Finland and Slovakia vs. Eurozone, or The Necessity of Federalism
by It should almost thank Helsinki and Bratislava, which provide evidence of the extreme toxicity of the intergovernmental method, that is to say, a mode of governance giving a veto to each. These countries, which weigh less than 11 million people between them, blocking, in fact, the adoption of a text for the entire euro area inhabited it, the 322 million people. Suffice to say that this is a textbook case.
July 21, seventeen heads of state and government of the euro area have indeed decided to increase the capacity and skills of the European Financial Stability Fund (EFSF) in order, it to buy government bonds on the secondary market, the resale. For now, only France, Belgium and Luxembourg have ratified the new treaty (one is outside the European Union). Other countries in the euro area should follow. But Finland requires, before ratifying it, and under pressure from the population of “True Finns” (photo by Timo Soini, the leader), though in opposition, real guarantees of Greece (deposits, guarantees estate, etc.). to be certain of recovering its implementation. The problem is that if everyone asks the same treatment will cancel nearly the impact of aid … Today, the finance ministers meeting in Wroclaw, Poland, were unable to resolve this issue against the stubborn Finns .
In Slovakia, it is the right-wing coalition that motion of the handle: the neo-liberal party (SAS), one of the four parties supporting the government, announced two days ago, he would vote against the extension of Average EFSF. “The rescue plan of the euro is trying to overcome the debt crisis with more debt and we say that even that is a threat to the euro,” said its president, Richard Sulik. “Greece should be allowed to go bankrupt. While the banks will suffer losses, but I do not understand why taxpayers should bear the losses. ” Slovakia is not his first attempt: while the Slovak government had agreed to the first bailout of Greece, the new majority had refused to honor the words of the State …
While it may be assumed that Slovakia, a country much poorer than Greece, is reluctant to pay, this is the challenge of an agreement reached by leaders of the euro area. And, as in the case of Finland, it is not even the majority of the country that refuses to ratify the agreement reached by their government, but a minority party: the SaS weighs 12.5% of the vote, and ” True Finns “, 19%. These are only a few hundred thousand people who claim the right to block hundreds of millions more.
This means that the intergovernmental method is by no means democratic. The genius of the Community method has, in fact, been to the majority vote of the normal decision-making to overcome the obstacles of a few. But the current attempt to Berlin and Paris is to institute the unique intergovernmental mode of governance of the euro zone even though it failed to prevent the excesses that led to the current crisis. The difficulties in ratifying the decisions – just as hard at Heads of State and Government – a perfect illustration of why markets do not believe the solutions proposed by the Franco-German consensus does not mean efficiency. In short, it is federalized, and the texts adopted by qualified majority under the control of Parliament, it is programmed to fail.
The French and Dutch refusal to ratify the Constitutional Treaty in 2005, also showed that majority voting should be instituted in case of modification of the treaties both at the intergovernmental conferences of the referendum or parliamentary ratification. One could, for example, state that if a majority of two thirds of countries representing two-thirds of Europe’s population approves a treaty comes into force. The countries that refuse to submit to the text could of course leave the Union or the euro area. An idea to submit to Finland and Slovakia.
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