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France is taking over the European Union’s rotating presidency for its 12th term beginning July 1. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is well known for his big ideas and enthusiasm and has put forward proposals for increasing energy security and independence, bulking up European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP), tightening immigration and asylum law and updating the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The media have encouraged the view that France’s 12th turn at leading the EU will be the grandest in the bloc’s history.
But the tide of world events has changed since Sarkozy first began to ruminate openly about what he had in store for the EU presidency. Earlier in June, the bloc’s governing agreement — the Lisbon Treaty — collapsed after Irish voters rejected it. The treaty failure dashed hopes that Europe would begin integrating into a super state with a single president and foreign policy chief. Meanwhile, commodity prices continue to surge, generating dissatisfaction among member countries’ populations and leading to strikes by fishermen, farmers and truckers that threaten to get worse as the year goes on.
The demise of the Lisbon Treaty weakened the bonds that tie EU members together, and member states are now individually trying to navigate the dire economic straits in whatever way they see fit. With all the cross purposes and mixed interests in the EU, Sarkozy can only achieve policy goals that already enjoy broad consensus, namely immigration and energy policy. If France is to redefine the EU, it needs to succeed in these areas.
The EU Presidency
The first obstacle facing France’s EU presidency lies in the nature of the office. The rotating presidency is not in itself a position of much authority; it is, rather, Europe’s arch-bureaucratic role. The country holding the presidency must organize all of the EU’s summits and meetings (4,000 total) during its six-month term, all the while persuading the EU’s diverse member states to negotiate, compromise and agree. In short, the presidency is not a position well suited for hyperactive leaders with grand schemes of sweeping reforms — like Sarkozy.
The problem of generating consensus is especially troublesome now, as failure of the Lisbon Treaty pushes Euro-skepticism to a recent high. France is responsible for handling the aftermath of the treaty’s rejection, and for showing bloc members and the rest of the world that the EU can survive without an underlying governing framework. Interestingly, this is not the first time France has held the EU presidency amid vexed attempts at structural reform. In the second half of 2000, France’s presidency oversaw the Treaty of Nice. An Irish “no” vote created problems for Brussels back then, too. Moreover, tension between France and Germany marred the whole treaty process. France ended up insisting on the unanimous voting requirement for a number of policy areas, which empowered Euro-skeptics and angered the Germans.
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