Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-06T09:16:02.320Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

2 - Why Europe needs a Constitution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 September 2009

By
Jürgen Habermas
Edited by
Ralf Rogowski  and
Charles Turner
Ralf Rogowski
Affiliation:
University of Warwick
Charles Turner
Affiliation:
University of Warwick
Get access

Summary

There is a remarkable contrast between the expectations and demands of those who pushed for European unification immediately after the Second World War, and those who contemplate the continuation of this project today – at the very least, a striking difference in rhetoric and ostensible aim. While the first generation advocates of European integration did not hesitate to speak of the project they had in mind as a ‘United States of Europe’, evoking the example of the USA, current discussion has moved away from the model of a federal state, avoiding even the term ‘federation’. Larry Siedentop's recent book Democracy in Europe expresses a more cautious mood:

[A] great constitutional debate need not involve a prior commitment to federalism as the most desirable outcome in Europe. It may reveal that Europe is in the process of inventing a new political form, something more than a confederation but less than a federation – an association of sovereign states which pool their sovereignty only in very restricted areas to varying degrees, an association which does not seek to have the coercive power to act directly on individuals in the fashion of nation states.

Does this shift in climate reflect a sound realism, born of a learning-process of over four decades, or is it rather the sign of a mood of hesitance, if not outright defeatism?

Type
Chapter
Information
The Shape of the New Europe , pp. 25 - 45
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2006

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Blichner, Lars, 2000, ‘Interparliamentary Discourse and the Quest for Legitimacy’, in Eriksen, Erik Oddvar and Fossum, John Erik (eds.), Democracy in the European Union. London: Routledge, pp. 140–63.Google Scholar
Böckenförde, Ernst-Wolfgang, 1997, Welchen Weg geht Europa?Munich: Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung.Google Scholar
Boer, Pim, 1998, ‘Europe as an Idea’, European Review, Vol. 6, October, 395–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Däubler, Wolfgang, 2000, ‘In bester Verfassung’, Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik, Vol. 11, 1315–21.Google Scholar
Esser, Josef, 1999, ‘Der kooperative Nationalstaat im Zeitalter der “Globalisierung” ’, in Döring, Diether (ed.), Sozialstaat in der Globalisierung. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, pp. 117–44.Google Scholar
European University Institute, 2000, A Basic Treaty for the European Union, May.
Fischer, Joschka, 2000, ‘From Confederacy to Federation: Thoughts on the Finality of European Integration’. Speech at the Humboldt University in Berlin, 12 May 2000. Available at: http://www.jeanmonnetprogram.org/papers/00/joschka_fischer_en.rtf
Fossum, John, 2000, ‘Constitution-making in the European Union’, in Eriksen, Erik Oddvar and Fossum, John Erik (eds.), Democracy in the European Union: Integration through Deliberation?London: Routledge, pp. 111–63.Google Scholar
Grande, Edgar, 1996, ‘Demokratische Legitimation und europäische Integration’, Leviathan, Vol. 24, 339–60.Google Scholar
Grande, Edgar, 2000, ‘Postnational Democracy in Europe’, in Greven, Michael and Pauly, Louis (eds.), Democracy beyond the State?Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, pp. 115–38.Google Scholar
Grande, Edgar and Risse, Thomas, 2000, ‘Bridging the Gap’, Zeitschrift für internationale Beziehungen, Vol. 7(2), 235–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Habermas, Jürgen, 1996, Between Facts and Norms.Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Habermas, Jürgen, 1998, ‘On the Relation between the Nation, Rule of Law and Democracy’, in Habermas, Jürgen, The Inclusion of the Other. Cambridge, MA: Polity, pp. 129–54.Google Scholar
Habermas, Jürgen, 2000, The Postnational Constellation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Hauser, Richard and Irene Becker, 1999, ‘Wird unsere Einkommensverteilung immer ungleicher? Einige Forschungsergebnisse’, in Döring, Diether (ed.), Sozialstaat in der Globalisierung. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, pp. 40–87.Google Scholar
Joerges, Christian and Michelle Everson, 2000, ‘Challenging the Bureaucratic Challenge’, in Eriksen, Erik Oddvar and Fossum, John Erik (eds.), Democracy in the European Union. London: Routledge, pp. 164–88.Google Scholar
Jospin Lionel, 2001, ‘On the Future of an Enlarged Europe’. Speech of the French Prime Minister to the Foreign Press Association, Paris, 28 May 2001. Available at: http://europa.eu.int/constitution/futurum/documents/speech/sp280501_en.htm
Kraus, Peter, 2000a, ‘Von Westfalen nach Kosmopolis. Die Proglematik kultureller Identität in der Europäischen Politik’, Berliner Journal für Soziologie, Vol. 2, 203–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kraus, Peter 2000b, ‘Political Unity and Linguistic Diversity in Europe’, Archives Européennes de Sociologie, Vol. 41, 138–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Niess, Frank, 2000, ‘Das “F-Wort” ’, Blätter fur deutsche und internationale Politik, Vol. 9, 1105–15.Google Scholar
Offe, Claus, 2002, ‘Is There, or Can There Be, a “European Society”?’, in Katenhusen, Ines and Lamping, Wolfram (eds.), Demokratie in Europa. Opladen: Leske & Budrich, pp. 71–90.Google Scholar
Pernice, Ingolf, 1999, ‘Which Institutions for What Kind of Europe? Proposals for the Reform of the European Union in the Year 2000’. WHI Working Paper 2/99, Walter Hallstein-Institute for European Constitutional Law at the Humboldt University, Berlin.
Rousseau, Dominique, 2000, ‘Pour une constitution européenne’, Le Debat, Vol. 108, 54–73.Google Scholar
Scharpf, Fritz, 2000, ‘The Viability of Advanced Welfare States in the International Economy’, Journal of European Public Policy, Vol. 7, 190–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schlesinger, Philip and Deirdre Kevin, 2000, ‘Can the European Union Become a Sphere of Publics?’, in Eriksen, Erik Oddvar and Fossum, John Erik (eds.), Democracy in the European Union: Integration through Deliberation?London: Routledge, pp. 206–29.Google Scholar
Schmitter, Philippe, 1996, ‘Imagining the Future of the Euro-Polity’, in Marks, Gary, Scharpf, Fritz, Schmitter, Philippe and Streeck, Wolfgang, Governance in the European Union. London: SAGE, pp. 121–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Siedentop, Larry, 2000, Democracy in Europe. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Telò, Mario and Paul Magnette, 2001, ‘Social Justice and Solidarity’, in Cerutti, Furio and Rudolph, Enno (eds.), A Soul for Europe, Vol. I. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 73–89.Google Scholar
Therborn, Göran, 2001, ‘Europe's Breaks with Itself. The European Economy and the History, Modernity and World Future of Europe’, in Cerutti, Furio and Rudolph, Enno (eds.), A Soul for Europe, Vol. II. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 73–94.Google Scholar
Vobruba, Georg, 2000, ‘Actors in Processes of Inclusion and Exclusion’, Social Policy and Administration, December, 603–13.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×