solution of the democracy problem and the need for a fundamental reordering of competences both horizontally, i.e. among the European institutions, and vertically, i.e. between Europe, the nation-state, and the regions – will only be able to succeed if Europe is established anew with a constitution. In other words: through the realization of the project of a European constitution centered on basic, human and civil rights, an equal division of powers between European institutions, and a precise delineation between the European and nation-state levels. The main axis of such a European constitution will be the relationship between the Federation and the nation-state. Let me not be misunderstood: this has nothing whatsoever to do with a return to renationalization, quite the contrary.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The question that is becoming more and more urgent today is this: can this vision of a Federation be achieved through the existing method of integration, or must this method itself, the central element of the integration process to date, be cast into doubt?
In the past, European integration was based on the “Monnet method” with its communitarization approach to European institutions and policy. This gradual process of integration, with no blueprint for the final state, was conceived in the 1950s for the economic integration of a small group of countries. Successful as it was in that scenario, this approach has proven to be of only limited use in the political integration and democratization of Europe. Where it was not possible for all EU members to move ahead, smaller groups of countries of varying composition took the lead, as was the case with the Economic and Monetary Union and with Schengen.
Does the answer, then, to the twin challenge of enlargement and deepening lie in such a differentiation, an enhanced cooperation in some areas? Precisely in an enlarged and thus necessarily more heterogeneous Union, further differentiation will be inevitable. Facilitating this process is thus one of the priorities of the intergovernmental conference.
However, increasing differentiation will also entail new problems: a loss of European identity, of internal coherence, as well as the danger of an internal erosion of the EU, should ever larger areas of intergovernmental cooperation loosen the nexus of integration. Even today, a crisis of the Monnet method can no longer be overlooked, a crisis that cannot be solved according to the method’s own logic.
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