Towards a trans-European referendum on the issues of new governance ?
by Baudouin
“More Europe without delay”, is the program that has just been put forward in Die Welt by the very pro-
European German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schäuble. Once again it calls for the transfer of increasingly
significant fiscal and budgetary powers at European level, whilst hoping it benefits from democratic
legitimacy, but without saying how1.
On the other hand, Nicolas Sarkozy has announced that France and Germany would prepare a number of
versions of the Treaties to strengthen Eurozone integration.
Currently, Euroland has a monopoly of power via its technostructure and a sort of oligarchy (laws are drafted by unelected officials who are
subject to pressure from lobbies and other various associations; trade unions, press...). MEPs are, in the main, subject to the instructions of
their own country’s government and leaders’ discipline, not to mention the influence of lobbies, not always devoid of corporate or industrial
interests. In this context, Euroland citizens feel that the Eurocrats and MEPs are disconnected from daily reality, which causes the feeling “that
we are no longer in a democracy”.
It would, therefore, be consistent with the logic of this development that the
citizens who are affected by changes beyond national borders, should have
the right to democratically influence, in their role as citizens of the Union, what
their government leaders negotiate or decide in a legal grey zone2.
One solution would be to use direct democracy such as is practiced in some
US states, Germany or in Switzerland (since the thirteenth century) and also
rely on the groups that are launching themselves in this field at present,
“
www.directdemocracynow.com” in the USA, Poland3 and Iceland4. It could be
based on articles 6 and 14 of the Declaration of Human Rights as the basis of
the claim. These two articles allow citizens to start off the political processes....