Disreputable sentiments in Europe

FionnMatthew

There will be calls in the EU to ensure that a few thousand Irish voters do not hold up half a billion European citizens who want this treaty.

-Antonio Missiroli

With all respect for the Irish vote, we cannot allow the huge majority of Europe to be duped by a minority of a minority of a minority.

-Axel Schafer

Now is the time for a courageous choice by those who want coherent progress in building Europe, leaving out those who despite solemn, signed pledges, threaten to block it.

-Giorgio Napolitano

This sort of reaction was predicted by the YES campaign from the beginning, and I am loathe to brandish it as support for one camp or the other. I'm more interested in the questions it raises.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the fact that ratification of the treaty was contingent on unanimity rather override these sentiments? Surely there was a reason the member states had to unanimously ratify the treaty, beyond mere frivolity? I would think the word UNANIMOUS, replete as it is with decades of important associations in international politics, is a big word to be hopping over.

The Irish electorate is, admittedly, small. So is the fraction of it that voted. So is the margin.

But that minority is empowered by the principle of unanimity, under which the treaty was forwarded. It looks pretty damn arrogant of Europe not to accept that, and to lapse into talk of minorities and majorities, as if those were the only thing we had to think about in a democracy.

And then there's the talk of us being 'ungrateful batsards, when you think of all the money' we 'got,' according to one British official in Brussels, as quoted in the Irish Times, pg 11, today.

Was there some tenet of the rationale behind democratic referenda that entailed that voters should honour some sort of informal fiscal agreement in the dispensation of their votes? Was our assent to the Lisbon treaty bought and payed for by European money, or did we have the right to make any other decision on it?

I have defended, in other threads, the idea that the Irish electorate has largely demeaned itself in the referendum, by being so willing to vote on something it so obviously had not read. But this sort of sentiment, the idea that we somehow "owed" it to Europe, irrespective of the content of the Treaty, is just as adolescent a way of thinking as the "if you don't know, vote no" slogan.

I'm also rather disappointed to see Missiroli and Schafer being so disingenuous as to suggest that the "majority" of Europe wants the treaty. To be perfectly correct, they don't know this, and can't know this. The most strongly they can make their case on this is to say that the treaty looked set to be otherwise unanimously ratified.

At best, they can say that the majority of European governments looked as if they wanted the treaty. There's certainly no mandate, even by the principles of representative democracy, to claim that half a billion people "wanted" this treaty, seeing as Missiroli chooses to ignore that that support is garnered indirectly through representatively elected governments, and chooses to set it against the Irish electorate. If we were to proceed only on the evidence of representative governments, as he insists on doing for the rest of Europe, EVERYONE in Europe wants this treaty, INCLUDING the Irish, because our government almost unanimously supported the Lisbon Treaty. It's somewhat fallacious, then, to position the mandated majority of representative governments against the Irish electorate. Procedurally, it's not entirely wrong, but Missiroli cannot claim that half a billion voters outwiegh the Irish electorate. It's simply not an issue of voters in the other member states. He has no right to infer from governmental support the support of every citizen of Europe. At the very most, he can infer only consent from the majority of Europe, and not assent. This amounts to saying that half a billion people "don't seem to mind" as opposed to "want" the Treaty of Lisbon.

And then one wonders whether the principle of unanimity, as a justificatory and supportive prop for taking the Irish NO seriously, should be set against the right of elected governments to decide on the ratification of the Lisbon treaty in other member states without consulting a european populace which, by indications in the press and on the web, for instance, doesn't seem to be unanimous at all. There seems to be two different, equally valid, legitimating factors here: representative democracy, and the requirement of unanimity. The right of the governments (a vast minority, when set against the people of Europe) to decide to ratify the treaty, and the right of the Irish electorate (which turns out to be a vast minority, when compared to the rest of Europe, but not nearly so vast a minority, when compared to the elected governmental personnel who have gotten to vote on the treaty) to veto the treaty.

The support for the Treaty is either procedural, and hence, only to do with whether each country says YES or NO, irrespective of population, or it has to do with the popular vote, which has only been registered in Ireland, and for the other member states the data is unavailable. To mix the two, as has been done in the first two quotes, is an example of unforgivably fuzzy thinking.

And finally, the idea, suggested by the Italian leader, to oust any nation which doesn't play along... I should think this rather defeats the purpose of having the ratification of the treaty reliant on a unanimous, pan-European assent. I can't see that there could be any more abhorrent way to do things. It would be entirely more honourable, and more respectable, to say "we don't respect Ireland's decision, and we disavow the principle of unanimity," than to claim to respect it, and then ooze around it anyway.

ircoha

Interesting and thoughtful piece,
I will read it in detail later but the comments from the Italians in todays IT makes me sick, coming from a country where the Mafia runs the country, just look at the situation in Naples with the rubbish and where elected officials have been murdered in recent weeks when they try sort it out.

Sort this out first before telling us how to vote.

Rb

ircoha wrote: »

Interesting and thoughtful piece,
I will read it in detail later but the comments from the Italians in todays IT makes me sick, coming from a country where the Mafia runs the country, just look at the situation in Naples with the rubbish and where elected officials have been murdered in recent weeks when they try sort it out.

Sort this out first before telling us how to vote.

Fully agree.

Scofflaw

One can look at the Treaty as an offer. It has been offered to all the EU member states, but it need not be.

I don't think we should concern ourselves with whether something "supports one camp or the other". That ended 10pm Thursday - we are all No voters now.

cordially,
Scofflaw

DeVore

This sort of response makes me determined to never ever vote yes on a treaty which weakens our Veto. Sorry but we've made our enemies now and we need to watch our own backs in Europe it seems.

DeV.

Rb

DeVore wrote: »

This sort of response makes me determined to never ever vote yes on a treaty which weakens our Veto. Sorry but we've made our enemies now and we need to watch our own backs in Europe it seems.

DeV.

Absolutely, have to keep our eyes peeled for French fighter jets soaring across our skys now

Darragh29

DeVore wrote: »

This sort of response makes me determined to never ever vote yes on a treaty which weakens our Veto. Sorry but we've made our enemies now and we need to watch our own backs in Europe it seems.

DeV.

Agreed. Watching this is like being at a party where people are doing cocaine and you would be afraid to turn your back on them.

Scofflaw

DeVore wrote: »

This sort of response makes me determined to never ever vote yes on a treaty which weakens our Veto. Sorry but we've made our enemies now and we need to watch our own backs in Europe it seems.

DeV.

There has never been a question of only Ireland giving up its veto, so keeping vetoes means that 26 other countries can veto anything we want. It's a two-edged sword.


cordially,
Scofflaw

ixtlan

FionnMatthew, good posting.

This attitude in Europe polical circles stems from the problem/fact/issue/reality/delight that when the EU finally painfully agrees to a new treaty, the ratification is usually a matter of formality for all other countries. Except in Ireland.

When other states put the constitution to a vote it failed in France and Holland, since there too the politicians could not get the public to have confidence in them.

There's no easy answer for this. If for example Kyoto had to be put to a public vote in every country, what would happen? What about the land-mine treaty? What about the cluster bomb treaty? Some countries would fail to pass it, even for these simple issues.

If every EU treaty went to a vote in every country, what would happen? You may say we would end up with a proper democratic treaty that we could all support. I say no... if we are concerned about voting weights you can be damn sure the German and French will be concerned. They will say why should Ireland have any more rights than them? They will say why should we have more MEPs per capita than them? They will say they want 2 commissioners to our one. Governments will eventually make difficult compromises. Publics often will not.

This is a rock and a hard place. I note the comment about "solemn, signed pledges". You need to look at it from their view. They made sacrifices and compromises. Ireland agreed. Now Ireland is reneging on it's agreement. Now I understand that this pledge was provisional on the support of the Irish public, and I'm sure Europe does too at a legal level, but there are personal levels and national levels too, and the frustration is coming out.

Ix.

ixtlan

DeVore wrote: »

This sort of response makes me determined to never ever vote yes on a treaty which weakens our Veto. Sorry but we've made our enemies now and we need to watch our own backs in Europe it seems.

DeV.

I thought watching our backs was pretty much the premise of the no campaign?

Also, I have to comment on the "weakens our veto". Isn't that like being a little pregnant? It's a binary issue. You have a veto or not.

Also, the no campaign told us that everyone would love us for voting no.

Ix.

sink

I knew this would happen, it is not the reason I voted yes but I knew that if we rejected the treaty we would get a lot of flak from some of the hard-line europhiles. It was completely naive of the no camp to claim there would be no consequences. But we are here now and we need to deal with the situation. If we become too defensive against these attacks we will end up like Britain who is deeply distrusted in Europe. We will probably have to go running into our former colonialists for some refuge.

Our only way to avoid that outcome is to ignore the hard-liner's in Europe the same way we ignore the hard-line nationalists here and try to work with our allies in Europe before we become too toxic even for them.

Darragh29

ixtlan wrote: »

This is a rock and a hard place. I note the comment about "solemn, signed pledges". You need to look at it from their view. They made sacrifices and compromises. Ireland agreed. Now Ireland is reneging on it's agreement. Now I understand that this pledge was provisional on the support of the Irish public, and I'm sure Europe does too at a legal level, but there are personal levels and national levels too, and the frustration is coming out.

Ix.

Ireland agreed what??? We agreed nothing!

DeVore

Well... when it comes to reducing the commissioners ala Nice, do you give us any chance in hell of having one?

When it comes to CAP and Fishing, do you think we wont have to go to our veto more often as countries like France may feel entitled to reduce those "peksy Irish" benefits.

I can see a situation whereby Ireland has to veto a number of times and Europe becomes unworkable for us, we leave and forum a mini union with Scotland and Wales and England (when the first two devolve) and Europ shatters and fractures.
Grim, yes, but it could slide that way...

DeV.

Jack Sheehan

It's an odd one, I certainly didn't expect this kind of response: http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0614/eulisbon.html

No disruption to the ratification? Surely the treaty being rejected by a country means that it is rejected by the whole EU, that's what unanimous means isn't it?

ixtlan

Darragh29 wrote: »

Ireland agreed what??? We agreed nothing!

True, in a literal sense. However the other states thought that the Irish government was representing Ireland. Now the impression is being given (which I think the no side agrees with) that they are like a bidder in an auction on the phone back to the real buyer. Imagine an auction where there were 27 telephone bidders and it took a few years to get bid approval...

As for vetos, do you realise how many vetos have been used for the past few decades by any country? I don't have the exact number but it's tiny.

ix

DeVore

There's no easy answer for this. If for example Kyoto had to be put to a public vote in every country, what would happen? What about the land-mine treaty? What about the cluster bomb treaty? Some countries would fail to pass it, even for these simple issues.

So instead you simply enforce it on the people? Because the politicians know better then their ignorant and pesky plebisites?

Wow. The implied arrogancy in that is stunning. Its quite shocking that people think its ok to force something everyone "knows" is "for the best" onto a populace who, God love them, dont know any better and need them to take care of us (or we drool....??)

DeV.

Darragh29

ixtlan wrote: »

True, in a literal sense. However the other states thought that the Irish government was representing Ireland. Now the impression is being given (which I think the no side agrees with) that they are like a bidder in an auction on the phone back to the real buyer.

As for vetos, do you realise how many vetos have been used for the past few decades by any country? I don't have the exact number but it's tiny.

ix

Well I suppose I can see the point you are trying to make there to be honest. It's like as if our government accepted Lisbon on tick and now that it's time to pay out on Lisbon, we found our selves very much in the red and unable to pay.

cornbb

DeVore wrote: »

So instead you simply enforce it on the people? Because the politicians know better then their ignorant and pesky plebisites?

Wow. The implied arrogancy in that is stunning. Its quite shocking that people think its ok to force something everyone "knows" is "for the best" onto a populace who, God love them, dont know any better and need them to take care of us (or we drool....??)

DeV.

Lets say we had a referendum on the Budget every year. It would never pass. Everyone would scratch their chin at it, see a fraction of it that might affect them, and reject it based on one or a few issues, whether perceived or real. This is essentially what happened with the Nice Lisbon referendum.

A referendum on something like divorce or abortion is easy. There is one issue at stake, one that everyone can understand, and the message sent by the electorate is crystal clear. Its not that easy voting on something as complex as a 200-odd page treaty.

Having the people delegate certain decisions to elected representatives is part and parcel of every democracy on the planet. Electing someone into public office involves placing a certain amount of trust in that person, and it enables them to make certain decisions on your behalf. Thats why we have governments, after all. All this doesn't weaken democracy, its just a different layer of it, its a very important part of it. If we referred every decision to the people nothing would get done.

turgon

FionnMathew has just put eloquently into words what has been in my mind all day. In any usual circumstances the 26 vs 1 argument would be perfectly valid. However the issue is that it is 1 nation vs 26 governments of nations, not exactly the same thing.

The debate had been raging all day today and yesterday about whether the people who are represented by Yes politicians are themselves Yes people. Of course many would know my opinion: that representative democracy just isnt that good: we are never going to have representatives who will do everything exactly as we, the electorate, want.

Voting in an election is like buying a computer. There are a lot of different factors to be considered. Just as when you buy a computer you have to consider the speed, the virtual memory, the hard drive and the operating system, when voting you have to consider the nominees personality, his/her workability, and his/her parties politices on different issues.

Now if I was buying a computer I wouldn't just buy one on the basis that it has a extra large hard drive: I would have to think about the other stats too. Equally when voting I wouldn't just elect a candidate because their policy on Europe suits mine, I would have to take their policies on every other issue too. So I might not vote for them based on their policy on tax, even though their policy on Europe mirrors mine.

The result is that in a country that elected 160 yes TDs, a majority voted No. To claim that somehow the other European people want this treaty it an unsubstantiated mis truth. And the worst part is is that Ireland is a scapegoat: the EU knows very well that if this treaty was put to the people in the 26 other countries, you would not have gotten 26 yeses.

CtrlSource

It will be interesting to see whether these muppets tone down their rhetoric over the coming days and weeks, or step up pressure on us to vote again or indeed simply try to relegate us to some sort of lower tier of EU membership.

i don't think either option will be acceptable when it comes to it though. If they respected the French and Dutch voters in '05, how can they possibly justify bullying us now?

sink

turgon wrote: »

The result is that in a country that elected 160 yes TDs, a majority voted No. To claim that somehow the other European people want this treaty it an unsubstantiated mis truth. And the worst part is is that Ireland is a scapegoat: the EU knows very well that if this treaty was put to the people in the 26 other countries, you would not have gotten 26 yeses.

Same thing can be said for everything the EU/EC/EEC/ECSC has ever done. If we held a referenda all over Europe every time the institutions in Europe change we wouldn't have any sort of united Europe even a free trade association would be difficult to maintain.

turgon

I know. Direct democracy only works when everyone gets informed. Which obviously didnt happen this year, especially on the No side.

murphaph

DeVore wrote: »

This sort of response makes me determined to never ever vote yes on a treaty which weakens our Veto. Sorry but we've made our enemies now and we need to watch our own backs in Europe it seems.

DeV.

Actually, I think we've made hundreds of millions of friends.

These career europoliticians (including our own!) don't want to believe that just maybe, the people of Europe are not in favour of further integration!

All the talk of 'keeping the process moving' etc. is proof if proof were needed that these individuals operate to their own agenda. Millions and millions of our fellow europeans are realising that today.

Scofflaw

Darragh29 wrote: »

Well I suppose I can see the point you are trying to make there to be honest. It's like as if our government accepted Lisbon on tick and now that it's time to pay out on Lisbon, we found our selves very much in the red and unable to pay.

You can also liken it to the person in a group that has to go and check with their partner before going on a trip with their mates. If the group have thrashed out where they're going and when after a lot of wrangling, then chances are that they're going to go to Amsterdam without him/her if the partner vetoes it.

Lisbon solves certain problems that the member states agree the Union has. The problems will not solve themselves, so something has to happen.

cordially,
Scofflaw

bug

With all respect for the Irish vote, we cannot allow the huge majority of Europe to be duped by a minority of a minority of a minority.

-Axel Schafer

Thanks Axel,
That's fine, I'll stay legislated by a state that gives me a vote and where it matters.
I think they may find that this minority grows and I hope that us putting ourselves in the line of fire on behalf of those who didnt get a direct vote allows them a voice.

FionnMatthew

sink wrote: »

Same thing can be said for everything the EU/EC/EEC/ECSC has ever done. If we held a referenda all over Europe every time the institutions in Europe change we wouldn't have any sort of united Europe even a free trade association would be difficult to maintain.

Then we shouldn't have any of those things.
It's blunt, but I don't see why it isn't true.

One assumes that those things would be approved by popular mandate, since they were largely approved by representatively elected officials.

If that isn't true - if we don't believe this - where does that leave us? If we are to stick to the idea of democracy, even if we have a pretty low opinion of voter competence, we ought to concede that, without direct popular support for those changes, they ought not to have happened. We ought also to concede that, if popular support would not have been forthcoming, and the electorate was therefore circumvented, that an evil has been done upon our professed ideals.

And if we don't think the people ought to decide on it - if we think it's unrealistic, that we can't expect people to wise up, get off their asses and get it well then, let's abandon democratic rhetoric entirely. We don't want democracy, then. Not with an idiot electorate.

It's one or the other. Anything else is hypocrisy.

Right?

Personally, I think that even with a massively pessimistic attitude towards the awareness of the electorate, and towards the state of democracy in the West, (as I have professed elsewhere) we simply can't give up on it. Even an idiot electorate is better than none. It's better than flipping a coin. Because it leaves open the possibility that the democratic awareness of this country could get into some sort of positive feedback loop, and people would actually start getting interested, and voting intelligently, and we would have proper democracy, where we could have confidence in the electorate to vote discerningly. Remember, there was only a 10% margin on this referendum. It was far from a unanimous NO. And there were at least some people who found the time to inform themselves to an adequate degree on this treaty, who voted with their eyes open. It is at least epistemically possible that most people could do this, even if it is unlikely. That's the unlikelihood we have to hold out for, if we are committed to a democratic ideal.

limklad

Scofflaw wrote: »

There has never been a question of only Ireland giving up its veto, so keeping vetoes means that 26 other countries can veto anything we want. It's a two-edged sword.


cordially,
Scofflaw

So Germany, France cannot get things their way also, therfore they needs us to pass agreements. Therefore, they have to play nice with us. Not so bad afterall. Peace and co-operation is all well at the moment

FionnMatthew

Scofflaw wrote: »

I don't think we should concern ourselves with whether something "supports one camp or the other". That ended 10pm Thursday - we are all No voters now.

Well. Those are pretty much my sentiments.

I didn't vote, mind. And I never made a decision on it. I said I wasn't interested in whether it supported one camp or the other.

Dirk Gently

Scofflaw wrote: »

You can also liken it to the person in a group that has to go and check with their partner before going on a trip with their mates. If the group have thrashed out where they're going and when after a lot of wrangling, then chances are that they're going to go to Amsterdam without him/her if the partner vetoes it.


cordially,
Scofflaw

Looks to me like the person booked the flights to the wrong destination without asking the group where they wanted to go and is expecting the group to just go anyway.
It does depend though on how you view Europe, whether it consists of citizens or whether it just consists of a few representatives of citizens.

copacetic

murphaph wrote: »

Actually, I think we've made hundreds of millions of friends.

These career europoliticians (including our own!) don't want to believe that just maybe, the people of Europe are not in favour of further integration!

All the talk of 'keeping the process moving' etc. is proof if proof were needed that these individuals operate to their own agenda. Millions and millions of our fellow europeans are realising that today.

making friends among the various far right and left parties in europe isn't my idea of a good thing and hardly hundreds of millions either.

I'm not that concerned about what the french, german or italians think. The opinions of the various eastern european states was more interesting to me. Basically the reaction seems to be that now that we have made billions out of Europe we don't care much anymore and are putting obstacles in the way of their progress into a more integrated Europe. Can't say I disagree with that reaction.

FionnMatthew

ixtlan wrote: »

If for example Kyoto had to be put to a public vote in every country, what would happen? What about the land-mine treaty? What about the cluster bomb treaty? Some countries would fail to pass it, even for these simple issues.

Right. As above. Surely, if this is the case, we don't deserve to have them passed. Even if you or I, on independent assessment, deem them to be unobjectionable, or even positively good. Our opinion ought not to prefigure a popular dissent, if we are to be truly democratic.

I say no... if we are concerned about voting weights you can be damn sure the German and French will be concerned. They will say why should Ireland have any more rights than them? They will say why should we have more MEPs per capita than them? They will say they want 2 commissioners to our one. Governments will eventually make difficult compromises. Publics often will not.

But the point I made was that it isn't about voting weights. It's about unanimity, as a necessary and sufficient condition for the ratification of this treaty, before the event, and the willful and convenient suppression of this fact in the aftermath. Voting weight doesn't come into it. It was agreed beforehand that unanimity would decide it.

This is a rock and a hard place. I note the comment about "solemn, signed pledges". You need to look at it from their view.

With respect, I believe I am considering it from their view. And the view is rather adolescent, if you ask me. The unanimity condition doesn't seem nearly as convenient now, since it makes matters difficult, so they choose to deploy pseudo-democratic rhetoric about voting-weight, when the conditions upon which every member-state entered into the ratification process was nothing to do with voting-weight. If there were worries about this beforehand, they ought to have demanded a different ratification process. It's bad faith now to claim that the Irish dissent is somehow undemocratic in the wider scheme of things. It's the sentiment of a spoiled child.

They made sacrifices and compromises. Ireland agreed. Now Ireland is reneging on it's agreement. Now I understand that this pledge was provisional on the support of the Irish public, and I'm sure Europe does too at a legal level, but there are personal levels and national levels too, and the frustration is coming out.

See, I'm actually really uneasy about talking about whole national bodies as if they were individuals. At the very least, it runs the risk of confusion between what the government, as a body, conveys as the message of the individual "Ireland," and what the demos, as a collective body, deems the general will of "Ireland."

To say, Ireland or France did this or that... it's inexact, if nothing else. And it leads to a sort of confusion.

I'm still not sure what sort of pledge it was that the Irish electorate made to ratifying this treaty.

And, frankly, it is unprofessional of diplomats and officials to vent frustration in a public forum in so profuse and intemperate a manner.