The European Union

The spillover method in what ways did or did not the European founding fathers  step-by-step approach proves to be successful in the development of European construction

The founding idea of the European Union was to have the Union possess almost all powers in making decisions pertaining key policy areas. The aim was to have a federal state with no independent area. The spill over strategy was that one area of the European cooperation would require support from another in order to work effectively (Warleigh-Lack, 2009, p 4). As such, there was supposed to be integration of sectors beginning from one sector to the others. It was for instance planned that the integration of the steel and coal industries would later lead to the harmonizing of the defense sectors which depended on the minerals. This would in effect lead to the need of having a universal foreign and defense policy. The spillover would culminate in having a universal European government. This integration approach was referred to as the Monnet Method after Jean Monnet, a founding father of the EU.

To some extent, the approach was successful but there were areas and extents into which it did not succeed. In particular, it was possible to harmonize certain economic fields but the politicalgovernmental integration was and has been a challenge. While it was possible to come up with an Economic and Steel Community, it was impossible to come up with the European Defense Community. The founding of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) to ensure food security was a successful integration approach although the policy has had its own harms. The idea of functionalism governance as proposed by the founding fathers of the EU can be said to have failed as states differ more on sovereignty and the amount of power that ought to be bestowed on the EU. Currently, the EU member states retain sovereignty although they retain links with the EU and its institutions. Only a few areas of cooperation such as agriculture and trade are regulated by the EU body. In short, the step-by-step approach of integration of the EU as proposed by the founding fathers has only been controversially successful in economic integration but little on political integration (Warleigh-Lack, 2009).

To what extent are each one of the EU institutionsCouncil of Ministers, Commission, and European Parliamentmarked by supranational or intergovernmental tendencies or practices

A supranational tendency is a neo-functionalist idea of integrating economic sectors as well as political fields to come up with a larger regional community governing individual members of the Union. On the other hand, intergovernmental tendencies are inclinations towards having individual states retain sovereignty and be allowed to make their independent decisions. The national governments may cooperate on say economic grounds but should not be subjected to political integration as is the tendency of supranational community. There are three main institutions of the EU (namely the European Parliament, the European Commission and the European Council of ministers) which to some degree advance either of the above tendencies.

The European Parliament (EP) is a body that is elected by the citizens of all the member states in a democratic manner. It was instituted in the 1950s during the development of the EU. The members of the parliament serve a five year term. The fact that the parliament is elected by all the citizens of the member states to a greater extent is an intergovernmental approach. The European parliament is mandated to pass European laws such as agricultural and economic policies which are eventually supranational tendencies.

The European Commission (EC) to some extent is an institution that propagates supranational tendencies. This is because the institution operates independent of the national governments with its main mandate being to represent and uphold the interests of the EU as a whole (Europa, 2009, para 1). The EC was established in the1950s during the setting up of the European Union. Although the EC operates on a supranational ground, its membership which is made of commissioners from every nation is to extent shows that it upholds to intergovernmental approach. The intergovernmental tendencies of the EC are rendered meaningless by the fact that commissioners are not supposed to represent the positions of their individual governments but rather pay loyalty to the Unions interests. Perhaps it is more of an intergovernmental approach to have the ECs president being proposed by Member State governments though this role is rendered insignificant as the other EU institutions play important roles in endorsing the appointee.

The Council of the European Union was also established during the founding of the EU in 1950s and has the role of making decisions on the activities of the EU. A minister from each member state has to represent the state in the meetings of the Council. There is no specific minister who attends all the meetings but rather the choice of the representative depends on the agenda at hand. It is therefore likely to have council meetings being referred to as Environmental Council when it is an environmental issue under discussion. To this extent, the Council is more of an advocate of intergovernmental tendencies. The EU Council is the best advocator of intergovernmental approach as ministers in the various Council configurations are bestowed the authority to represent their states to the best. The answerability of the ministers to the home government and citizens means that the minister has to air the concerns of hisher nation to the best of their abilities thus representing an intergovernmental approach (Europa, 2009).

The involvement of the presidents of the individual member states in the Council to resolve contentious issues shows that this institution has more of intergovernmental approaches.  The best examples of intergovernmental cooperation of the Council is their coming together to develop a common foreign and security policy as well as ensure that national courts and police forces co-work. Each member state has its own sovereignty regarding foreign and security policy with very minimal involvement of the EP and the EC.

What has been the contribution of the different European treaties in shaping a European foreign policy

The European Union was established on a number of treaties. The issue of foreign policy was however left to be decided by individual states and therefore a common European policy was not given much weight. As mentioned earlier, the Council for European Union does not have a final decision on the EU foreign policy since each member state retains its own foreign policy making decisions.

The founding Treaty of Rome led to the EU being less interactive with the rest of the world as seen by the establishment of various policies. The Common Agricultural Policy for instance led to poor international relations due to restrictions on goods entering the European Union jurisdiction yet its goods were freely traded to other countries. The EU member states can therefore be said to have suffered in their supranational tendency of agreeing to the CAP. However, a common foreign and security policy was more of the view of the Maastricht Treaty due to need for defense against surging terrorism as well as need to offer humanitarian and military aid more so to the third world countries (Warleigh-Lack, 2009). 

The 1992 Maastricht Treaty was a step towards developing a common foreign and security policy.  The member sates were initially operating under national foreign policies but need for a common stand in issues affecting the EU as a block propelled the decision to have a common foreign and security policy in the 1992 treaty. The treaty however did not realize the goal of having a common foreign policy hence the Treaty of Lisbon. Coming under the pressure of globalization and need to maintain good international relations with its allies, the EU has been forced to rethink on agreeing on a common foreign policy.

The Treaty of Lisbon has come up with the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy (HRFASP), a personality with the mandate of spearhead the streamlining of the EU foreign policy.  Acting as the representative of the EU highest institutions, the HRFASP is supposed to direct foreign policy agenda from an intergovernmental agenda to a supranational issue. In essence, it can be said that the Lisbon Treaty has had the highest influence in charting the way for the EU foreign policy as it mandates the Council to take this role (Gaspers, 2009).

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