EU Election: European Old Guard in Denial

European political leaders in established state parties struggled through the first hours following punishment dealt to them in EU parliamentary elections. Despite the clear message from voters that they are not willing to allow a dramatic power shift to Brussels, the old guard is not showing signs that the message has been received.

Reporters who interviewed current members of parliament after the election described a certain amount of "arrogance" and "pathetic" reactions, such as describing voters as too uninformed to participate in the political process and doubting the "legitimacy" of the results due to low voter turnout. Jacques Chirac said that the EU elections were "disappointing for all of us and for Europe," apparently making a clear distinction between his Europe and the democratic voice of European voters. According to BBC correspondent Carole Walker; Michael Howard, leader of the Tory Party in England that lost nine seats in this election, promised he will not let the result "force the party into an anti-EU position."

Media professor Stig Hadenius, writing in <i>Dagens Nyheter</i>, criticized media handling of EU politics. What is needed is independent journalistic scrutiny. Instead, the media went hand in hand with established parties and opinion polls and made the same errors in judging the level of EU skepticism. He also criticized the topics covered by the media. Instead of taking up important European political issues, the focus was on voter participation and partisan polling data.

After some initial confusion, an attempt at damage control is starting to take shape. In some press releases, the concept of EU skepticism is limited to counting members of newly created parties that were founded with the sole mission of opposing the <i>super state</i> that the proposed constitution would create, and those parties are lumped together in post election analysis with "nationalists" and parties that are "hostile to foreigners." With the right spin, it can look like EU skeptics are a mixed collection of extremists that will make up only a bit more than 10 percent of the new parliament.

EU skeptics however, cut across the political spectrum and are found in most if not all political parties. Individuals within parties have been at odds with party leadership. In Sweden, this movement become obvious last year when voters rejected the Euro in a referendum. Splinter groups from every political party broke from their party leadership to campaign against the uncontrolled power shift often called "the European project."

Anna Hedh is a member of the Swedish Social Democratic Labor Party and a good example. As an EU skeptic, she is at odds with party leadership even though a majority of Swedish Social Democrats oppose the proposed constitution. As a candidate for the EU Parliament, her name was placed 31st on the back side of the party list where in normal circumstances it might have gone unnoticed and quickly forgotten. But Social Democratic voters found and checked her name in droves, an option in Sweden's partisan system. She will be a member of the new parliament along with candidates that were placed at the top of the list.

After her victory she commented that "the establishment" is not in step with the people on EU issues. That view is supported by Uppsala political science professor Sverker Gustavsson, who commented that established parties did not care about the voters.

Despite the success of skeptics in this election, the battle to defend states' rights is far from over. New EU MP Robert Kilroy-Silk, of the UK Independent Party has promised to "wreck" the EU by exposing the corruption that is destroying independence. It has been reported that Tony Blair is meeting with British MPs to formulate a strategy to stop him. One proposal from a pro-Europe politician is to eliminate elections to the EU Parliament in favor of political appointments.

The EU Parliament in fact, does not have the power to stop adoption of the constitution. One of the problems with "the European project" is that elected representatives to the EU actually have about as much power as the sausage vendor out on the street. The dramatic shift in power that would result if the proposed constitution were to go into effect would reduce state legislatures to symbolic artifacts, causing the collapse of democracy in Europe.

The election of a powerful EU skeptics bloc however sends a strong message to the established political class that has driven "the European project." One positive reaction is to allow a referendum on the proposed constitution, a step that several states have already accepted. A more positive step would be to abandon the proposed constitution to begin work on an acceptable political program. If Europeans are unable to move established state leaders from their current course, their only option is to replace them with EU skeptics in state elections. Given what the old guard has tried to get away with, that is probably a good idea in any case.

Roger F. Gay