Punitive European policy: a view from the North

Notes internacionals CIDOB, núm. 30

In the wake of recent blips in the Euro- and Schengen zones, northern member states want to see new forms of conditionality and sanction introduced to EU law. It has unleashed a chorus of disapproval. Such policies would, say critics, not only reinforce the unfairness inherent in many EU rules. They would also have less to do with deterrence than with straightforward retribution: northerners quite simply want to punish other members for what they see as moral failings. But is this so bad? Punitive policies may be messy and unfair, but they are an overdue response to a political system that is oblique, technocratic and conflict-shy. Dabbling in mutual punishment is not a perversion of the European dream but a perfectly healthy phase in the EU’s development.

The end of mutual trust

Northern EU governments suspect that they have been the victims of free-riding, moral hazard and deception at the hands of their partners. Their suspicions focus on the common European currency and the EU’s passport-free travel zone. There, interdependencies between member states are high but governments retain considerable national regulatory discretion. Unsettled northerners wish to see an end to that gentleman’s agreement known as “mutual trust” under which each government’s sphere of autonomy is respected. They will now monitor more closely one another’s implementation of EU rules as well as the prosecution of national policies with implications for EU cooperation.

The enlargement of the EU to 27 has stretched these governments’ tolerance to breaking point. The disparities highlighted by enlargement have sunk the myths of “convergence” which formerly nourished hands-off intergovernmental relations. The prospect of Romania and Bulgaria acceding to the Schengen Zone has, for example, done more than merely highlight the crime and administration problems in those two countries. It has forced northerners finally to face up to border and immigration problems in Greece, long a Schengen member but until now physically separated from the bloc. Meanwhile, the Euro-crisis has shown northerners that the process of integration as currently constructed will not overcome regulatory disparities.

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