After 15 amazing years, Europe enters surreal phase By Gideon Rachman René Magritte, the surrealist painter, lived and worked in Brussels for most of his life. So it seems only appropriate that the European Union – an increasingly surreal organisation – should have chosen to base itself in Magritte's home town.
The hint of surrealism in the EU's affairs struck me at the organisation's most recent summit, after I overheard a conversation in the corridor. A flustered diplomat was insisting angrily to a journalist: "This is not a non-paper." It was a pleasing phrase, faintly reminiscent of Magritte's masterwork "This Is Not A Pipe". In an EU context, the phrase "This is not a non-paper" actually makes perfect sense. A "non-paper" is diplomat-speak for an informal discussion document, which can be used to broach a controversial subject. The rumour in Brussels was that there was a document of this sort in the works, about a possible EU diplomatic initiative towards Syria. Since I never got to discuss the matter further, I cannot confirm the non-paper's non-existence. But the surrealism of the incident went well beyond language. Suppose the non-non-paper had become a proper non-paper, then a paper and then a proposal and then a policy. Then what? Well, then nothing. The chance of an EU diplomatic initiative to Syria actually changing anything in the real world seems pretty close to zero. The whole incident is symptomatic of the EU's broader problem with reality. For the truth is that the EU is poised to spend the next five years in agonised debate about things that look less and less likely ever to happen – the admission of Turkey to the EU and the introduction of a new constitution for the Union. Non-papers are the least of the problem; the whole of the EU is threatening to turn into a bit of a non-event. It was not always like this. On the contrary, the EU has just gone through 15 years of the most astonishing practical achievements. It launched a single currency, a single market and a common foreign policy – and it has more than doubled in size from 12 to 27 members. Only last week Bulgaria and Romania were formally admitted as the latest members of the Union. It is possible that at some point in the next five years, Croatia will sneak in under the wire as the 28th member of the EU. But the next two really big projects – Turkey and the constitution – look increasingly like they will never make it off the drawing board. The EU's age of achievement is coming to a close. So what has changed? The short answer is public opinion. For many years the EU has essentially been built by elites, without much consultation with ordinary people. This was possible as long as the "European project" was broadly popular and seemed largely technical and economic in nature. But the enlargement of the Union to include countries that are much poorer than the western European members has proved controversial. The attempt to write a formal constitution for the EU – with its deliberate evocation of the creation of a state – was similarly politically charged. As a result, politicians in several important EU countries felt unable to treat the constitution as simply a technical political matter, to be pushed through parliaments in the normal manner. Hence, the fateful decisions by France and the Netherlands to hold referendums. The repercussions of the French and Dutch rejections of the constitution in 2005 are still being felt. Many French politicians concluded that the rejection of the constitution was an indirect protest against enlargement. So President Jacques Chirac has amended the French constitution to make it compulsory to submit any further enlargements (after Croatia) to a popular vote – you could call it the Turkey clause. France will not be alone. The Austrians have also promised a referendum on Turkish membership. Given the state of public opinion in both countries, a No vote seems all but inevitable. Meanwhile, the Dutch have made it clear that they will have to vote again on anything that looks like an effort to resurrect the constitution – and the Poles, Brits and others will feel similarly obliged. Since both Turkish accession and a new constitution would have to be passed unanimously by all 27 EU members, handing a hostile public a veto looks like the end of the matter. European politicians have yet fully to acknowledge how the new popularity of referendums has changed the Union. Officially, the EU remains committed to (increasingly fraught) negotiations with Turkey. Germany, which recently took over the presidency of the EU, is committed to reviving the constitution. Some of the finest minds in Brussels are also working on the problem. One senior EU official reckons that the solution will be to calm public fears, by stripping the constitution of any elements that suggest that a European state is being built. He even wants to ditch the name constitution, in favour of a "treaty amending the treaties on the European communities and the European Union". "Who could ever object to that?" says the official, laughing uproariously. Much as I admire the ingenuity and cynicism of the effort, I'm afraid it will not fly. The average European is definitely stupider than the average Brussels bureaucrat. But the intelligence gap is not so enormous that a ruse this transparent will work. However, the fact that both the constitution and the admission of Turkey seem doomed ultimately to be blocked by public opinion will not stop European politicians and diplomats spending huge amounts of time and energy, debating and negotiating both topics. To stop the process now would be to acknowledge that the European project has been altered irreversibly by the French and Dutch referendums. As somebody once remarked, humankind cannot bear very much reality. One popular definition of surrealism is "a dream-like state different from, or ultimately 'truer' than everyday reality". Anyone who has attended an EU summit should recognise this description. Once you cross the threshold of the Justus Lipsius building in Brussels, where summits are held and enter the realm of "non-papers" and agonised debates about things that are never going to happen, the real world does indeed seem a long way away. But people at the summit are happy with their alternative reality. The company is congenial, the bars stay open late and the food is free. Who cares if nothing ever happens? 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