Charlemagne: A party spoiled?

For EU old-timers, new guests could wreck the feast

IS IT a dining club, a cocktail party, a coterie or even a cabal? Almost everybody who sets out to describe the European Union to a bewildered world uses images drawn from exclusive forms of social life or entertainment. And as every caterer knows, the key to a successful social event lies in estimating numbers correctly, and adapting the refreshments accordingly. So with ten new guests donning their evening clothes to join the existing 15 at the EU's never-ending gala, and several others looking on hungrily, the party planners of Brussels wonder if they can cope.

When the process of European unification began in the 1950s, the early meetings were marked by an easy-going, first-name intimacy. With just six countries involved, the atmosphere did resemble an up-market dinner party with a bit of politics thrown in. But as the club expanded to nine members, then ten, then 12 and then 15, things became more formal. For the past few months, the EU has already been meeting with 25 countries around the table - and early reports are not encouraging.

One EU veteran laments that the new Union no longer feels like a family and instead is beginning to resemble the UN or any other big, international organisation. Shortly before stepping down, the Spanish prime minister, José María Aznar, told Le Monde: “It's been a long time since we discussed things really in depth between European leaders. In recent times [at European summits] we have talked about virtually nothing.” This is hardly surprising: if all 25 leaders make an opening statement, it takes an hour and a half before discussions even begin.

The day-to-day business that keeps the EU running is conducted by specialist ministers meeting in councils that deal with everything from agriculture to foreign policy. These meetings, too, have become much harder. Each minister may have at least a couple of advisers; add in all the EU officials and there can be more than 100 people in the room. “EU meetings are absolutely atrocious now,” groans a senior French official. “Nobody would ever say anything remotely confidential at an EU meeting any more”, says a Briton. “You might as well go outside and shout it through a megaphone.”

The disparity in member states' size and power adds to the sense that EU meetings are becoming a charade. Nine of the ten new members that join the Union on May 1st have populations of less than 10m. Yet diplomatic niceties dictate that Gerhard Schroder, chancellor of Germany with a population of 82m, can be treated no differently in EU meetings than Lawrence Gonzi, prime minister of Malta, with a population of 397,000.

One might expect bigger countries to lead the discussions. But at recent summits the interventions of Mr Schroder, Tony Blair and Jacques Chirac have been brief. “They are trying to set an example to the others so that the meetings do not go on for ever,” comments one EU official. Or perhaps they now feel that important business cannot be conducted in formal EU meetings: it is best done at looser, smaller gatherings.

The emergence of a directoire of big countries is precisely what the small members of the EU fear most. They howled when the British, German and French leaders staged a three-way summit in Berlin in February. Less noticed - but perhaps more significant - is the emergence of a group of home-affairs ministers from five larger EU countries who meet to co-ordinate policies on issues ranging from immigrants to terror.

Together, the ministers from Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain represent around 300m of the enlarged EU's population of 455m. The big five's ministers naturally continue to turn up for the meetings of all 25 EU justice ministers. But they may increasingly feel they are liable to get more done in the smaller formation of ministers from big countries. Purists might expect the European Commission to crack down on such ad-hoc arrangements. Instead it seems inclined to take a pragmatic attitude. One senior official comments: “There is nothing quite like this in other policy areas yet, but the practice is likely to spread. Caucuses could well be the future in an EU of 25.”

A nobler image needed

Such a development is bound to cause bitterness and suspicion among smaller countries. And the bitterness could flow both ways, if the bigger states begin to feel that important EU policies are being blocked by minor veto-wielding states. The decision of Greek-Cypriots to vote against the EU-endorsed plan for a peace settlement last week shows just how this might happen. It has led to fears that the Union's decision on whether to start entry negotiations with Turkey - a critical strategic choice - could now become hostage to about 700,000 Cypriots.

So the potential problems associated with enlargement go well beyond the practical headaches of trying to run meetings in Brussels. But there are also potential benefits, of far greater moment than the “catering” problems which are worrying EU insiders. People struggling to make the EU work on a daily basis are prone to lose sight of the big picture, and to take for granted the huge benefits that enlargement could bring the EU - freer travel, faster growth, more stable and peaceful societies.

Robert Schuman, a French foreign minister of the 1950s and a founding father of European unity, always insisted it was the role of western Europe to serve as a beacon of hope to countries trapped on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain. As he put it: “We must construct Europe not only in the interests of the free peoples, but also to welcome in it the peoples of eastern Europe, who freed from their repression will ask us for their adhesion and our moral support.”

If the European Union could somehow recapture that spirit of generosity - and open-ended hospitality - it might be able to imagine itself as something a bit nobler than a perpetual feast for the already well-fed, where newcomers are a headache for the chefs and seating planners.

Commentary feature looks at the institutional and decision-making challenges facing the enlarged EU.

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