European governments are fuelling Euroscepticism
Cas Mudde
If Ursula von der Leyen gets the EU top job, it will
undermine steps to give voters more of a role in European governance
@casmudde
Mon 15 Jul 2019 10.55 BST Last modified on Mon 15 Jul 2019
10.57 BST
‘Only a third of Germans believe Ursula von der Leyen is a
good candidate for the powerful Brussels position.’ Photograph: François
Lenoir/Reuters
After days of drama and late-night meetings, EU heads of
government recently nominated their candidate to replace the Luxembourger
Jean-Claude Juncker when he steps down as president of the European commission
in October. As expected, the name to emerge was a German, but not the German
who was expected. Rather than Manfred Weber, the lead candidate, or Spitzenkandidat
of the biggest political group in the European parliament, the centre-right
European People’s Party (EPP), Ursula von der Leyen, the German minister of
defence was announced as the nominee. As some celebrated (finally) the
promotion of a woman to the most powerful EU position, others (rightly)
criticised her nomination for rendering the European electorate irrelevant in
the process.
In political science, European elections are referred to as
“second-order” elections, as opposed to “first-order” elections, which
determine national governments. In fact, European elections don’t even
determine the EU’s “government”, which is constituted by the executive body,
the European commission and the European council, where the member governments
make new laws.
In 2014, to make European elections a bit more relevant, or
“first-order”, the largest political groups in the European parliament fielded
their so-called Spitzenkandidaten or “lead candidates” for the commission
presidency. Despite opposition from heads of government, notably Britain’s
David Cameron and the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, Juncker, the
candidate put up by the EPP, which won most seats in the 2014 elections, was
voted president of the European commission for the 2014 to 2019 term.
Five years on, this minimal attempt to give European voters
more of a role in the EU’s governance has been abandoned in a return to the
traditional horse-trading between national governments over the top jobs.
Weber, Spitzenkandidat of the EPP, was opposed within both the European council
and parliament, while Frans Timmermans, the lead candidate of the Socialists
& Democrats (S&D), was rejected by leaders of the central and east
European member states as well as the EPP.
Instead, government leaders came up with Von der Leyen, a
candidate no one expected, and who had played no role in the European
elections. As a member of Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU), she
is supposed to represent the EPP, the overall winner of the European elections.
‘Josep Borrell, the council’s nominee for the EU high
representative for foreign affairs and security policy, was fined €30,000 for
insider trading last year.’ Photograph: Stéphanie Lecocq/EPA
Despite Von der Leyen being a Merkel ally, the German
chancellor had to abstain in the European council vote because her coalition
partner, the Social Democratic party (SPD), opposed the nomination. In fact,
only a third of Germans believe Von der Leyen is a good candidate for the
powerful Brussels position. A majority (56%) think otherwise. This should come
as no surprise, as she is currently under fire for her performance as minister
of defence and is the second-most unpopular minister in an overall very
unpopular German federal government.
But Von der Leyen is not the only candidate for a top EU
position with no direct relation to the European elections. Nor is she the
worst. Spanish foreign minister Josep Borrell, the council’s nominee for the EU
high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, was forced to
resign as president of the European University Institute (EUI) over a conflict
of interest in 2012, had to step down from the board of renewable energy group
Abengoa because of a financial scandal in 2015, and was fined €30,000 for
insider trading last year. His undiplomatic statements about American
independence or Catalan separatism are right up there with Donald Trump’s. On
the former, for example, he said: “all they (Americans) had to do was kill four
Indians, but apart from that it was very easy.”
Compared to Borrell, Christine Lagarde, currently managing
director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the nominee for president
of the European Central Bank (ECB), is squeaky clean. She “only” has a
conviction for failing to challenge the state arbitration payout to a friend of
former French president Nicolas Sarkozy, her then boss.
Should the European parliament ratify the European council’s
nominations in a vote on Tuesday, it will officially kill off the
Spitzenkandidaten system. To be clear, this process was always an insider’s
solution to an insider’s problem, namely the frustration of MEPs over their
marginal role within the EU, rather than a true solution to the rightly
maligned “democratic deficit” exemplified by the second-order status of
European elections. Moreover, its top candidate, EPP Spitzenkandidat Weber, has
done more than almost anyone to undermine the foundations of the European
project by enabling Orbán to create an authoritarian state while remaining
within Europe’s so-called “community of values”.
In essence, the failure of the Spitzenkandidaten system is a
logical consequence of the withdrawal of most of Europe’s national leaders in
the wake of the great recession. Confronted with the unforeseen realities of
the eurozone, they chose short-term national interests over long-time
proclaimed European solidarity. From Berlin to The Hague they have rejected French
president Emmanuel Macron’s reform proposal, which would further centralise
governance of the eurozone, and instead called for less rather than more EU.
The 2019 European election results were hailed as a setback
for populists, who had “gained votes, but lost initiative,” while the highest
turnout in 20 years was celebrated as a victory for democracy. Somewhat
overstating his case, the EPP lead candidate, Weber, declared that Europeans
had “used their right to vote to decide about the future of Europe and that
gives the European parliament much more credibility and legitimacy for the
future of the continent”.
One month later, the European council has quashed this
short-lived optimism for EU democracy. The governments’ motley crew of nominees
shows not only a stunning disregard for the Spitzenkandidaten process but also
for the European voter. They undid the little progress the European elections
made, instead boosting Euroscepticism and weakening voter participation. For
the sake of its own relevance as well as that of European elections, the
European parliament should reject the nominees and propose its own list of
candidates, who defend not only the interests of the European institutions but
also those of liberal democracy.
Cas Mudde is a Guardian US columnist and the Stanley Wade
Shelton UGAF professor in the School of Public and International Affairs at the
University of Georgia
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário