Why Europe does not need a constitution

Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg im Breisgau
Seminar für wissenschaftliche Politik
VL/HS: Issues of Contemporary International Politics
Sommersemester 2000
Hans Christian Siller
6. Semester

Why Europe Does Not Need
A Constitution

Table of content

I. INTRODUCTION ... 1

II. DOES THE EU HAVE A CONSTITUTION? ... 2

III. SHOULD THE EU HAVE A CONSTITUTION? ... 8

III.1. The EU - State or Process? ... 9
III.2. A Constitution without a State? ... 10
III.3. A Constitution and legal/institutional reform ... 12
III.4. A Constitution without a Constituency? ... 13
III.4.a. Principle of Double Legitimacy ... 13
III.4.b. The Democratic Deficit ... 15
III.4.c. European Democracy without a European Demos? ... 18

IV. CONCLUSION ... 23

"L′Europe a un nom depuis 25 siècles, mais elle en est
encore au stade de projet." Jacques Le Goff

I. Introduction

The history of attempts for giving Europe a constitution is long and encompasses some famous names like the Abbé de Saint Pierre or Immanuel Kant, but also resistance groups during WWII1 and Winston Churchill, who presented his vision of the United States of Europe in 1946 in Zurich2. In the last months the discussion about a European Constitution has gained further popularity with the highly controversial speech of German foreign minister Joschka Fischer at the Humboldt University3. Fischer, who had already at the beginning of German Presidency expressed before the European Parliament that he deemed necessary a fundamental revision of the European integration process, develops in this speech his vision of a federal constitution for Europe. Until recently, most draft constitutions like the Spinelli initiative of the European Parliament in 1994 or the Herman Report in 1994 were discussed on a theoretical level without a hope for realization. Now there is a wave of speeches and contribution of key politicians on this subject. In fact, there are reasons to assume that there is more to it that just the typical German focus on constitutionalism4 but that “a window of opportunity is opening”5: the need for legal and institutional reform becomes evident in view of the incipient eastern enlargement and the results of the Amsterdam Conference and its postponing strategy have satisfied only few. Moreover, the fact that ECSC expires in 2002 gives further monumentum to the discussion about where Europe should be heading in the years to come and how the problems of a deeper and enlarged Union can be overcome. In the following, it will be shown that a European Constitution does not offer a solution to these problems. Constitutions usually form the legal basis of states. Therefore, it is necessary to clarify first to what extent the EU is comparable to statal structures and then proceed to the question whether the founding treaties can be regarded as the constitution of the EU. The first part of the analysis is therefore centered around the question whether the EU does already have a constitution with its founding treaties and hence does not need one. It will be shown that this is not the case. Consequently, the second part will deal with the question whether Europe can and should give itself a constitution, i.e. if one can expect the EU to develop the currently missing attributes to qualify for a constitution in the full sense and if such a development would be a desirable one.

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1 see Schneider, Heinrich: Gesamteuropäische Herausforderungen an eine Europäische Union, in: Wildenmann, Rudolf (Hrsg.): Staatswerdung Europas? Optionen für eine Europäische Union, Baden-Baden Nomos, 1991 (Studien zur gesellschaftlichen Entwicklung, Bd. 9), pp. 125.
2 see Weidenfeld, Werner: Die Reformbilanz der Europäischen Gemeinschaft: ′Bundesrepublik Europa′ als Perspektive? in: Weidenfeld, Werner/Wessels, Wolfgang (Hrsg.): Wege zur Europäischen Union. Vom Vertrag zur Verfassung? Bonn Europa Union, 1986, pp. 28, and Hertel, Wolfram: Supranationalität als Verfassungsprinzip. Normativität und Legitimation als Elemente des Europäischen Verfassungsrechts, Berlin Duncker und Humblot, 1999 (Tübinger Schriften zum internationalen und europäischen Recht, Bd. 47), Diss. Univ. Tübingen 1998, pp. 21.
3 Fischer, Joschka: Vom Staatenbund zur Föderation – Gedanken über die Finalität der europäischen Integration. Rede am 12. Mai 2000 in der Humboldt-Universität in Berlin, http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/4_europa/index.htm.
4 Kohler-Koch, Beate: A Constitution for Europe?, Mannheim, 1999 (Arbeitspapiere - Mannheimer Zentrum für Europäische Sozialforschung, Bd. 8), pp. 2.
5 ibid. pp. 3.