Influential institutes bid to shape EU’s post-Nice agenda

Date: 07/12/00

By Rory Watson

HOWEVER the public, politicians or posterity judge the outcome of this week's European summit in Nice, there is already clear evidence that influential think-tanks and research bodies across the continent are convinced that far more fundamental issues facing the Union must be addressed.

Questions about the elusive concepts of governance and European values are rubbing shoulders with more tangible issues, such as the impact of enlargement and practical ways of applying the new economic and social agenda agreed by EU leaders in Lisbon in March.

Add to this the contentious subjects of institutional reform, the desirability of a Union constitution and the wisdom of handling future treaty changes in a meandering Intergovernmental Conference, and it is not hard to see the heady brew of issues already being concocted.

While politicians have grabbed the limelight with their contradictory calls for closer integration among pioneering EU countries, a directly-elected European Commission president and a supreme role for the European Council, it is the behind-the-scenes work of various institutes which provides much of the fuel for the public statements.

One of the first to take up the cudgels post-Nice will be the European Institute of Public Administration in Maastricht. At the end of January, academics and practitioners will hold a seminar to draw lessons from the different processes used to update the EU treaty, draft the charter of fundamental rights and reorganise the Union's basic constitutional texts.

Later, in the autumn, the institute will focus on governance in collaboration with the Belgian EU presidency and European Parliament. It will consider ideas on new forms of Commission administrative intervention, citizen participationand accountability involving courts, parliaments and other bodies.

The Paris-based European Steering Committee - founded by former Commission President Jacques Delors and consisting of 40 prominent European personalities - is another looking to the Belgian presidency in the second half of the year to stimulate the wider debate.

Its work is likely to focus on institutional reform, in particular on ways to improve the central role of the General Affairs Council and on procedures for involving candidate countries in the next IGC.

Frank Vibert, director of the London-based European Policy Forum, which specialises in regulatory economics, is another taking up the governance theme. He intends to publish the think-tank's thoughts before the Commission produces its White Paper in the spring.

Before then, the increasingly influential Centre for European Reform will present its view on governance with radical plans to end the rotating Council presidency, increased use of enhanced cooperation and an overhaul of the Commission.

This will be followed later in the year with a pamphlet from its director Charles Grant examining prospects for European defence over the next five years and studies on how to regulate a European stock market and on the economic benefits for existing and future Union members from enlargement.

The independent Foreign Policy Centre, which is also London based and whose patron is UK Premier Tony Blair, will be equally active. Its future work will focus on three central themes: democracy and governance, economic government and reform, and a 'Europe of values'.

One of the longest-established research institutes, the Brussels-based Centre for European Policy Studies, is organising its future work around the twin subjects of the EU's institutional future and enlargement.

Under the first, books are being prepared on the Treaty of Nice and beyond; small member states in an enlarged Union; and the role of the European Council in the past, present and future governance of Europe. A novel feature of the second strand will be a six-monthly review on specific enlargement issues.

In addition to concentrating on similar issues, the European Policy Centre, whose remit is to influence policy discussions rather than conduct pure research, is devoting thought to the procedures for agreeing future changes.

Chairman Stanley Crossick sees much merit in a convention similar to the one used to draft the fundamental rights charter as it could involve opinion-formers and increase public participation. He is also keen to develop cross-border cooperation between Europe's think-tanks."We believe strongly in developing networks of think-tanks and bringing their national thought to the European level and this appears consistent to us with President Prodi's thinking," he says.

However the public, politicians or posterity judge the outcome of the European summit in Nice, there is already clear evidence that influential think-tanks and research bodies across the continent are convinced that far more fundamental issues facing the Union must be addressed.