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Chapter 2 The End of the Nation State?

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• Useful websites 
• Discussion questions
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Chapter Summary

Belgium – arguably something of an artificial nineteenth-century creation – has adopted a federal structure in order to accommodate the demands for autonomy of its most assertive, Dutch-speaking linguistic community. But this seems to not to have halted but rather to have fuelled calls for more (or even complete) independence.

Spain is a state composed of several historic kingdoms, some of which have never been entirely reconciled to rule from Madrid. Since its return to democracy in the mid-1970s, it has accordingly granted some of its regions extra autonomy. Whether this flexible response can save Spain from separatist violence or even eventual break-up remains to be seen.

The UK has, like Spain, offered its component countries varying levels of autonomy in order to contain minority nationalism. Its situation is rather more complicated because some in Northern Ireland would like to see the province absorbed into the Irish Republic and have taken up arms to achieve this outcome. This violent conflict, however, appears to be over, but it is by no means certain that in the long term the UK will retain its present shape.

France has never been quite as united as it likes to think of itself and has taken its first faltering steps towards granting additional autonomy to its island province of Corsica in order to respond to separatist feeling there.

What has become known as the European Union has expanded since its birth in the late 1950s to include most of the continent’s states. Since, in large part, they wish to combine continued sovereignty with collective action and a common market, the EU experiences a more or less creative tension between intergovernmental and supranational impulses – impulses that are embodied by its component institutions. So far, this has not prevented increased integration, even if the latter (and the alteration in decision-making rules it has required) has proceeded in fits and starts.

Although they originated in political decisions, two of the key drivers of European integration are not overtly political. The euro is both the culmination and the spur to completion of a single market that locks member states into ‘an ever closer union’ – one that is underpinned and constantly reinforced not only by the supremacy of EU law but also by the fact that it is directly applicable by domestic courts.

Like the EU Constitution that could not be ratified, the Lisbon Treaty that replaces it is seen by some as merely a necessary tidying up exercise to allow the EU to cope with twenty-seven (and possibly more) members and by others as a major step (for good or ill) along the road to some kind of federal superstate. A balanced assessment suggests that the irritation of its proponents is understandable but so, too, are the suspicions of its opponents.

By no means all European states face a threat to their territorial integrity from minority nationalism, although where it exists that threat is serious. However, all the states involved in European integration have incrementally compromised their sovereignty, even though they continue to command the primary loyalty of their (majority) populations and could, in theory, reassert their authority by leaving the EU.

Useful websites

(For general web materials on European Politics see Tim Bale's Internet Guide)

www.ethnologue.com  
Twists and turns of Belgian politics

www.expatica.com  
Minority languages and cultures in Europe

www.lehendakaritza.ejgv.euskadi.net  
Basque Country

www.gencat.net  
Catalunya

www.cain.ulst.ac.uk  
Northern Ireland

www.moi.gov.cy  and www.trncinfo.com
Both sides of the Cyprus question

www.europa.eu  
official overview of EU

www.euractiv.com  
In-depth EU (and European) news, discussion and debate

www.epc.eu  and www.cer.org.uk
EU think tanks

www.brugesgroup  and www.openeurope.org.uk
Eurosceptic perspectives

www.europeanmovement.org  and www.fedtrust.co.uk
Europhile perspectives

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6928737.stm#foreign  
Compares the EU Constitution and its Lisbon Treaty

Discussion questions

1. What are the historical roots of minority nationalism, and why do you think it has become more important in recent years?

2. Why have states like Belgium, Spain and the UK become (or made moves toward becoming) federal countries? Do you think these moves are a rational solution – and one that will last – to the problems they face? Or are these problems (and, indeed, the solutions) actually very different from each other?

3. In your opinion, can there be any justification for Europe’s minorities to employ violence in order to make their case and impose their solutions?

4. There are lots of criticisms of the EU. Yet in less than fifty years it has gone from a group of six to a group of twenty seven countries. Presumably, then, it has some attractions for the countries that have joined. What do you think explains its growth?

5. Why are some EU institutions thought of as supranational and some as intergovernmental? Do you think this is a useful or a false distinction? Is the tension between them creative or destructive?

6. What role have law and decision making rules played in increasing European integration? Do you think they have eroded, or even ended, the sovereignty of EU member states?

7. How different is the EU’s Lisbon Treaty from the supposedly rejected constitution and should countries have had a referendum on it? One MEP who argued that it was substantively different noted that the DNA of mice and humans is 90 per cent the same, but the remaining 10 per cent is rather important: did he have a point?

8. Has the European nation state had its day?

Updates

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