EUROPEAN POLITICS
DISCUSS THE CHALLENGE OF ENLARGEMENT FOR THE EUROPEAN UNION

By Carolina Valsecchi

and

Florian Schuebeler

Introduction

"The end of the Cold War and disintegration of the Soviet Union therefore presented a historic opportunity to reintegrate Europe culturally, politically, and economically. EU enlargement into Central and Eastern Europe is an important part of that process."(Dinan)
When the discussions about Eastern Enlargement first came up in the EU, the priority was on EMU project and TEU implementation . Therefore, EU strategy Enlargement only gradually emerged; mainly consisting for the period between 1991-1998 in the further development and intergration of the economic and political CEECs trought European Agreements .
Since the 1996 ICG in spite of various attempts at reform, the EU has failed to reach agreement on the key issues as a result of national and sectorial interests prevailing.But reforms were budly needed: a budget reform as "without such reform the admission of relatively poor and farm-intensive CEECs could bankrupt the EU budget"(M.Baun) and a substancial reform of the decision-making institutions in order to absorb 12 new members .
Despite this there are many factors that leads us to think that from 1999 in the EU there has been a major impetus toward reform for enlargement.
Among these the new Commission of July 1999, headed by President Romano Prodi, with the precise goal of cutting through the EU′s accumulated inefficiencies; the appointment of commissioner Guenter Verheugen with the sole responsibility for eastward expansion. and the weaknesses showned by the EU in the Kosovo crisis was a further catalyst
for reform. In this renewed athmosphere we belive the EU has started to move the big machine reform with the summits of Berlin in 1999 and Nice in 2000. We will focus on these summits in our analysis.
How the EU has faced the challenge of the enlargement through these reforms? Has the EU really overtaken the national interests that were avoiding previous agreements ? these lines will conduct our analisys.

Reform of the budgetary system

The EU can be heavely criticized for its inability to deal effectively with the major reforms that the Enlargement required .In the `90s its attitude was maily intervining in the candidates countries with economic aid and cooperation .But still the EU was too devided by sectoral and national interests to agree on a reform package in with a view to Enlargement.
Yet now we can finally say that the EU is going in the direction of " reform it self in the face of unprecedented change "(Bowker,2000:p.221) and finally agreed in Berlin on the important issue of the reform of the budgetary system for the period 2000-2006 .The package approved is a reform of the CAP and the Structural and Cohesion Funds that toghether cover more than 80% of the Union′s budget.
The CAP has been reformed by reducing the price support mesures to the farmers in order to spend on a new rural policy that should sustain the transformation of the agricultural economies of the East .The 2/3 of the Structural Funds , meant for those regions whose development is lagging behind , are going to be redistributed between the countries with a per capita GDP below 75% of the EU average .The eligibility for the Cohesion Funds is going to be rechecked against the 90% of the GDP criteria and reduced accordingly shoud a State be no more eligible (Agenda 2000) .
However , all these reforms have been made in a financial framework that is leaving the costs for the Enlargement at the present level of budget expediture . How radical can a reform be that creates conditions of entry in the Union for 12 countries , with 22% of labour employed in agriculture (against the actual 5% of the EU) and with an average GDP at 1/3 of the EU level , with no possibility of investing there new resources ?
This question led me to agree with BreffniO′Rourke that this reform merely "discipline[d] the EU′s extravagant spending habits and stabilize budget costs", but this seems to be more "a trimmig of existing lines rather than anything truly innovative ".
Nevertheless, Gerhard Schroeder at the precidency of the EU told journalists that the summit has been "extraordinaly succesfull". Indeed , he sais the acceptance of the reform package "shows the EU can work cohesively and is moving towards greater unity"(O′Rourke,1999)
Is the EU really moving towards a greater unity in dealing with these reforms necessary to the Enlarlargement?
Germany and the Netherlands, the two biggest contributors to the EU budget, are still worried about capping the budget expediture at the present level, proposing thet national governaments should pay part of the subsidies to the farmers.
As the Commissioner for Enlargement Guenter Verheugen said "Spain or France fear they could be forced to relinquish some of their benefits and will fight to avoid this ".
The Southern States lead by Spain are still demanding that their own development aid does not fall significantly after Enlargement. Spain is meanwhile using the accession talks as a new instrument to be heard , "blocking an agreement on a EU common position on worker′s movement after expansion" counting that "without a common position , talks with leading candidates will stall" (Lubiakas,2001) .

Reform of the decision-making institutions

"Eastern Enlargement requiers substantial internal EU reforms [...] not at least because the present EU [...] operates with an institutional system originaly designed for six members."(Baun, 1999: p.280). It is unlikely that the member states have not concidered the inefficency and lack of effectivnes in decision-making, but in fact it looks like the disaster during the Kosovo conflict was necessary to wake them up. "The Kosovo crisis has strechted the EU′s decision-making process to the limit at a time when it was creaking forward with the thorny task of eastward expansion."(O′Rourke, 1999). As a result, in Nice, the EU has started with institutional reforms in three areas:

- size of the commission
- use of Qualified Majority Voting (QMV)
- role of veto
- weighting of votes

In the end, the 15 member states managed to reach an agreemnent about the size of the commission after the Enlargement. Spain, Italy, France, Germany and Britain have agreed to give up their second commissioner. As a result, from 2005, the Commission will have 27 members, one from each m,ember state. However, having agreed to this compromise, these countries started to fight even harder about the weight of votes in the Council and in which areas the veto was removed and replaced by QMV. "The veto was removed from 29 of 70 Treaty articles where it still applied; but in important areas national interests prevented movement."(George/Bache, 2001: p.416). So while Britain refused to remove the veto from tax and social security aspects, Germany and France refused the removal of veto for many parts of asylum and imigration harmonisation. Spain, supported by Portugal and Greece managed to get a veto on the reconstructure the cohesion funds, which is highly problematic for the economical preperation process of the EU for Enlargement. For the 29 Treaty articles where veto was removed they had to find a way of weighting the votes under QMV. The most powerful countries, Germany, France, Britain and Italy, will gain 29 votes each, Spain and Poland 27.(Nice, 2000). In total there will be 342 votes. Further they agreed that every decision made by QMV has to be supported by 62% of EU′s population. "The re-weighting, which would apply from 1 January 2005, left the small and medium-sized states with a smaller percentage of the total votes relative the larger states than under the previous system."(George/Bache, 2001: p.416). But thats not all. To fix the support on 62% left France, Germany and Britain, or any two of them plus Italy, in a very strong position. Effectivly they could block every decission if they agree in a common interest.(Nice, 2000).
As these examples about the outcome of Nice demonstrate, an extensive reform of the decision-making intitutions could not be reached. In the main elements relating to the process of Enlargement, the veto still applies and the compromise of weighted votes under QMV is not sanstied considering that three countries could block every decision of potentialy 20 member states. That the EU itself is not totaly satisfied with the result of Nice, illustrates by a statement from the Commissioner for Enlargement: "[...] if not the Nice treaty, then something else must establish the necessarry link between the deepening and the widening of the EU"(Lobjakas, 2001).

CONCLUSION

Although in Berlin and Nice important agreements have been reached and the EU has demonstrated the will to respond to the challenge of Enlargement, we are not as optimistic as Schroeder after Berlin. The EU needs more unity and financial support from her members in order to proceed with a coherent and consistent line. The challenge of an effective and efficient decision-making process is not over and Nice can′t be more than the first step for further reforms until 2004.
Every possible effort from the EU has to be made to insure a successful Enlargement, because "the political and economic stakes are too high that the EU could not afford to fail."(O′Rourke, 1999).

1508 words

Bibliography

Books:
Barnes, Ian and Barnes, Pamela. (1995) The enlarged European Union. London, New York: Longman.

Baun, M. (1999). "Enlargement." In Cram, Laura/ Dinan, Desmond/ Nugent, Neill (eds.). (1999). Developments in the European Union. Basingstoke: Macmillan.

Dinan, Desmond. (1999). Ever closer union: an introduction to European integration (2^nd ed.). Basingstoke: Macmillan.

George, Stephen & Bache, Ian. (2001). Politics in the European Union. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.

Parry, Geraint and Moran, Michael. (1994). Democracy and democratization London, New York: Routledge, 1994

Sakwa, Richard & Stevens, Anne (eds.). (2000). Contemporary Europe. Basingstoke: Macmillan.

Web-sites:
Lobjakas, A. (2001). "EU: Analysis - Enlargement Commissioner Sounds Notes Of Caution" On-line (accessed 25/11/2001). http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2001/09/04092001125613.asp

Nice, France; 1 December 2000 (RFE/RL): "EU: Reform Treaty Paves Way to Enlargement December 2000. On-line (accessed 25/11/2001). http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2001

O′Rourke, Breffni. (1999). "EU: Changes may prove Definitive for policy." On-line (accessed 25/11/2001). http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2001