FRONT PAGE
To be torn down as soon as possible for the good of Europe
On the eve of the 20th anniversary since the fall of the Berlin Wall the – seemingly scholastic -question “how did the end of the Cold War formally and substantially affect Europe and its institutions?” has more than one answer. However, before attempting answers and analyses – on whose objectivity nobody would stake his life on, viewed against the framework of world history they are but a gust of wind – a lead-in ought to be made. Besides peoples’ afflatus, besides Moscow- Washington thawing relations, besides the personal commitment of Karol Wojtyla, part of the merit of the fall of the Wall ought to be ascribed to the example of freedom, development, democracy and respect of human rights conveyed in the EU project. This was always present at theoretical level and often also in concrete reality. The answer to the opening question encompasses two distinct spheres. As relates to the integration of the European Continent, the disappearance of political ad economic borders has entailed the victory of reason and peace over meaninglessness and war. The common historical, cultural, and religious roots were finally brought together, and although this unity is currently heterogeneous, yet it is destined to irreversible cohesion. The second sphere regards the entry of East European countries in the European Union. As former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan once said, past and future cohesions represent “the most significant event since the end of World War II”. And how could we blame him, considering that States which for over half a century had nuclear weapons aimed against each other now peacefully sit around the same table sharing the same agenda? However also the “nature” of the response is twofold, especially as relates to EU enlargement. The democratization and modernization process of national institutions and of the governance model that took off in the pre-adhesion period and which is still under way, is positive both for Eastern States and for the EU’s “historical partners” (which were thus given the opportunity to recover the sense of solidarity that had been neglected in the 1990s), while the (hastened) mass adhesion negatively impacted EU institutions and their own performance. The rules were obsolete in EU-15, and they are all the more so in EU-27. Decisional immobility has been transformed from being political to geopolitical. This led to a standstill in the reforms and to the EU’s attempts to wear a habit that would conform to its new size: a political, social and environmental habit, not only a business and economic one.Far too few substantial changes were made over the past twenty, ten, and even in the last five years in the areas of performance, responsibilities and decision-making process. The non-reform wall, far from being invisible, ought to be torn down as soon as possible. If not, our children and we will be content with historical developments, but we will harbor regrets over the unjustly missed and wasted opportunities.
