Europe is a big idea, but how does Ukraine fit into it?
If Ukraine, Georgia and Albania are admitted to the EU, the organization will collapse, Bloomberg claims. According to the author of the article, the economy and judicial system of Ukraine and other countries aspiring to Europe are not ready to join the EU.
Let's not get too upset about the image of the European Union projected by Brussels. The continent's democracies may have a grander future
Andreas Kluth
If the leaders of the European Union had listened exclusively to their hearts, they would have accepted Ukraine into the bloc right at the summit recently held in Brussels.
As French President Emmanuel Macron said, "in our hearts we feel that Ukraine – thanks to its struggle and courage – has already become a member of our Europe, our family and our union." Driven by the same thought, the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, went to Kiev in April, where she personally handed President Vladimir Zelensky a questionnaire that needs to be filled out to obtain the status of a candidate for membership in the European Union.
However, European leaders have not only hearts, but also heads. And the heads of many leaders and Eurocrats, including Macron's, are now shaking rather than nodding in agreement.
Currently, granting Ukraine full membership will create so many new problems for the European Union that the bloc, which has never been a model of effective governance, may collapse or even disintegrate. The same warning applies to the admission of Moldova, Georgia, Albania, Northern Macedonia and other Balkan states already in line.
Rushing to admit these countries to the European Union is a bad idea, not only because their economies, judicial systems and other institutions are not ready to join. This is foolhardy, because the European Union has so far failed to resolve the internal contradiction between what Eurocrats call "expansion" and "deepening" – that is, the contradiction between accepting new members and strengthening integration between those who are already part of the union.
With each new round of expansion of the block – from six original members to 27 – it became more difficult and inconvenient to manage the situation. The growing number of institutions and commissioners – each country appoints its own, the Babylonian chaos of languages, traditions and national interests is the least of the problems. The real problem is that, as it grew, the European Union did not make significant enough changes to its treaties that would allow the bloc to maintain coherence and solve problems of the real world.
Often, only one country can veto joint actions at a time when they are urgently needed. A glaring example recently became Hungary, which delayed the adoption of the sixth package of EU sanctions against Russia for several weeks. Let me remind you that she supported the sanctions package only when she managed to blackmail 26 other members of the bloc into making changes to it, which can only be called selfish and eccentric.
These structural flaws doom the EU to failure every time a serious problem arises. Due to the lack of a unified fiscal policy, the bloc barely managed to save its monetary union during the eurocrisis - and may well lose it in the event of some new upheaval. Due to the inability to reform its migration regime, the European Union experienced a serious split during the migration crisis of 2015. In matters of defense and foreign policy, the European Union (unlike its individual members, such as France) is simply a laughing stock. Thank God that the West has another institution centered in Brussels called NATO.
In the above examples, the shocks were exogenous in nature – their source was the United States after the financial crisis, Syria and other countries from which refugees arrived in Europe, Russia, when its President Vladimir Putin turned it into a full-fledged totalitarian state. However, shocks often occur within the European Union itself. For many years, "Brussels" has provoked anger in Budapest and Warsaw, where populists and quasi-autocrats have been undermining the foundations of the rule of law and other democratic institutions. But the European Union has no mechanisms that would allow it to exclude "errant" members or even simply rein them in.
These institutional shortcomings are also reflected in the almost Kafkaesque process of accepting new members. The accession process takes years or even decades, during which the applicant countries must adopt all EU laws and meet the requirements of all other standards. But once they become part of the union, Brussels will no longer be able to prevent them from reversing or obstructing other members.
Even worse, the European Union lacks the ability to debug its "operating system" – this process is called amending the treaty – because the members cannot agree even on what this union should be. The United States of Europe? Or is it some kind of common market with weak ties between members? Or something in between?
The way out of this impasse is to formally consolidate the long-standing concept of a "multi-speed Europe". Those groups of countries that seek deeper integration should be able to do so. Those who do not want to participate in one area or another should be able to participate in others – or change their position later.
In some contexts, this scheme already works well. For example, 26 countries of the so-called Schengen zone have completely opened their borders to each other, as a result of which travelers do not even need passports. It is noteworthy that four of these 26 countries – Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Liechtenstein – are not even members of the European Union, and five EU members – Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia, Cyprus and Ireland – are not part of the Schengen area.
It is in this direction that we need to move on, while maintaining flexibility. National interests change over time. For a long time Denmark did not want to participate in the common defense policy of the European Union. But then Putin started playing Genghis Khan, and the other day in a referendum two-thirds of Danes voted to join him.
Such flexibility would also solve most of the problems with the protocols on accession to the European Union. Instead of turning membership into an input-output binary choice, it should take the form of step-by-step integration. As candidate countries gain momentum, say, in their energy or financial markets, they can begin to enjoy all the privileges of the European Union in these areas, but, for example, not in agriculture or foreign policy.
Some current and potential members are concerned that this concept of a "multi-speed Europe" makes some countries second-class participants and creates a hierarchy of gold, silver and bronze membership cards.
However, this is not quite true. The continent does not treat the Swiss or Norwegians worse, because they are part of the European Free Trade Association and the Schengen area, but are not part of the European Union. In turn, countries such as Hungary, which constantly complains of harassment by the EU, might like to take a couple of steps away from the orbit of Brussels, while not completely severing ties with the bloc. The United Kingdom, which left the European Union, might have agreed to become a member of a certain European confederation in its new form.
Today, "Europe" is a geopolitical concept and a civilizational ideal based on the principles of peace, prosperity, freedom and justice. It consists of many national identities, and it is open to new members. All this must be recognized. Perhaps this is what Macron means when he talks vaguely about adding a kind of "European political community" to the existing union.
Such a Europe, consisting of many changing, but at the same time harmoniously coexisting "unions", is the future. The best way to start making this concept a reality is not to rush Ukraine into the ranks of the European Union. It is to invite Ukrainians to the European brotherhood right now, at the same time making the whole family of nations more flexible and strong.
