Europe on Hold

...Today, all that seems like a pipe dream...

...Regardless of whether such a measure comes to pass, though, no one is expecting very much to happen in 1993...

...The multinational committees at EC headquarters in Brussels inspire little confidence...

...There is widespread uneasiness that the new border crossing privileges within the Community will facilitate an explosion of the narcotics trade...

...The Old World, in short, was to become a New World, radiating hope and flush with excitement...

...In Germany, where the much prized economic "locomotive" is running out of fuel, Chancellor Helmut Kohl's Christian Democrats may soon find themselves as scorned as France's recently dominant Socialists...

...A couple of years ago, when Euro-enthusiasm was high, none of today's concerns would have been viewed as more than peripheral...

...Despite some reservations, his Conservative government strongly backs greater EC integration, as does the opposition Labor Party...

...A far more serious manifestation of the EC's problems, though, was the rejection of the Maastricht Treaty—designed to accelerate the unity process?by first the Danish electorate and then (probably temporarily) the British Parliament...

...And the longstanding resentment over massive subsidies given to farmers —who at most makeup 6 per cent of the Community's population—is growing more intense as food prices in Europe continue to be inflated by them...

...Since virtually everywhere in the 12-nation Community citizens are questioning the ability of their own leaders to ameliorate mounting domestic woes, they are not inclined to entrust the task to foreigners...

...Chancellor Kohl has meanwhile hinted that the rest of the EC might be prepared to adopt a two-tier system of integration, with the laggards (meaning Britain) left behind...

...The remaining obstacles to economic integration among members of the European Community (EC) were to be swept away, allowing the long-awaited free movement of people, goods, services, and investments...

...funding badly needed capital projects in Europe's rust belt as well as other impoverished regions, or promoting scientific and technological research—receive scant praise from most Europeans...

...Instead of displaying a clear sense of purpose and direction, the EC seems anxious, tired and confused...

...As 1993 approached, several nations still had reservations about critical issues, and certain disagreements, such as those involving a common social policy, appeared unlikely to be resolved quickly...

...Major is deeply embarrassed by the rebellion of the "Little Englanders" in Tory ranks who have delayed Parliament's passage of the Maastricht agreement, and promises that Britain will fall in line later this year...

...Euro-champions like EC Commission President Jacques Delors and former British Prime Minister Edward Heath protest that those actions are a grave mistake...

...The surge of enthusiasm that had been building up for '93 has been replaced by skepticism, cynicism and, in some cases, violence...

...At the moment, there is nothing Prime Minister Major can do about the country's spoiler image...

...Sights were set on the big prize: the momentous economic advantages that could be realized by a market of 320 million First World consumers, and the international political power that a united Europe could wield...

...Nevertheless, the EC governments each proclaimed a commitment to taking major steps toward unification...

...Yet this merely serves to highlight the EC's paralysis in the face of troubling outside events that impinge upon it directly...

...Measures were to be introduced that would establish a Western European monetary union with a single currency, and a coordinated EC foreign policy...

...throughout Europe this is a time of disenchantment with politicians...

...In Italy, where almost daily new stories of corruption have been surfacing, the entire political establishment is in disgrace...

...True, only the most starry-eyed Euro-zealots believed the transformation would be achieved before the year was out...

...In addition to all these doubts and disputes, many EC members are unhappy with Germany's primary concentration on funding the reintegration and rehabilitation of its impoverished eastern sector, for that has diverted Bonn's attention and financial resources from the cause of European union...

...The benefits already derived from existing Community agreements, they argue, are proof that the difficulties currently facing member states—drooping trade and production, underinvestment, unemployment—can best be dealt with by maintaining the momentum toward greater cooperation...

...The failure of the Community to respond cohesively, let alone effectively, to the Bosnian catastrophe in its backyard—leaving any action to the United Nations and President Bill Clinton—has drawn understandable criticism here and abroad...

...Prime Minister John Major is rapidly becoming a target of ridicule...

...The French, who choose to make more of the British-American special relationship than is any longer warranted, would have no difficulty with that...

...Their ministers met with encouraging regularity and pledged to overcome disruptive national sentiments...

...European unification inches forward...

...When enraged French fishermen violated existing EC trade regulations by destroying huge amounts of low-priced fish imported from Britain, Scottish fishermen did the same to fish imported from France...

...But key phases of the process will almost certainly remain on hold until the Continent's economic malaise can be overcome—and Europeans are once more receptive to historic change...

...As Shakespeare's Brutus pointed out, "There is a tide in the affairs of men,/Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune...

...A number of European leaders contend that the British are largely responsible for the EC's loss of momentum, because their reluctance to relinquish sovereignty to a superstate has been most vocal...

...Especially in troubled EC industrial areas, the feeling is that those investments are misdirected...

...The Germans have also aroused qualms by exhibiting an apparent eagerness to carve out a separate sphere of influence in Eastern Europe through heavy investments like the one they have made in the Skoda automobile factory near Prague...

...Norman Gelb writes regularly for The New Leader on British affairs...

...The period of prosperity and growth that encouraged bold plans for the role the European Community would assume by this year is now a memory—and a hope...

...But the tide has now ebbed, and even if the current spate of difficulties were somehow marginalized, cataclysmic developments outside the EC—in the former Soviet Union, former Yugoslavia, and parts of Eastern Europe?have cast serious doubt on its capabilities, purposes and merits...

...The French have protested permitting the Hoover Vacuum Cleaner Company to shift production from Dijon to Glasgow, where labor costs are lower...

...The British Institute of Directors has lambasted Brussels for issuing "nightmare" regulations that are said to be hampering Britain's economic recovery...

...Even undeniably positive steps—e.g...

...Here in England, where the government seems incapable of sticking to any policy it puts forward...

...Exasperation with particular EC decisions, on the other hand, is being increasingly expressed...

...All one hears nowadays are scare stories about destitute millions flooding westward—some have already arrived in Germany—and then taking advantage of the eased border controls to fan out across the Community...

...But the public is no longer listening...