Interpreting US-Europe: US-Europe Relations in the Process of European Integration

Author: Ye Jiang / Country: Mainland China
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1999-06-01
Features: The main purpose of the Single European Act is to establish a unified internal market within the European Community. Its main content is divided into two aspects: expanding the functions and scope of the Community and improving the Community's decision-making mechanism. In terms of expanding functions, the Single European Act grants the Community certain monetary functions, explicitly proposes economic and monetary policy cooperation (economic and monetary union), strengthens balanced economic and social development within the European Community, emphasizes the consistency of economics and society, promotes research and development in science and technology to provide a stronger foundation and greater competitiveness for Community industry, and strengthens joint actions in environmental protection, implementing unified environmental protection and conservation laws. In terms of improving decision-making mechanisms, the Single European Act grants the European Parliament greater influence, allowing it to participate in Community legislation; strengthens the executive power of the European Community Executive Commission to implement its authority more clearly and comprehensively; and expands the implementation of the majority voting procedure in the Council, stipulating that in newly expanded areas such as the internal market, majority voting shall be the basic decision-making procedure of the Council. Regarding political cooperation, the Single European Act affirms the necessity of cooperation in political and security matters, preparing to more closely coordinate political and economic matters related to security and defense within the framework of political cooperation. With the change in the "leadership and follower" rules in U.S.-European relations, the division of responsibilities between the transatlantic alliance has also undergone fundamental changes. During the Cold War, the division of responsibilities between the United States and Europe primarily focused on how to assume and allocate defense obligations and costs within the transatlantic alliance. However, in this regard, the United States, which was in a leadership position at the time, naturally bore the main obligations and responsibilities. Although the United States and Europe have continuously balanced their respective obligations and responsibilities in terms of political stability, collective defense, and economic recovery and prosperity from the beginning, the division of responsibilities in the transatlantic alliance seemed to always rest with the United States, of course, while Europe had to follow orders. With the end of the bipolar, the disappearance of the Soviet threat, the relative decline of U.S. hegemony, and more importantly, globalization's unprecedentedly close ties between the economies, politics, and security of both sides of the Atlantic, the division of responsibilities between the United States and Europe has inevitably undergone new changes and created new contradictions. In the 1990s, disputes over responsibilities and obligations within the U.S.-European alliance increased, and the focus of these debates was not primarily on how to share defense costs (although there were also contradictions in this regard), but rather on how to define and interpret defense, security, and their relationships with politics and the economy. From the U.S. perspective, on one hand, it hopes to maintain its dominant position in the transatlantic alliance while reducing expenditures (as seen during the 1991 Gulf War), and on the other hand, it consistently emphasizes that security and related military issues should continue to be prioritized in the U.S.-European alliance, followed by economic issues. Europe, however, takes the opposite approach, believing that the United States' dominant position in the alliance has come to an end and that Europe should be on an equal footing with the United States. At the same time, Europe also argues that in today's increasingly integrated global economy and politics, security should be embedded within economic and political frameworks, so the responsibilities between the United States and Europe should not be hierarchical, and obligations should be equal. For example, in matters of armaments, Europe should have its own independent defense system and no longer rely entirely on the United States as in the past. Clearly, the desire to establish an independent European defense system is precisely in line with the deepening integration of Europe's economy and politics. In summary, globalization has indeed changed the traditional U.S.-led U.S.-European partnership, but at the dawn of the 21st century, a new U.S.-European relationship model has not yet been established. Under globalization, the positions of the United States and Europe in international relations have undergone significant but uncertain changes. Since the demise of the Yalta international system, the United States has formally become the world's only superpower, but it is also a relatively declining superpower. While U.S. power and authority still have a significant impact in the international relations of globalization, they are now very limited, and the era when the United States dominated international political and economic relations has come to an end. Meanwhile, Europe (the European Union) has gradually become a potential center of power in the new international environment, but it has not yet fully consolidated. The collective will of an integrated Europe, especially its political collective will, still remains intermittent, although the prospects for integration seem promising. Precisely because the positions of the United States and Europe in international relations are so uncertain, yet at the same time the transatlantic ties have become even closer due to globalization, and the mutual economic dependence between the two has been increasing, while their political alliance will continue to exist for a considerable period, the future development of U.S.-European relations under the new circumstances is highly and. However, a comprehensive and correct understanding of the future direction of U.S.-European relations should be approached from a historical perspective, as historical experience often helps people better understand and interpret the present and, to a certain extent, predict the future. Of course, to achieve a scientific understanding of the present and the future, social science methods such as political economy must also be applied. The analysis of the similarities and differences in the political systems of the United States and Europe should acknowledge that their political systems are largely similar but with minor differences, as their fundamental attributes are consistent in essence. However, this does not mean that the differences in their political systems are insignificant. In fact, the development and evolution of U.S.-European relations after World War II are not only related to the commonalities of their political systems but also, to a certain extent, related to their differences.
1. The Homogeneity of U.S.-European Political Systems. Whether from a historical or a contemporary perspective, the political systems of Western Europe and the United States are essentially homogenous. Homogeneity refers to the fact that the class nature of the political systems of Western European countries and the United States is bourgeois dictatorship. At the same time, the common feature of political systems based on bourgeois dictatorship is that representative institutions are elected through universal suffrage of citizens. Great Britain is the birthplace of modern representative political systems, hence the title "Mother of Parliaments." After Britain established the first bourgeois representative government in human history in the 17th century, a series of capitalist countries in North America and Western Europe successively established bourgeois representative governments through revolutions (such as the 1776 American Revolution and the 1789 French Revolution) or reforms (such as political reforms in Germany, Italy, and other countries). This form of representative political democracy reached perfection in Western Europe and North America after World War II. In fact, the bourgeois representative political systems of Europe and the United States are a form of realizing "popular sovereignty." Although the principle of bourgeois "popular sovereignty" has obvious class characteristics, at least in form, according to this principle, the power of representative governments comes from the of the people, and the specific expression of this is the universal suffrage system. Prominent economist Joseph Alois Schumpeter, in his classic work "Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy," argues that democratic politics is the selection of political leadership through elections. Schumpeter defines a society that implements democratic politics as one that selects its government through regular, organized elections. This means that elections are the main that distinguishes democratic political systems from other political systems, and in contemporary Europe and the United States, political elections are manifested as universal participation in suffrage. ① It is therefore evident that universal suffrage is a fundamental commonality of the representative parliamentary democratic political systems of Europe and the United States. Although the universal suffrage systems of Europe and the United States differ in form to some extent, their basic spirit is consistent, which is that the political elites who actually hold the highest power in the state are selected through elections. For example, although the universal suffrage system in the United Kingdom only involves citizens electing members of the House of Commons, the King and members of the House of Lords are not elected, while in the United States and the Fifth Republic of France, both houses of Congress and the president are elected by citizens through universal suffrage. However, whether in the United Kingdom, the United States, or other Western European countries, political authority ultimately rests with institutions chosen by the electorate. In the United Kingdom, this is manifested in the selection of the House of Commons by the electorate, with the majority party in the House forming the government and establishing a responsible cabinet government. The responsible cabinet government is directly politically accountable to the parliament, but the electorate still retains the ultimate, because, first, the electorate can change the majority party in the House through regular general elections, thereby changing the ruling party and forming a new government; second, the prime minister of the responsible cabinet government has the power to request the dissolution of the parliament and call for new elections, with the electorate deciding whether to allow the original government to continue in office. In the United States and France, since the highest legislative and executive institutions of the state are all elected by the people through universal suffrage, the role and status of universal suffrage in the political system are even more prominent, that is, the highest decision-making and power institutions of the state are formed through elections. In summary, the representative political systems of Europe and the United States are based on the premise of implementing universal suffrage, and without universal suffrage, there can be no representative government. Universal suffrage, as a common feature of the representative democratic political systems of Europe and the United States, has brought Europe and the United States together in politics