Europe’s Nationalists are Undermining the National Interest
Governments that resist a stronger EU cannot deliver the protection their voters demand. Pro-European forces have an opportunity to make the democratic case for collective action. A commentary by Marco Buti, and Marcello Messori
The rise of nationalist parties in opinion polls across many European countries has revived the debate about the relationship between national sovereignism and European sovereignty.
Some political scientists argue that calls for “more Europe” run up against political constraints that cannot be removed in the short to medium term. The result is an apparently intractable predicament.
On the one hand, international pressures and the marginal standing of individual nations within today’s European Union mean that initiatives by individual member states are doomed to impotence.
On the other, sovereignism dominates most EU countries, making it unrealistic to demand “more Europe” without addressing the question of political feasibility.
One proposed way out of this impasse is to recognise nation states as the sole locus of democratic legitimacy, on the grounds that they hold a monopoly on politics.
National governments — whether sovereignist or not — would therefore be the only actors entitled to reconcile individual countries’ interests with the preservation of European ties.
We believe this appeal to nation states and confederal solutions suffers from several weaknesses. The first concerns the minimum scale needed to carry weight in a world governed by might rather than rules.
At best, sovereignist governments can identify issues around which to build heterogeneous coalitions of countries that reduce the national interest to zero-sum games, in which each country’s gains come from shifting greater costs on to others.
Four examples, all relevant to Italy too, illustrate the point.
First, many countries oppose stronger EU spending on innovation, social protection and security in order to preserve transfers that benefit their established electoral constituencies.
In doing so, they lend legitimacy to the position of states that favour shrinking the European budget to prevent waste. The risk is that funding for competitiveness and solidarity will be cut.
Second, reducing European industrial policy to a relaxation of state aid rules, as suggested by the Italian-German agreement last spring, maximises differences between national rules and thus fragments the single market.
The outcome is the greatest possible divergence between European countries.
Third, policies to turn migrants away are gaining ground at the expense of a common approach to migration management consistent with the need to reverse demographic trends that constrain the EU’s future economic development.
If sovereignists imagine they can seal national borders, the inevitable result will be to send migrants back to countries of first arrival.
Fourth, defending the unanimity rule harms rather than protects the national interest, because it leads to decision-making paralysis that hits countries with institutional weaknesses particularly hard.
These examples expose the incompatibility between sovereignist “solutions” and the protection of national interests. National escape routes would condemn individual states to irrelevance on the international stage.
Embracing the sovereignist logic of might makes right damages both the common interest and the national interest.
Sovereignist arrangements of variable geometry produce an EU à la carte, fostering coalitions that lack critical mass.
By contrast, where European institutions enjoy exclusive competence — as in international trade — and do not bow to bullies under pressure from national governments, they can reach ambitious agreements with other economic regions in the interests of all member states.
The supposed democratic advantage of national institutions is reinforced by those who accept the terms set by sovereignists in the name of realism. Yet nation states hold no monopoly on democratic legitimacy.
Citizens seek protection from the political institutions they perceive as closest to them. At the same time, however, opinion polls show that they want the stronger Europe that their elected representatives reject.
Once we recognise that nation states are condemned to impotence without common institutions and shared decisions, it follows that the EU’s sovereignist governments are structurally incapable of meeting their voters’ political demand for protection.
There is, instead, room for pro-European forces to advance a democratic — and electoral — agenda.
A version of this article appeared in Italian in Il Sole 24 Ore.
IEP Bocconi does not express opinions of its own. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors. Any errors or omissions are the responsibility of the authors.
