Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho: Rhetorics, the European Union and some patents
Oh yes, it's fun to wield the sword of politics, that is, rhetorics. It is, however, rather interesting to hear the same people condemn politicians for their use of rhetorics and use rhetorics of their own for their own political advantage.
Yes, I'm talking about this absurd "Banana Republic" rhetoric that has been spreading since the latest turn of events in the EU software patents farce. I'm not talking about the FFII, whose use of the rhetoric is certainly appropriate (it was in response to the Luxembourg presidency's statement that introduced the Banana Republic term to this discussion) - I'm talking about all of those individuals who parrot the FFII's position, often with false arguments, certainly with a poor understanding of the EU power structure and often with the air of "the EU approves the software patents, hence the EU must be evil" and general anti-EU sentiments.
Now, if the reports I have read are accurate, the Council of the European Union (the Council of Ministers) has made a decision on software patents in direct violation of its own rules of procedure. As such, the decision is illegal and should be challenged in a competent court of law.
However...
The following are quotes from blog postings that use the "Banana Republic" rhetoric:
Europeans: Don't let the antidemocratic Council (not elected by you) get away with it. Don't let it overturn a decision made by the European Parliament, an elected and legitimate body.
Parliaments, as the people, does not have any power anymore. Councils rise!
Thanks to all those joining me with linking to the Council of the European Union (CONSILIUM), for their shady move towards software patents in Europe.
Help spread the link to this undemocratic thing in Europe, overriding the wishes of the elected parliament.
Today my my believe into democracy died. Even against several national parliaments and the european parliament the directive about software patents got adopted by the european council. This is really a sad day :(.
This is a very sad day for democracy, and casts a very dark shadow over the European Constitution, which will give the Council even more power.
(from Isaac Clerencia: Council Presidency Adopts Software Patent Agreement Against Councils Rules)
I've heard the rhetoric of the Council of Ministers being an undemocratic organ before, and I have discussed this claim before. The important point is that the Council of Ministers is an organ that directly represents the member states and consists of cabinet members of each state. Each cabinet and hence each member of the Council is directly responsible to their own national parliament, and if a member of the Council behaves contrary to the will of his or her national parliament, it is an internal problem of that particular member state, and it does not reflect on the Council as an organ of the Union. (Unfortunately to me, the Finnish government's pro-swpat stance has been approved by the national parliament. However, I don't blame the Council for this fact.)
The balance of power between the houses of the EU parliament is not ideal, I agree, but it's much better than it used to be and it will get better. In any case, the Council (which I dub the upper house of the EU parliament) does not have the power to completely overrule the lower house (the "European Parliament"). The European Parliament can, if it so chooses, kill this whole directive. Make sure your MEP knows how you feel about it, and try to stress to them how important it is that they should be actually present at the vote!
What I find most disconcerting is the use of this particular debate to strengthen rhetoric against the European Union or the proposed EU Constitution. We need European integration, and we need it badly, and even the current EU with its problems is much better than an alternative Europe without integration. For without integration, Europe is reduced again to the traditional collection of competing and conflicting states that wage war against each other.
2005-03-09T09:44+0200 - /en/politics
Trackback url: http://antti-juhani.kaijanaho.info/blog/en/politics/banana.trackback (trackback on rikki / trackback is broken)
Re: Constitutions and countries
In addition to not reading properly the last article of mine you referred to, did you not follow any of my links this time then?
- MJR/slef, ma, 21 kesä 2004 22:00
Re: Constitutions and countries
No. If you have an argument, present it in the posting, or indicate clearly that your argument is contained in the links.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, ma, 21 kesä 2004 22:18
Re: Constitutions and countries
Now you know what a link-quote is.
- MJR/slef, ti, 22 kesä 2004 00:14
Re: Constitutions and countries
And now we know what a misbehaving arrogant bastard is.
Re: On the European Union Constitution
I am Portuguese, and there are two things I have to remember you. Up to know there was no "European law". European directives had to be ratified by national parlaments. With the European Constitution there will be European law and it will superceed ALL national laws. Our own Constitution had to be changed to accomodate this fact. Also, several competences, up to now exclusive to each country, will become EXCLUSIVE competences of the EU. There is a clear loss of national sovereignty.
Also, the argument on the acceptance of new members does not hold, since the Nice treaty already endorsed the required updates.
To conclude, I also remember you that the process of reaching the draft of the European Constitution was extremely un-democratic. Not A SINGLE voting was done during the entire process. National "delegates" to the assembly were NOT elected. Also, government oficials and even national parlaments (at least in our case) are not granted discretionary constitutional powers.
The European Constitution impact is not illusory. It has several important changes to the current statu quo. You will have a EU president. You will have a european foreign policy official. EU exclusive competences are defined. Unanimity and veto is lost to double majority.
A referendum is without a doubt required. People HAVE to be able to choose their future and to decide in such important matters.
- João Luis Pinto, su, 20 kesä 2004 12:26
Re: On the European Union Constitution
The Nice treaty is inadequate, a stopgap measure because the required changes could not be agreed upon at that time. It was clear even then that further changes would be needed. The loss of unanimity and veto are related to this; what works for a dozen states and which sort of works for fifteen will not work for thirty.
European Union Regulations already override national laws. We lost that sovereignty a long time ago. The Constituion mainly clarifies that.
It is true that competencies are changed.
Laws are generally drafted by government officials, not by elected bodies. Only after a draft has been agreed upon are the elected bodies given a chance to review and change it. This is a part of standard democratic process everywhere.
The EU president and the foreign policy official are examples of the illusory impacts I mentioned. Neither individuals have much individual power; rather, they are there as opinion leaders and to chair certain bodies (and, in the case of foreign policy official, to oversee the execution of policy decision).
Referenda were held in post-Maastricht new members when they joined the EU and in many pre-Maastrict members at the time of adoption of the Maastricht treaty. The essential changes you complain about were accepted then.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, su, 20 kesä 2004 14:48
Re: On the European Union Constitution
You say: "Perhaps this FUD is exactly why the consitution should not be subjected to referenda." That sounds like you have lost faith in democracy. I've not.
By the way, you are an european citizen and you can interact with the european institutions in your mother tongue, which is a language spoken only in europe. On the other side, I'm also an european citizen and I can not interact with the european institutions in my mother tongui, which is also a language spoken only in europe. I don't see that we have equal rights.
- enric, su, 20 kesä 2004 19:09
Re: On the European Union Constitution
Enric: Agreed on the language issue
The problem with referanda is that it is hard to ensure that the decisions are based on fact instead of fear, uncertainty and doubt created by uninformed opinions and demagogy. If democracy is about having as much referanda as possible, I certainly have lost my faith in it; but that is not how I define democracy.
In my youth (well, I am still quite young, I would like to think) I believed in direct democracy. What disillusioned me was a few years' worth of life experience and a minuscule experience in local politics (I have participated in it as a green deputy representative in a minor committee). I have learned that most decisions are quite hard and it takes a lot of effort to learn the issues. If it is hard for a representative, it's going to be even harder for a layman (not for any other reason but that they cannot be expected to invest enough time and energy).
The biggest problem with a referendum is that it can ask only very simple questions, like "should we accept this treaty or not", without any possibility for informed debate. In many cases, a referendum is loaded with implicit questions that have nothing to do with the actual question, for example, it can be considered a vote of (no) confidence for the current national government.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, su, 20 kesä 2004 21:07
Re: On the European Union Constitution
The adequacy of Nice treaty remains to be tested. It has been only a few weeks since the entry of our new fellow countries. The fact that somebody is tryng to makes us believe it does not exist or is inadequate without near inexistant testing and that a new document is required is untimely and, to say the least, suspect.
Regarding "what works for a dozen states and which sort of works for fifteen will not work for thirty": if it doesn't suit all countries, perhaps it should't be EU's business in the first place. The idea of imposing a "EU view", a "formatting" to everything will be, in my opinion, EU's demise. The countries of the EU are simply too different to accept central "formatting".
"European Union Regulations already override national laws": this is simply not true, at least in the Portuguese case. European Regulations, or Directives have to be ratified by our Parlament, that can vote FREELY on it. It is not an automatic process. After the ratification, if the Directive is accepted, it is incorporated in Portuguese Law.
"Laws are generally drafted by government officials, not by elected bodies (...) This is a part of standard democratic process everywhere." Also not true. I, of course, speak only for the Portuguese case, which I believe has several similar implementations in Europe. Governments are EXECUTIVE organs. They can, sometime, legislate, with limited scope (what we call a "decree"), or be delegatted by the Parlament with legislative powers in specific and delimited subjects. All "1st class law" emanates from the Parlament.
Regarding the EU President and Foreign Policy Official, things are also different from "illusory". One of the new exclusive competences of the EU will be, guess what, Foreign Policy! If this is not personal power... Also, it reeks of hipocrisy. Do you really belive the UK and France are going to trade in their seat in UN Security Council for a single EU representative? Do you believe it will happen with all the European countries in NATO?
Regarding former referenda, there was not a single EU related referendum in Portugal, as I believe was also the case in several EU countries. If some opted for it and changed there own internal Law accosrding to it, it did not happen to ALL countries. Also, the scope of what we are discussing now is completely different of what was on the table in the previous treaties. Up to now sovereignty was a non-issue.
The EU "we" are building is seriously lacking democratic support. In the end, for good or bad, if we are talking Democracy you have to let people decide. What you are saying that sometimes things are too complicated for the "layman" is an extremely dangerous way to go. The problem with decisions is sometimes that they try to solve lots of problems satisfying everybody. Perhaps the focus should be on deciding on what is accepted by all and abstain from imposing the rest to Greeks and Trojans.
- João Luis Pinto, su, 20 kesä 2004 21:55
Re: On the European Union Constitution
Note that Regulations and Directives are different things. Regulations indeed override local laws, directives only direct law-making in the individual states.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, su, 20 kesä 2004 21:58
Re: On the European Union Constitution
Antti-Juhani, you said it well: "Referenda were held in post-Maastricht new members when they joined the EU and in many pre-Maastrict members at the time of adoption of the Maastricht treaty." The "many" word happens not to apply to the state I live in. The president by then said: "we don't need a referendum for that, it's like making a referendum to ask the people whether the royal palace should be painted pink or blue". (I find that utterly offensive.)
By now, in my state the people has not ever voted to accept any european institution. I do believe that politicians are afraid of losing the acceptance of a constitution that reinforces the power of states. I'm an euro-enthusiast myself, and if Europe is to become a state as I'd like, I want a really good constitution for it. But the current draft is unacceptable for me and I will vote against it when the referendum arrives.
Also, most of the text of the constitution is of an economical nature, which seems remnant of its beginings as an economic union. But I'm not sure whether the constitution is an appropriate place for that. (I've not read it fully, as it is long and difficult, but I've seen the different parts and read about 10% of them.)
- enric, su, 20 kesä 2004 22:19
Re: On the European Union Constitution
By the way, I'm catalan, and lots of people here (I can not speak about % because those questions never arise in elections) are euro-enthusiasts and much more so than our spanish neighbours. However, there's also lots of people here sad about two things: that they are not going to have the same linguistic rights within europe as other citizens, and that the european institutions are not neutral to the catalan national issues. As an example of the latter, there are iniciatives to forbid acceptance of member states into the union that split from previous member states. And this is even sadder when we notice that several of the new members were some time ago part of bigger states.
- enric, su, 20 kesä 2004 22:26
Re: On the European Union Constitution
Enric: I agree that in states where no referendum has ever been held about the union, this is as good time as any. I also agree that all members should have held (and should hold if not already have held) a referendum about the union as a general concept. However, the consitution in itself does not IMHO warrant one.
João Luis Pinto, however, seems to be ignorant about his own country and about political processes in general. I checked the Portuguese constitution at http://www.parlamento.pt/ingles/cons_leg/crp_ing/index.html. First, it confirms that the Portuguese government does have the power to introduce bills to the parliament; the constitution does not say whether this is the normal procedure or not, but I suspect it is. Second, as an aside, I found it curious that the Portuguese constitution forbids holding referenda on consitutional amendments :)
Pinto seems to confuse the notions of preparation of bills and the enactment of laws: when I claimed that preparation is normally done by government officials, he responds by saying that the government can only enact decrees. Of course he is right, but the response missed the point quite a bit.
I'll also dare to say that if you don't want an inter-European authority that overrides member states in some cases, you should campaign for your country to leave the European Union. There are other, more apt ways to handle simple inter-government cooperation.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, su, 20 kesä 2004 22:36
Re: On the European Union Constitution
It is a fact that governments can propose drafts of law proposals. Even groups of electors. I did not say they couldn't. I just objected to your "generally". Although it is a common procedure, I can asure you (and, well, I live here!) is that is NOT the general or dominationg case. Most of out law is drafted by the Parlament. I would say what you refer as a "standard" is hardly so. I also doubt on the existance of anything close to a "standard democratic process". Also, in the end, what matters is who approves the law.
Regarding your last paragraph, my only remark is on who "specified" what Europe should be? Were is the plan? Are we following a blueprint? Who said and decided that Europe should be "an inter-European authority that overrides member states in some cases"? Or should the rightful people of the EU have the say of what they want?
- João Luis Pinto, su, 20 kesä 2004 23:28
Re: On the European Union Constitution
It is the dominating method here (in fact, MP-initiated law almost never gets accepted as such). I may be mistaken about how common it is elsewhere.
There is no blueprint, it is an evolving process - but one needs only to look at what EU is now to see that it is where it is going. A body of intergovernment cooperation does not need a supernational parliament, for example.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, ma, 21 kesä 2004 00:59
Re: Rhetorics, the European Union and some patents
I'm glad you didn't link to my entry. I think I understand the basic power structure of the EU and I believe that this action was anti-democratic.
The overwhelming mass of electors probably don't care too much on the actual issue, but they do care that things are done properly. The position the council and commission are trying to force through is that of a small number of large corporations, many of whom are not HQ'd in the EU, and the financially-interested patent offices. They should care more about the vastly more numerous EU-based SMEs that it will hurt.
The EU presently has elaborate decision-making procedures which are intended to bring about compromise, not allow a hard-line view to be forced through and then bind the member states, especially not by the council which is at least two levels of indirection from the electors (and often three, like in the UK, where we elect MPs who elect a leader who appoints the minister). I don't think I've ever seen such a one-sided "harmonisation" as the last "Intellectual Property" directive and this swpat one looks like it will be another. The more direct democracy of the MEPs is being discarded. This looks like the secretariat and/or senate overruling the commons. In the UK at least, the commons can overrule the senate/Lords (sometimes).
I'm not sure whether the proposed constitution will make it better or worse. I'm still reading it, but I'm in no hurry yet because the UK won't vote on it very soon.
- MJR, ke, 09 maalis 2005 19:15
Re: Rhetorics, the European Union and some patents
I didn't link to you because you didn't commit any of the mistakes :)
I think we differ in that I see these problems mainly as problems of the people holding the offices (and in lack of oversight by the national parliaments, or in some cases, in the unfortunate fact that some states genuinely believe swpats are a good thing, in any case stuff that doesn't need to be fixed by overhauling the system), but you seem to see it as a symptom of a systematic problem in the power structure.
Of course, even I would like to see the power of the lower house (the "European Parliament) increase, but I see that as an independent, long-term issue.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, ke, 09 maalis 2005 20:01
Re: Rhetorics, the European Union and some patents
Be it national parliaments or the EU bosses, big corporations have lobbed hard to make both the local and the EU-level decision makers accept software patents.
"For without integration, Europe is reduced again to the traditional collection of competing and conflicting states that wage war against each other."
I don't quite agree. Besides, isn't that rather poor rhetorics too? Are you trying to scare people with the possibility of war in western Europe? Gimme a break... I don't think that we would be any closer to World War 3 in Europe without the EU. The European countries understand the need for cooperation and the times of national wars inside the western Europe seem to be over (and if the situation would really drastically change in the future(?), unions like EU are not going to stop it, but actually could also be part and reson for the conflicts too).
It is not a black-and-white situation: either no integration and cooperation at all, or very deep economic and political integration even to the level of federal republic. Of course there are various levels of integration and cooperation in Europe.
EU is essentially an economic union. It is money that matters in the EU. Nowadays EU is often serving the interests of big European (and multinational) corporations (that e.g. support software patents). That is why we, for example, see so many protesters against globalization in Brussels all the time. They are not against (democratic) European integration itself but against the increasing power of big money and mega-corporations to rule all the things in the world.
- Matt, ke, 09 maalis 2005 23:30
Re: Rhetorics, the European Union and some patents
Matt, one of the chief reasons the integration process that we now know as EU was started in order to avoid yet another paneuropean war. The theory was that if you get traditional enemies (specifically, France and Germany, though France and England is another good pair:) to depend on each other sufficiently, they no longer can afford to wage war against each other. Now, EU is not the only way to do this kind of integration, but it is currently the only one we have.
About the influence of big money on political decisions: Again, I fail to see how this can be fixed by changing the system. The problem is cultural and attitudes have a lot to do with it; get the politicians to stand their ground and you get a functioning, non-corrupt EU - without changing the system.
- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, to, 10 maalis 2005 18:05
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