European Union

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The European Union (EU) is an intergovernmental and supranational union of 25 member states. The European Union was established under that name in 1992 by the Treaty on European Union (the Maastricht Treaty). However, many aspects of the Union existed before that date through a series of predecessor relationships, dating back to 1951. [1]

The Union currently has a common single market consisting of a customs union, a single currency managed by the European Central Bank (so far adopted by 12 of the 25 member states), a Common Agricultural Policy, a common trade policy, and a Common Fisheries Policy.[2] A Common Foreign and Security Policy was also established as the second of the three pillars of the European Union. The Schengen Agreement abolished passport control, and customs checks were also abolished at many of the EU's internal borders, creating a single space of mobility for EU citizens to live, travel, work and invest. [3]

The most important EU institutions include the Council of the European Union, the European Commission, the European Court of Justice, the European Central Bank and the European Parliament. The European Parliament's origins go back to the 1950s and the founding treaties, and since 1979 its members have been directly elected by the people they represent. Elections are held every five years, and every EU citizen who is registered as a voter is entitled to vote.

The European Union's activities cover all areas of public policy, from health and economic policy to foreign affairs and defense. However, the extent of its powers differs greatly between areas. Depending on the area in question, the EU may therefore resemble a federation (e.g. on monetary affairs, agricultural, trade and environmental policy, economic and social policy), a confederation (e.g. on home affairs) or an international organisation (e.g. in foreign affairs).

The members of the European Union have transferred to it considerable sovereignty, more than that of any other non-sovereign regional organisation. As has been mentioned, in certain areas the EU begins to take on the character of a federation or confederation. However, in legal terms, member states remain the masters of the Treaties, which means that the Union does not have the power to transfer additional powers from states onto itself without their agreement through further international treaties. Further, in many areas member states have given up relatively little national sovereignty, particularly in key areas of national interest such as foreign relations and defense. Because of this unique structure most simply classify the European Union as a sui generis entity and leave it at that.

On October 29, 2004, EU member state heads of government and state signed the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe. This has been ratified by 13 member states and is currently awaiting ratification by the other states. However, this process faltered on May 29, 2005 when the majority of French voters rejected the constitution in a referendum by 54.7%. The French rejection was followed three days later by a Dutch one on June 1 when in the Netherlands 61.6% of voters refused the constitution as well. [4]

The current and future status of the European Union therefore continues to be subject of political controversy, with widely differing views both within and between member states. For example, in the United Kingdom one poll suggested that around 50% of the population are indifferent to the European Union and 20% voted for parties that wanted to withdraw from the EU in the 2004 EU elections [5]. However, other countries are more in favour of European integration — soon after the Netherlands and the French voted "no" on the constitution, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg voted "yes." What the term "European integration" itself means is also the subject of much debate.

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Issues currently facing the EU cover its membership, structure, procedures and policies; they include the adoption, abandonment or adjustment of the new constitutional treaty, the Union's enlargement to the south and east, resolving the Union's problematic fiscal and democratic accountability, economic viability with the United States, China, and India, revision of the rules of the Stability and Growth Pact, and the future budget and the Common Agricultural Policy.

At the December 2005 European Council, which is a semi-annual meeting of EU member states' heads of state and government, EU member states decided on how it should allocate the EU budget for the next seven years (2007–2013). Also, the "Financial Perspective" was defined as EU members agreed to fix the common budget to 1.045% of the European GDP.[6] UK Prime Minister Tony Blair agreed to review the British rebate, negotiated by Margaret Thatcher in 1984, despite a promise to the contrary made to the UK Parliament. French President Jacques Chirac declared that this increase in budget will permit Europe to "finance common policies" such as the Common Agricultural Policy or the Research and Technological Development Policy. However, France's demand to lower the VAT in catering was refused.[7]

Issues controversial during upcoming budget debates include the British rebate, France's benefits from the Common Agricultural Policy, Germany and the Netherlands' large contributions to the EU budget, and reform of the European Regional Development Funds.

Many commentators have envisaged these debates to yield a major split between governments such as France and Germany, who call for a broader budget and a more federal union, and governments such as that of the UK, who demanded a slimmer budget with more funding transferred to science and research (and whose watchword is modernisation).

The Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe (TCE), commonly referred to as the European Constitution, is an international treaty intended to create a constitution for the European Union. The failure of the constitution to win popular support in some member states (France and Netherlands[8]) caused other countries to postpone or halt their ratification procedures, and the Constitution now has a highly uncertain future.[9][10] Had it been ratified, the treaty would have entered into force on November 1, 2006. However, as of May 2006, Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Slovakia, Slovenia and Spain had ratified the constitutional treaty.[11] The two countries due to join the European Union in 2007, Bulgaria and Romania, have already accepted the constitutional treaty too, ratifying their accession treaty.

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Attempts to unite the disparate nations of Europe precede the modern nation states; they have occurred repeatedly throughout the history of Europe. Two and a half thousand years ago, Europe was dominated by the Celts and other tribes which were not a single political entity, and then conquered and ruled by the Mediterranean centred Roman Empire. This early union was created by the force of one central state. The Frankish empire of Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire united large areas under a loose administration for hundreds of years. The 1800s customs union under Napoleon and the 1940s conquests of Germany had only transitory existence.

Given Europe's collections of languages, cultures and ethnic groups, these attempts usually involved military subjugation of unwilling nations, leading to instability; others have lasted hundreds of years and promulgated large spells of peace and economical and technological progress as in the Roman Empire's Pax Romana. One of the first proposals for peaceful unification through cooperation and equality of membership was made by the pacifist Victor Hugo in 1851. Following the catastrophes of the First World War and the Second World War, the impetus for the founding of (what was later to become) the European Union greatly increased, driven by the determination to rebuild Europe and to eliminate the possibility of another war. This sentiment eventually led to the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community by (West) Germany, France, Italy and the Benelux countries. This was accomplished by the Treaty of Paris, signed in April, 1951, and taking effect in July, 1952. [12]

The first full customs union was originally known as the European Economic Community (informally called the Common Market in the UK), established by the Treaty of Rome in 1957 and implemented on 1 January 1958. This later changed to the European Community which is now the "first pillar" of the European Union created by the Maastricht treaty. The EU has evolved from a trade body into an economic and political partnership. As president of the Convention on the Future of Europe, the former French president Valéry Giscard d'Estaing proposed to change the name of the European Union to United Europe but it was not adopted.

The European Union is a highly populated, culturally diverse union of 25 member states, constantly expanding and developing. Approximately 4.5 percent of the EU population is comprised of Muslim (many second and third generation) immigrants, some 20,000,000 persons. These are mainly Magrehbians from North Africa, Turks, and immigrants from the Balkan states. There are small communities of Asians and some sub-saharan populations. Over the next two decades the total population of the EU25 is expected to increase by more than 13 million inhabitants, from 456.8 million on 1 January 2004 to 470.1 million on 1 January 2025. Population growth in the EU25 until 2025 will be mainly due to net migration, since total deaths in the EU25 will outnumber total births from 2010. The effect of net migration will no longer outweigh the natural decrease after 2025, when the population will start to decline gradually. The population will reach 449.8 million on 1 January 2050, that is a decrease of more than 20 million inhabitants compared to 2025. Over the whole projection period the EU25 population will decrease by 1.5%, resulting from a 0.4% increase for the EU15 and a 11.7% decrease for the ten new Member States.

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Member states and enlargement

The European Union's 25 member states covers an area of 3,892,685 km² and has approximately 460 million inhabitants as of December 2004 [14]. The European Union's member states combined represent the world's largest economy by GDP, the seventh largest territory in the world by area and the third largest by population. The EU describes itself as a "a family of democratic European countries",[1] though the extent of "European" has been a matter of debate, especially in relation to the possibility of the accession of Turkey.

The European Union has land borders with 22 nations (23 if counting Northern Cyprus).

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Greenland, which was granted home rule by Denmark in 1979, left the European Community in 1985, following a referendum.
Bulgaria and Romania are scheduled to become members on 1 January 2007.
Several overseas territories and dependencies have close associations with particular EU member states, for example Greenland, the Isle of Man, the Azores and Madeira. (See special member state territories and their relations with the EU)
1 European jurisdiction is not currently enforced in Northern Cyprus.

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Bulgaria and Romania are scheduled to become members on 1 January 2007,[15] provided that they meet the conditions for membership and that the Treaty of Accession for the Republic of Bulgaria and Romania is ratified by parliaments of member states. The treaty was signed by representatives of the EU Member States at the Abbaye de Neumünster in Luxembourg on 25 April 2005.[15] As of 2005, member state parliaments are taking forward its ratification. On 16 May 2006 an EU report to the European Parliament on the two states entry said that it was still possible for them to enter on schedule but listed areas in which progress had to be made to meet the target date. For Bulgaria this was principally tackling organised crime and for Romania it was in the area of food safety. [16]

Croatia is an official candidate country to join and started accession negotiations in October 2005. In June 2006, the EU officials projected that the accession of Croatia would likely happen in 2010. The closure of negotiations for all chapters of the acquis communautaire is expected in 2008 or 2009, while signing the Accession treaty would happen in the year after.

Turkey is an official candidate to join the European Union. Turkish European ambitions date back to 1963 Ankara Agreements. Turkey started preliminary negotiations on 3 October 2005. However, analysts believe 2015 is the earliest date the country can join the union due to the plethora of economic and social reforms it has to complete, and the fact that the 2007-2013 budget takes no account of the considerable costs Turkey's accession will involve.[17]

Republic of Macedonia has been given official candidate status as of December 2005 under the name "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia".[18]

The EFTA states of Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway are members of the European Economic Area which allows them to participate in most aspects of the EU single market without joining the EU. Switzerland, the fourth EFTA state, rejected EEA membership in a referendum; however, it has established close ties to the EU by means of bilateral treaties.

Further information: Accession of Bulgaria to the European Union, Accession of Romania to the European Union, Accession of Croatia to the European Union, Accession of Turkey to the European Union, Accession of the Republic of Macedonia to the European Union, Iceland and the European Union, Norway and the European Union, Ukraine and the European Union, and Third country relationships with the EU
Supporters of the European Union argue that the growth of the EU is a force for peace and democracy. They argue that the wars which were a periodic feature of the history of Western Europe have ceased since the formation of the European Economic Community (which later became the EU) in the 1950s. They also claim that in the early 1970s, Greece, Portugal and Spain were all dictatorships, but the desire of the business communities in these three countries to be in the EU created a strong impetus for democracy there. Others argue that peace in Europe since World War II is more due to other causes, such as the need for a unified response to the threat from the Soviet Union, a need for reconstruction after World War II, and a collective temporary tiring of waging war, and that the dictatorships cited came to an end for totally different reasons.

In more recent times, the European Union has been extending its influence to the east. It has accepted several new members that were previously behind the Iron Curtain, and has plans to accept several more in the medium-term. It is hoped that in a similar fashion to the entry of Spain, Portugal and Greece in the 1980s, membership for these states will help cement economic and political stability.

As the EU continues to enlarge eastward, the candidate countries' accessions tend to grow more controversial. As previously explained, the EU has finished accession talks with Bulgaria and Romania, and set an entry date for the two countries in 2007. However, the rejection of the EU Constitution by France and the Netherlands, and the EU's slow economic growth, have cast some doubt on whether the EU will be ready to accept new members after 2007, when Romania and Bulgaria are set to join EU (in early 2005 they signed the Accession Treaty).

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EU institutions and bodies
The functioning of the European Union is supported by the five institutions, as enumerated in the Maastricht Treaty:

The European Parliament (732 members 750 max.)
The Council of the European Union (or 'Council of Ministers') (25 members)
The European Commission (25 members)
The European Court of Justice (incorporating the Court of First Instance) (25 judges (& 25 judges of CFI))
The European Court of Auditors (25 members)
The European Council, which is a regular meeting of the 25 head of member states and the European Commission president is sometimes also listed as an institution, although since it lacks its own staff, budget and the legal powers held by the above 5 institutions, it is better described as a "quasi-institution".

There are two financial bodies[19]:

European Central Bank (which alongside the national Central Banks, composes the European System of Central Banks)
European Investment Bank (including the European Investment Fund)
There are also two advisory committees to the institutions:

Committee of the Regions, advising on regional issues
Economic and Social Committee, advising on economic and social policy (principally relations between workers and employers)
There are also a great number of bodies, usually set up by secondary legislation, which exist to implement particular policies. These are the agencies of the European Union. Examples are the EUROPOL (the European Police Office), the European Environment Agency, the European Aviation Safety Agency or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market, the Political and Security Committee, established in the context of the Common Foreign and Security Policy, monitoring and advising on international issues of global security.

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As soon as the European Economic Community (EEC) was established, political and legal wrangling began over where the European institutions should be located. The Member States were unable to reach agreement on where the permanent seats should be, particularly since the concept of a European district, proposed by Jean Monnet, won little support. From 1958, the Commissions of the EEC and the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC or Euratom) had their seats in Brussels.

Until such time as the member states reached agreement on a single permanent seat for the Community institutions, European officials were distributed between Brussels, Luxembourg and Strasbourg, leading, in particular, to a considerable increase in overheads. Brussels was chosen as the seat of the Single Commission and the Council of Ministers. In practical terms, this meant that most European officials were employed there. Luxembourg sought compensation for the loss of the High Authority and the Special Council of Ministers of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), both of which were relocated to Brussels. However, Luxembourg became the seat for the new European Investment Bank (EIB) and was given the assurance that certain meetings of the Council of Ministers would be held there, in April, June and September. The Court of Justice, the Central Statistical Office, the Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, the Advisory Committee and the financial services of the ECSC and the Secretariat of the Parliamentary Assembly also remained in Luxembourg. Meanwhile, France refused to renounce its claim for Strasbourg as seat of the Parliamentary Assembly. An expensive and inconvenient compromise was reached whereby Parliament’s Members met in plenary session in Strasbourg but meetings of parliamentary committees were held in Brussels. Certain plenary meetings were also held in Luxembourg, which was also the seat of the Secretariat of the European Parliament.

The EU has no official capital and its institutions are divided between several cities:

Brussels — considered the de facto capital of the EU, being the seat of the European Commission and the Council of the European Union. It is also the venue of the European Parliament's committee meetings and mini-sessions and (since 2004) the host city for all European Council summits.
Strasbourg — seat of the European Parliament and venue of its twelve week-long plenary sessions each year. Strasbourg is also the seat of the Council of Europe and the European Court of Human Rights, two institutions which are separate from (and have a wider membership than) the EU.
Luxembourg City — seat of the European Court of Justice, the Secretariat of the European Parliament and the European Investment Bank.

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