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President Drnovšek speaks on the future of European Union at Davos

Davos, Switzerland, 01/23/2004  |  speech


President Drnovšek today spoke in Davos, Switzerland, at a World Economic Forum debate entitled “What Europe should CEO’s prepare for?” The discussion, led by Louis Schweitzer – chairman and CEO of Renault, included President Drnovšek, Pat Cox – the president of the European Parliament, Poland’s President Kwasniewski, Klaus Zumwinkel – Chairman of the DeutschePost board of management, and Robert Kagan – Senior Associate, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. According to the organisers of the World Economic Forum, from where it is currently placed Europe could become a world power or experience the gradual erosion of its global influence; this lead to debate on the question of what Europe would be like in ten years time and what position it would hold in the global system.

President Drnovšek used his speech to focus on the issue of the EU constitution. He said it was unfortunate that it had not been adopted at the December summit in Brussels, as it will now be even more difficult to conclude the treaty. There was no doubt, he said, that in ten years time, in 2014, this issue would have been settled – exactly when would depend on countries such as Poland and Spain. The greatest danger of postponing adoption of the constitution is the creation of a two speed Europe, which would only lead to further tensions. For this reason, the President said work on the constitution must continue and it should be adopted as soon as possible.

President Drnovšek also said that he felt discussions on the future of Europe should not avoid the Lisbon process, which set the objective for the European Union of becoming the most competitive economy in the world. Current results in this field cannot be expected to meet these objectives, as economic development in Europe was simply not high enough, President Drnovšek warned, going on to say that agricultural subsidies were still the largest item in the EU budget. He said it was unlikely that the EU could successfully catch up with the United States while this remained the case. He recognised that changing this form of spending would be politically very difficult, but said that priorities must change. He pointed out that both the EU and the US had agricultural policies that could almost be called protectionist from a global point of view, which distorted global trade and harmed developing countries and should be addressed, particularly in the EU budget for 2006-2013.

President Drnovšek also used his speech to draw attention to the issue of the EU’s external affairs. He said that he doubted that in ten years time the EU would be speaking on external affairs with a single voice. Nevertheless, he expected the current position to improve, though that would depend on whether Europe had its own constitution, president and foreign minister. Much more coordination and hard work will be needed for the EU to move towards a more coherent foreign policy, and it would also be unproductive to expect too much too soon as changes of this kind cannot be forced.

Speaking on the European defence policy President Drnovšek said that some improvements would occur in the future, rather than wholesale changes. He did not expect European defence expenditure to increase, which meant that the gap in military capacity between Europe and the United States would grow. In other words, the EU is not set to become a superpower. He did feel that in all likelihood its military units would be better organised that at present and better prepared to face asymmetric security threats, but not to the same extent as US forces.

The continued enlargement of the European Union remains an important issue. President Drnovšek said that a certain amount of “enlargement fatigue” was already noticeable in the European Union, relating to the entry of the ten new members and discussions on the EU constitution. He nevertheless expects that Bulgaria and Romania will be EU members by 2014, joined by Croatia and Turkey. Furthermore a clear European future must be offered to other countries of South Eastern and Eastern Europe as otherwise their economic and democratic trends will deteriorate further.

President Drnovšek used his speech to point out that he did not see the role of the future Europe as a counterweight to the United States on the international scene. Europe, he said, would continue to play an important role in peacekeeping operations, but little else, while Nato remained the primarily transatlantic framework for cooperation, though the US would attribute more importance to ad hoc coalitions intended to meet specific tasks, as was clear from the example of Iraq. Nevertheless Europe would definitely play an important role in the discussion on international trade and the environment. President Drnovšek mentioned that the EU had adopted the Kyoto protocol, unlike the US and Russia. He said that although the Americans were not implementing the Kyoto protocol provisions they were developing new environmental protection technologies, meaning that they may at some point progress in this area. The EU should recognise this fact and readdress the issues relating to the Kyoto protocol to decide whether it was the best possible solution, given its effect on competitiveness.

President Drnovšek concluded his speech by expressing the idea that the future European Union could play an important moral role in the world, particularly through expanding European values. Adopting a constitution would give further support to such a role. He said that he expected that in the future it would be Europe and not the United States that would take on the moral leadership of the world, particularly in discussions on the issues of poverty, the environment and interethnic and interfaith dialogue. This he said was an area in which the EU should take the lead.

President Drnovšek closed by responding to questions from the audience. He agreed with a comment that discussions on the future of Europe should address the aging of the continent’s population. He said the aging population was undoubtedly a priority for Europe and one reason that it would not be increasing its defence budget. He said the ageing of the population was already seen in Europe as a significantly larger problem than the existing security challenges. In response to a question on what diversity means for European cohesion he replied that he felt it was a strength; one which demanded mutual patience, tolerance and dialogue, with precisely that European practice of tolerance being a must for the complex modern world. In the future Europe could function as a model to others of how to accept diversity and turn it into a strength.


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