A common defence market for the EU is a necessary good

Date: 06/10/05

A "voluntary code of conduct to boost competition in defence procurement" is what the European Defence Agency (EDA) is striving to achieve in the very near future. It is a correct approach to improving one of the most neglected sectors of European industry - and delivering accountability to the European citizen.

In either a direct capacity through major manufacturers or in an indirect capacity through thousands of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that produce anything from metal rivets to highly sophisticated electronics, defence industries are a major source of employment and revenue throughout the EU. And while the Union is committed to supporting and protecting most segments within the sector, such as metal or plastics, it will do nothing for defence as a whole because it is not covered by the EU. This is plainly stupid. Worse still, this stupidity has by default supported hugely wasteful national procurement systems, which have become insupportable. It is time to take them on - which is what the EDA is quietly doing.

Basic political wisdom has it that for the average EU citizen defence has a very low priority. This wisdom is based on two elements. The first is factual: all issues of defence in modern Europe have evolved within the context of the Second World War. Having dragged itself and the rest of the world into two grotesque wars in the 20th century, this continent has rightly been reluctant to put defence into any part of its agenda. The Cold War made defence an unquestionable imperative within which each nation handled it separately, or else within the collective frameworks of either NATO, the Warsaw Pact or armed neutrality - but never as a central issue of public life.

For more than 60 years across Europe, the public perception of defence has become more and more remote and unappealing. But at the same time within each nation there has always been a ministry that has quietly dealt with defence and spent large budgets on it. Security, at the same time, has come to be seen as an issue of policing and justice rather than one of military and is therefore also separate.

All these are now converging due to the rising importance of defence and security and the dwindling national budgets - which is where the second element of political wisdom comes in.

This suggests that alongside defence, EU citizens are probably not interested in trade and the outcome of the Doha round, or the long-term implications of farm policy reform - since they care only for issues of quality of life such as health, education and transport.

Such a perception actually holds the citizen in contempt, but following it logically means that defence procurement equals political death: a politician who prefers to spend public funds on guns and missiles instead of textbooks and hospitals is a heartless warmongering rogue.

This being the case, politicians across the EU have systematically cut defence budgets while at the same time maintaining their national defence establishments, each of which has been buying small amounts of necessary weapons at huge sums, often from national manufacturers. But the budgets are now too small and the sums too big. No nation can support its own industries alone, nor can defence be constantly ring-fenced as a non-commercial issue in the stagnant EU economies - especially in an era of heightened security needs.

Creating an EU defence market is a logical way to address these issues and it is what the EDA is attempting to do. Using the voluntary approach is also logical, since it allows each state to weigh up the merits of the market without being obligated to deal immediately with the pitfalls. It is a good and necessary EU endeavour, which hopefully not too many will volunteer to collapse.

• Ilana Bet-El is an academic, author and policy adviser based in Brussels.

Author takes a look at the European Defence Agency's plans to create a 'voluntary code of conduct to boost competition in defence procurement.

European Commission: DG Enterprise: Industry Index: Defence http://ec.europa.eu/comm/enterprise/defence/index_en.htm

European Defence Agency: Homepage http://www.eda.europa.eu/

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