The Dutch would be allowed to have a say on agricultural subsidies to France and Spain, for example, which to me is pretty big, as that's where the most EU money is wasted on. Also abolishing the veto is good news for Holland, as the Dutch traditionally form a block with the Northern Europeans and the other smaller countires and now through majority voting they can much better promote their own agenda. And then there's the directives that help us protect our liberal luvvy laws on abortion, euthanasia and such, they can't touch that anymore now. Plenty of good news.
Well, I voted yes three months ago, but nevertheless AFCA has some points. First, let me tell you that I did vote yes because I thougt that an increasingly politically unified Europe is a good idea; though I don't like the exact road we are taking with the constitution, I balanced what I believed were pros and cons ond decided in favor of taking a small step forward instead of a big one backward. Was this wise? I'm not sure, IMO only time will tell, but, hey, after all Europe has been very good for my country. BTW I managed to read about 70% of the treaty. The countries and their respective problems are too diverse to be ruled by one superstate. Conflicting interests and stages of development combined with the fact that many if not all nations are mainly concerned with what europe can do for them and how much they can get out of it does not comfort me. I don't think any member state constitution has anything about actual standards, though I believe this is a very valid concern. This, and tax harmonization should be implemented. I'd say this would have exactly the opposite effect. Where is this and why is it bad? Where is this from? Another very valid concern, I'd love to have a really effective European Parliament, even with transnational parties. But have in mind that reaching an agreement between 25 parties is lengthy, and steps must be careful. The Dutch, though performing bad in recent times, are still way richer than, say, the Spaniards. Which is your GDP per capita? And have in mind that you can sell your light bulbs without taxes to us... Me neither. Virtually all other countries are trying to change this right now. This is nowhere in the treaty. Finally, I would want to point that the ampliation to the East has been hastily made in a bad economical moment and this is probably the root of many problems the EU has tight now.
AFCA is right, the Dutch pay 0.51% of their national income for EU membership and with that they're paying by far the most. Germany is second with 0.36% of their national income, all the others pay around 0.30%. Add to that the fact that the strongest performing economy in Europe, the UK gets an automatic 5 billion Euro rebate on their EU membership EVERY YEAR (negotiated by Thatcher decades ago because the British economy was in trouble then, and for some reason the arrangement has continued) plus the by now frankly ludicrous agricultural subsidies paid out to Spain and France, and you can probably understand why the Dutch are not happy bunnies. The simple fact is that the Dutch pay more yet get less in return, financially that is. That said I don't think that's what the vote on the EU consitution should be about. The EU is essentially a good organisation. There has been no war and there have been no conflicts within EU borders, and that is pretty massive. Anti EU Europeans seem to have forgotten what state the continent was is in pre-EU days in the 20th century. I'm pretty confident that things will improve.
Oh dont worry about that. They are a principled and very strong-willed people. They will stick with it thru thick and thin...
Dont know about that. I find it funny, though, that Chancellour Schroeder is visiting France to convince them of EU evil plan. I think if they get aware of him they will be even more convinced to vote "NON". lol
What does a Europe look like as solely the EEC (European Economic Community)? No elected European voice (European Parliament, elected by the peoples of the Member States); rather, economic elites shape the nature of the relationship. You'd love that now, because the Netherlands is doing well right now; but the nature of capitalist systems of consideration are that they experience cyclic downturns, recessions and depressions (the worst of which can only be staved off by war). I wonder how you'd feel then. Keep the Parliament? For what? With what power? With no set of decision-rules, nothing is enforceable over the mid and long-term; a set of individual mini-treaties positions weaker members in places ripe for exploitation, in that survival of the "fittest" dynamic global capital markets demand. No prob for the Dutch, until that tiered dynamic brings more refugees to your doorstep, or to the doorstep of a neighboring nation, which takes such in for cheap labour, which then attracts Dutch businesses...no, we've seen the EEC resultant before. Where is the agrred-upon playing field where Europe's nation-states dialogue if it isn't the Council of the European Union (representing the governments of the Member States)? Help me understand the body of law that affirms the Court of Justice (ensuring compliance with the law), if there's no Constitution. There's certainly no need for a Court of Auditors (controlling sound and lawful management of the EU budget), but what else does that Court do that will be sorely missed? What interests do the European Economic and Social Committees represent, and waht will fill the gap noticeable by their resultant absence? Is a combined economic and social awareness across the region important? Was it ever important? Why might it remain so? How do you empower such discussion without an agreed-upon set of decision-rules? The Committee of the Regions would go away, but in the pure EEC environ left, what would be the legal status of opinions of regional and local authorities, and complaints to them? Or would this post-EU world be one in which regional and local elected authority simply made themselves subject to the aspect of public discourse and public policy that, in a pure economic environ, would have to be simply extensions of the marketplace? Even with a solely EEC framework, there's no need for a European Central Bank, because the Bank's job is common monetary policy and managing the euro); No need for a Euro if the EEC framework is what it distills down to, because within that framework every nation is out for self, not unlike your concerns that the Netherlands, right now, seem to be carrying Europe's water. Without Union, and with solely an economic sensibility, everyone rests replete in that thinking. No need for a common currency in that case; everyone's currency brings the national power to the int'l table that they can muster for it themsleves. Of course, the entrenchment of the dollar and the ascendancy of China and India, along with declining birth rates in Europe (with the exceptions of France and Denmark, and they are marginal), means that you get picked off one by one by those nations who bring more of the macrostats to bear...but, whatever...here comes the GM food... The European Investment Bank, which helps achieve EU objectives like precautionary principality and sustainable development by financing investment projects along those lines would not be needed; in fact, in a solely economic environ, notions like the Precautionary principle and sustainable development are patently stupid, because economics is corporate, and corporations are quarterly, and thus competition, and institutonal veracity is measured in that way. In that world, acquiescing to notions like sustainable development is a competitive weakness, so that would be among the first things to go, which, in terms of US competition and Chinese competition, would be great for them, because current standards (that would fall away without the legal Union to establish their veracity and their comprehensiveness) inhibit their ability to treat the world as one big marketplace unfettered by social or long-term sensibility. If a seamless communications grid, a seamless transportation grid, and a fully unified internal market aren't specifically viable for one nation or another, that's out of the window too. Enjoy being forced to employ French mobile companies, at high rates, when travleing to Paris; the French will love paying your companies the same foolish rates when they go to Einhoven... In the EU Europe has a small window - 50 years - to set forth a countervailing vision to the American model. You've established farewell (or "welfare") states that for most ofthe post-war period competed highly favorable against the US and other models in terms of not only productivity, but crime, education, universal health care, environment, land use, etc. As the US model is "neoconized," and becomes more rampant, and as China and India come on-line, they'd like nothing more than a Europe they could pick off nation by nation, a Europe bereft of the vision that said to the world "There's a way to maximize the enterpreneurial nature of the market while placing into a context reflective of the truth that marginalized peoples kill themselves and others, and we're the battleground of a millennia of that truth, and our commitment to a new way of being in the world is steeped in the blood of that nightmare of tribal/nationalist separatism and resultant tiered systems and marginalization and exploitation and suffering. We're throwing in our lot together, on the shared value of 'Never again'." Too bad for the world that when it comes down to it, Europe seems at least divided on the seemingly absurd question of whether to retreat into the former tribalism/nationalism (and folks think that predicating it all on a solely economic relationship will make it better? it will make it FAR FAR WORSE!!!), or whether or not to push forward in valuing the things it's donw ell, maximizing them by embracing the truths behind them, and offering a countervailing vision to the ones being offered now. Too bad for the world. See, as Jeremy Rifkin rightly assessed, the US overhypes its approach, and Europe undersells its approach. Employment is a big one, right? Well, when you look at REAL unemployment in both regions, as a Univ. of Chicago study did (we don't count truly underemployed and those who drop off the system and prisoners), real unemployment is about the same in both regions. When you take a look at the paycheck, Americans are 36% percent richer, no doubt. But we also have much higher crime, no universal preventative health care, worse primary and secondary school education (our universities, and especially our grad schools, seem to be much better), and live to work (worse quality of life). Under the neocon expression of America currently underway, we codify the opposite of sustainable development and work to authentically both deregulate the globe and to remove the public voice of the citizen and replace it solely with the wallet-voting of the consumer..."human" as economic being, as opposed to the economic aspects of humanity one in a spectrum of attributes. The EU Constitution was codifying broadly a different vision; the best traditions you have established out the rubble of war, and it's being pissed down the crapper as the discussion descends into things that led to war in the first place. And all that's happening is that, in working so hard to defeat any sense of Europe beyond the economic, and an individually national sense of THAT, you are leaving yourselves in no position to engage those bringing more economic and population power to bear. Enjoy Monsanto execs "accidently" allowing cross-border pollination of your agriculture with their licensed seed, for example, and the resultant paying of them a license to EAT in perpetuity. That's what a solely economic model will get you. The members of the Erasmus generation who increasingly referred to themselves as European have to continental voice other than that of a consumer... ...which is exactly the way that economic elites want us to see ourselves. The idea of coming together to also offer a social vision, a values vision? For those voting no, that's absurd, they say, as they head off to Hollywood films and pull on GAP jeans and post on American soccer boards in American standard english and wonder why their culture is disappearing anyway... Do what you want; I'm not European. But the clock is ticking, and there's no Plan B and if you want less personal and national power (and how can more autonomy be used if you have less power? It's like choosing to be rich and in jail as opposed to being middle class and free), not more, as bigger fish make themselves felt on your communities, without the protections that the EU project was offering, vote "no." I'll pray for ya.