European integration

European integration is the process of political, legal, economic (and in some cases social and cultural) integration of European states, including some states that are partly in Europe. In the present day, European Integration is primarily achieved through the Council of Europe in Strasbourg and the European Union seated in Brussels and Luxembourg.

History

For centuries, there have been proposals for some form of European integration. With his "Memorandum on the Organization of a Regime of European Federal Union" in 1930, Aristide Briand produced for the French government the first twentieth-century proposal by a European government for European Unity.

Council of Europe

Against the background of the devastation and suffering during the second World War as well as the need for reconciliation after the war, the idea of European integration led to the creation of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg in 1949. In his famous speech at the University of Zurich in 1946, Winston Churchill had called for a United States of Europe and the creation of a Council of Europe.

The most important achievement of the Council of Europe is the European Convention on Human Rights of 1950 with its European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, which serves as a de facto supreme court for human rights and fundamental freedoms throughout Europe. Human rights are also protected by the Council of Europe's Committee for the Prevention of Torture and the European Social Charter.

Most conventions of the Council of Europe pursue the aim of greater legal integration, such as the conventions on legal assistance, against corruption, against money laundering, against doping in sport, or cyber crime.

Cultural co-operation is based on the Cultural Convention of 1954 and subsequent conventions on the recognition of university studies and diplomas as well as on the protection of minority languages.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, former communist countries in central and eastern Europe were able to accede to the Council of Europe, which now comprises all 47 states in Europe with the exception of Belarus due to its still non-democratic government. Therefore, European integration practically succeeded at the level of the Council of Europe, encompassing the whole European continent.

European integration at the level of the Council of Europe functions through the accession of member states to its conventions as well as through political coordination at the level of ministerial conferences and inter-parliamentary sessions. In accordance with its Statute of 1949, the Council of Europe works to achieve greater unity among its members based on common values, such as human rights and democracy.

European Coal and Steel Community

In 1951, a few European states agreed to confer powers over their steel and coal production to the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) in Luxembourg.

Coal and steel production was essential for the reconstruction of countries in Europe after the second World War and this sector of the national economy had been important for warfare in the first and second World Wars. Therefore, France had originally maintained its occupation of the Saarland with its steel companies after the founding of the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) in 1949. By transferring national powers over the coal and steel production to a newly created ECSC Commission, the member states of the ECSC were able to provide for greater transparency and trust among themselves.

This transfer of national powers to a "Community" to be exercised by its Commission was paralled under the 1957 Treaties of Rome establishing the European Atomic Energy Community and the European Economic Community in Brussels, which over the years were transformed into what is now called the European Union.

A key person in this initiative was Jean Monnet, regarded as the "founding father" of the European Union. Through different stages and set-backs, the ECSC has evolved into the European Union, which is regarded as the dominant force in European integration.

European Union

The institutions of the European Union, its parliamentarians, judges, commissioners and secretariat, the governments of its member states as well as their people, all play a role in European Integration. Nevertheless, the question of who plays the key role is disputed as there are different theories on European Integration focusing on different actors and agency.

Theories of Integration

The question of how to avoid wars between the nation-states was essential for the first theories. Federalism and Functionalism proposed the containment of the nation-state, while Transactionalism sought to theorize the conditions for the stabilization of the nation-state system. One of the most influental theories of European integration is Neo-functionalism, developed by Ernst Haas (1958) and further investigated by Leon Lindberg (1963). The important debate between neofunctionialism and (liberal) intergovernmentalism still remains central in understanding the development and set-backs of the European Union. But as the empirical world has changed, so have the theories and thus the understanding of European Integration. Today there is a relatively new focus on the complex policy making in the EU and Multi-level governance theory (MLG) trying to produce a theory of the workings and development of the EU.

Future of European Integration

There is no fixed end result of the process of integration. Integration and enlargement of the European Union are major issues in the politics of Europe, both at European, national and local level. Integration may conflict with national sovereignty and cultural identity, and is opposed by eurosceptics However many pro EU ideals are now creating many pro EU citizens.

References

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