Exactly a week ago, last Friday evening, I attended a discussion at the home of CNE boss Tim Evans, one of his Putney Debates. Alex Singleton spoke eloquently about what a fine thing free markets are and how difficult it is for the government to do as well.
Also present at the discussion was a long-time friend of London libertarianism by the name of Bruce. Bruce has been living in Spain for the last decade or so, but is now back in London, and during the discussion he said something very interesting which stuck in my mind, and which I now realise deserves the attention of this blog.
For as along as I can remember, whenever we’ve met up, Bruce has been telling me that the Spaniards have had a much more sensible attitude towards the EU than the British, which is that if they don’t like any particular EUro-regulation or EUro-imposition, they just ignore it. Why, he would ask, can’t the British just learn to do the same? That’s a sentiment I think we’ve heard here quite a lot also, whenever we’ve been arguing about the nuances of the EU.
This time, however, he said something different. Apparently, in Spain, a class of pestilential busybodies who take EUro-stupidity seriously is starting to form and to make its pestilential presence felt, and the Spaniards are starting to notice this, and to get rather fidgety. To put it another way, instead of the sensible Spanish practice – of ignoring all this EUro-nonsense and just carrying on baking bread, fishing for fish, being a bit rude to the occasional ethnic minority, driving as they please, dodging VAT, and so on and so on, the way they always have – spreading to Britain, the British practice, of taking all such drivel seriously, on account of it being the law and all that, is now spreading to Spain. And my guess would be, this tendency isn’t confined to Spain.
This official bEUrocratic infestation process, if it is indeed happening, strikes me as a lot more significant than the grumbling that is now occurring throughout the Euro area about inflation, because this ‘inflation’ could just be a one-off effect from the switch from the local currencies to the Euro. Yes, prices have gone up a gut-wrenching amount, and a lot more than is being officially admitted, but presumably that effect will calm down, and in due course be forgotten. But this hideous tribe of meddling EUro-despots look like being a permanent and ever-growing presence, and the hatred of them seems likely only to grow and grow.
I don’t have any links to stories which might back up any of this, but of course commenters may well be able to correct that omission.
It is regrettably a similar story in Ireland. Quotidian Irish life is similar to British but one thing we do share with the (also predominantly catholic) Spanish which differs from the British is this casual attitude towards enforcement (I have written about this before). There is this attachment in catholic countries for myriad “symbolic” legislation: designed primarily to “send a message”. This is tolerable up to a point, if a nuisance, so long as there is general apathy and little enforcement.
Unfortunately “Compliance” is the new clarion call and there is a new breed of steely eyed (mostly) university graduates with no experience of the private sector working in government agencies determined to enforce this.
Didn’t the Nazis, have offspring spying on their parents?
Unfortunately it seems that part of being a ‘socialist’, is making sure that everyone else is as bloody miserable as you are, and making sure that someone smarter than you, is not ‘improving’ themselves beyond the general low drear levels considered acceptable by the ‘left’.
They have made being a snitch and a busybody an acceptable thing.
Of course, none of this applies if you are a member of the self-styled ‘elite’, you know the ones, – the Toynbees, Abbotts, Blairs et al.
Old Spanish proverb (quoted by VS Naipaul in “Loss of Eldorado”): The law is observed but not obeyed. Ignoring regulation is a Spanish cultural imperative, and for the sake of multiculturalism, ought to be respected.
I’m still confused.
Can some European person explain to me again why anyone would sign up to put themselves under a government they have no control over?
Or, simpler, just what is the appeal of the EU? What is it going to do for you?
I can’t see that it does, or can do, anything that needs doing. To the contrary, it seems that its only purpose is to do things that shouldn’t be done (imo).
So again, seriously, why did countries join this thing?
Can some European person explain to me again why anyone would sign up to put themselves under a government they have no control over?
I read Thatcher’s autobiography recently.
One point she made was that it is in part due to empire building by Foreign Office mandarins. Foreign Office officials are heavily involved in EU policy making. So expanding the areas over which the EU has competence means expanding the responsibilities (and hence perks and status) of FO civil servants.
To me, an outsider, the most striking motivation seems to be a subliminal fear of another world war. The lesson many young Brits seem to have taken away from the appalling carnage of the 20th Century (no doubt with lots of help from their history teachers), is that nationalism is evil and bad and inevitably leads to war.
Their only hope is to castigate themselves and subsume pride in any one country in favor of a big, featureless and unlovable conglomerate that includes all the players from the last century’s dramas.
The way we Americans still love to march in parades and wave the flag and yell “hooray for us!” strikes them as not merely obnoxious and unsophisticated, but downright dangerously psychotic. Don’t we know that’s how millions die?
well, eu membership hasn’t been bad for spain. it trousers about 7bn euro a year in subsidies, its economy has boomed since it joined the eu, and 7 years of strong, conservative government still hasn’t dented the 22% black economy which means you never see any homeless in the streets in spain. oh, and by the way, spain has, according to the economist, just overtaken canada as the 8th largest economy in the world. plus the deluded separatists in spain see the eu as freeing them from some madrid “yoke”
S Weasel – I think you’re close. Also, though, when the idea of the “Common Market” was first mooted, it sounded wonderful. A market of the whole of Europe (or the whole of it which hadn’t been subsumed by the USSR) as a market and no duties, no trade barriers.
Those who saw a darker political agenda were jeered at. Those who had mild reservations were reassured. It was just a trading group – that’s all. One by one, little tiny regulations crept in in the name of “harmony”. Then, those regulations, fashioned by unelected people whose names we didn’t even know, acquired the force of law. And so it crept on and crept on, with those who demurred being described as ‘little Englanders’ (as though the British, of all people in history, could be accused of insularity), xenophobes and, lately racists.
The carpet was slipped quietly from under their feet. Britain was being governed by corrupt, unelected apparachiks and paying, through taxes, for the nomenklatura to have special privileges and for their industries to be destroyed.
That’s how it happened. And they deserve every last regulation and tax theft and theft of national freedom that has been visited on them. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance, and the British were too lazy to be vigilant.
Just as a thought experiment:
Would not ignoring those (stupid) pesky laws tend to breed a certain disrespect for all laws?
And lead to “gotcha” enforcement…where only those in a bad odor with the “powers that be” get the full inspection regime?
Oh goody. The third (world ) way finally explained.
Well, I don’t know where to start. I’ve blogged numerous times in numerous places about the Italian uomo-della/sulla-strada (man-on-the-street) view on the EU and it is very much as described of the Spaniards. I got back from doing some biz in Florence about an hour ago (finally having found a decent properly priced restaurant there, email me for info!) and was reminded innumerable times of the logic of the Italian approach to life, inter alia:-
1. I arrived late at my local railway station so crossed the tracks (rather than using the underpass) with my heavily pregnant wife in tow – England – whaoaa! Arrested and generous internal cavity search follows. Italy – not a glance from the stationmaster wielding the cigarette and chatting about his kids
2. Taxi whisked me from the station to my appointment downtown, using several one way street – but not as they should be used.
3. morning meetings consisted of constant surpises as to vocab – why use an Italian word when there’s a better anglo one – French readers please note. viz – Italians have recently graduated from calling “gomma americana” to what it should be – “chewing gum”, there’s no word apart from english for “standard” etc. etc.
4. the supposedly EU dictated smoker-free lunchtime restaurant had the distict pall of virginia leaf – can’t understand it or subscribe to it personally but love and admire the Italians freedom to do it.
5. definitely over the legal alcohol limit resulting from consumption of Antinori’s methde champenoise Bollinger copy (better than the french stuff though je regrette not a lot cheaper) and still drove home without fear for me or other motorists/pedestrians.
All in all a profitable and enjoyable day. No EU intrusion visible so far here in Tuscany.
which is that if they don’t like any particular EUro-regulation or EUro-imposition, they just ignore it. Why, he would ask, can’t the British just learn to do the same?
Its called respect for the rule of law. Cultures where the law is taken casually tend to have corruption, and/or lots of very broad laws that are enforced in arbitrary and discriminatory ways.
We silly Anglosphere types tend to believe that if a law is on the books, it should be taken seriously. We have a similar attitude toward treaty obligations (and other contracts) that is often lacking in countries that treat the rule of law casually. The insouciance with which the French violate their treaties is a frequent source of teeth-gnashing on this site; it is of a piece with the relaxed attitude toward the law generally that is bieng lauded above.
Frankly, I prefer the Anglosphere approach.
“Its called respect for the rule of law.”
No, no, no.
The french rulemakers and self-stlyed elite who ignore their own pontifications and spouting are one thing. The decision by an alleged “citizen” to ignore the unwanted impositions of some grubby, pointless, unwanted, interfering “politician” is something entirely, entirely different.
I loathe the “do as I say, not as I do” pathetic self-delusion and self-aggrandisement of the likes of the ghastly and pathetic Diane Abbot.
I love the insouciant attitude to stupid bureaucrat-serving rules and self-generated paperwork of my Italian neighbours and friends.
Tony, my point is that the insouciant attitude toward the law cannot be confined only to laws that you and I might agree are trivial.
It is typical of the attitude toward all laws in many countries, and sets the stage for passage of anything and everything (“hey, its only a law! Who cares?”) and arbitrary rule by “prosecutorial discretion.” This attitude nationwide is essential to enarquism and other flavors of elite rule – after all, if everyone blows off the law, why should it apply to the elites?
Yeah, its funny when everyone blows off meaningless bureaucratic diktats, until one of those bureaucrats gets a call from his chum at your competitor and shows up at your door to enforce them.
Its even more hilarious when the treaty obligations are treated in exactly the same way.
Tuscany Tony – “I love the insouciant attitude to stupid bureaucrat-serving rules and self-generated paperwork of my Italian neighbours and friends.”
The insouciant attitude is being mercilessly cut out. Ireland. Spain. Get the message. The enforcers are in charge now.
Second: Why were these “self-serving bureaucratic rules” allowed into being among your relaxed compadres? Didn’t they know they were on a short leash? The EU bureaucrats are in charge now. How did you miss that?
I interpreted your original comments as meaning all laws should be obeyed equally without self-determination of their relevance. Agree that there must be some basic ground rules for all, though personally prefer general “philosophies” from inflexible “rules”
Verity
The bureaucrats are only in charge of what they know about, which in Italy is probably 25-30% of anything! This is my key point, and remains valid until sat-technology can hear the spoken word and the rustle of greasy euronotes from geostationary orbit above my house.
I know about Ireland (was in Dublin swilling Guinness and making some cash 2 weeks ago). Spain, not so sure. All my info on the place derives from my deep and oft-repeated analysis of Fawlty Towers’ very own Manuel, so the prognosis ain’t good.
Prosecutorial discretion and civil asset forfeture in the US have led us far down the path toward the kind of anarcho-tryanny (Pournelle’s term for it) that R.C.Dean decries above.
Wanna stomp your competitor to the ground? Manufacture a drug scandal against the CEO, who then loses his house, car, etc. It’s happened here.
And the Federal Bureaucracy isn’t getting any smaller under GWB. Ever looked at the Federal Register? After the comment period, all of those fun regulations have the force of law, and they were made up by civil ‘servants’, not even by our Reps. from their safe, gerrymandered seats. They couldn’t be bothered to work out the messy details, and have now almost wholly (in practice) pawned off the law making to the executive branch.
All of these things are no surprise to one who has studied the historical evolution of govermental forms.
These are all classical features of historical Empires.
We should perhaps tend to our glass house before we Americans denigrate the EU so much. Avoiding another world war is the European excuse for going down this garden path. We used getting out of the Depression via the New Deal as ours.
S.Weasel, – a response, – better late than never
Fear of another world war and blaming nationalism for the same, maybe the explanation fed to the younger generation. That makes it easier to bemuse them into thinking that the EU is a valid option.
The reason mentioned was valid immediately after WWll, and Churchill is on record as saying as much. see: http://www.winstonchurchill.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=226#SUMMER but then the memories of WWll were still fresh in mind, and no-one wanted more of the same.
However times change, and the main objective now seems to be to become some sort of competitor, or balance, to the US, and to try and fashion an entity where countries in decline, cling together in an effort to regain some semblance of their former status. Hence, nationalism is now being replaced by ‘continentalism’, and the same old propaganda used to promote nationalism, is now being used to promote continentalism.
First it was the US versus Russia, one virtual continent against another, with Europe hanging on somewhere in between. Now it is Europe versus the USA, with Asia in the wings.
The USA has the advantage in that it combines the size of a continent, with the loyalties of a country. It does not have the centuries old antagonisms, so rife in Europe, to contend with. Europe cannot even get its act together on a national level. (see Belgium, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Spain, UK, etc.)
The anti-nationalism stance, is only working now because the number of people alive, who have personal experience of the sacrifices made in the name of nationalism, are dwindling.
The concept of nationalism works for the US, because it is a big country, it does not work for European countries because they are too small, thus we get to the concept of (a socialist) Europe as a single entity. So for the former it is good and for the latter a bad thing. European governments stamp on nationalism, and having given it up, – just like reformed smokers, – they see, anyone doing just what they used to do, as being backward etc. etc. as a danger and get quite abusive as a result.
As for respect for the law, there are so many ‘laws’, that most folk are ‘criminals’ to some degree or another. It is the fault of the lawmakers, that laws, (like policemen), are viewed with derision, and only those that makes sense are obeyed. it is touch and go as to who will be the victor in the battle between stupid mindless legislation and common sense.
Ernest Young – That was a very interesting post. Yes, the number of people with experience of the sacrifices that paid for our freedom is dwindling. And, actually, you hit the nail on the head when you said Europeans are like reformed smokers. Having given it up themselves, they look down on people who still have the habit [of nationalism].
Tuscany Tony – France is also experiencing the urge to interfere in everyone’s lives. There are government sponsored fake, happy little conversations between people advising one another not to smoke. And not to forget to eat their vegetables!! And here’s the maximum amount of alcohol you should allow yourself daily! And remember to exercise, for your heart! And they’ve also put tax up on cigarettes, although this will probably be as successful as it has been in Britain. But the government’s chipping away at the smoking culture, and they’ll win. Meanwhile, they’ve got their knickers in a bunch because more and more entrepreneurial types are going over the border into Spain and coming back with vans laden with cheap cigarettes. The Spanish, meanwhile, are driving over the border into Andorra. Where will it all end?
I don’t see why there would be a connection between nationalism and the size of the country. There are lots of little nations that are very taken with themselves, even now.
I’ve known more than one Dutchman, for example, who happily disparaged Americans and our primitive, unsophisticated ways, then reared up on his hind legs and got all huffy and God Save the Queen on my ass when the topic turned to the Netherlands and Queen Beatrix.
I suspect there are many wells of nationalistic feeling left in Europe, and eventually they’re going to show. Not in any catastrophic way. Perhaps just in a dawning realization that the nations of Europe are too autonomous to function as a single entity. A mutually dependant and cooperative group of entities, maybe, but not one unit.
S.Weasel,
A mutually dependant and cooperative group of entities,
I think that this was the original idea and intention, before it was hijacked by the Franco-German clique.
but not (as) one unit.
Isn’t this the aim of the proposed ‘Constitution’? and the result of France’s anti-Americanism. To produce a centrally controlled European State, to act as a counter weight to the US.?
Already the loss of judicial and sovereign rights among members, has ensured that most of them could not go-it-alone now.
It seems that the modern displays of nationalism are restricted to those small countries that were swallowed up in previous amalgamations, such as the Basques, the Scots and Welsh, The Serbs etc.etc.
The worry with continentalism as averse to nationalism, is that the inevitable wars, when they happen, will be far more devastating than anything that has happened in the past. Think nuclear…
The power vested in continental entities is enormous, and the people who are in charge, are consequently very powerful, and as we all know ‘power corrupts’. Why do you think the French and Germans are so eager to be the Big Nebbies in the EU.
The same forces that drove clans to fight each other, that drove countries to war, will be the same forces that will drive ‘continental entities’ to war.
Things change, but the human condition does not.
Posted after the rugby World Cup:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7995-904620,00.html
Chirac (Lord High Bastard), claims this is a victory for Europe…. just bears out the gist of my last two posts.
They just heap one calumny on another…
Oh, I know what they intend for Europe, ernest. I just don’t think they can pull it off.
I don’t think they’ll achieve it either, what will most likely happen is that the strangling regulation and forced “continental antionalism” will progress to a point and then there will be an almighty SNAP! and you’ll get the second coming, figuratively, of Oliver Cromwell.
Thanks to all for the serious replies to my question.
I’m not surprised that folks would want to form a European Union, for all the reasons given above (although I think it would have been better to stick to a purely-economic union, as originally proposed).
No, what amazes me so, and what I question, is why folks would sign up for something so removed from any form of citizen control. It’s not the EU in theory that amazes me, it’s the EU in fact.
The EU, in practice, looks like a tyranny of bureaucrats, all unelected, and each President-for-Life.
Tyranny doesn’t surprise me. It’s a pretty common human condition. But that folks would vote for it, clamor for it, ask to be admitted to it – I guess I still don’t get it.
If the EU experiment doesn’t work out and you become unhappy with what they’re doing, then what? As I understand it, you can’t leave, and you can’t vote the rascals out of office. So now what?
My philosophy re all the above is to try to avoid the ghastly creeping doom of the whole thing. The stealth approach – if I remember rightly 5 of the 6 Orwellian points were already in place in 1984 (20 years ago in 39 days time!) – is the worst of all worlds.
Thus, let’s hope for rapidly raised taxes, much more pettifogging bureaucracy, immediate derestriction on immigration, increase in all un-means tested benefits to Swedish-style 85% of average wages, guaranteed state housing for all, promotion of strict fundamentalist Islamic values for all, the instant federalisation of the Union, Identity Cards for each to be shown to the authorities at least 3 times a day, motion trackers fixed permanently on all taxpaying citizens, replacement if the “innocuous” symbols on the EU “currency” with Neil and Glenys Kinnock’s visages, the immediate and ongoing pardoning of all the French political elite, and the immediate appointment of S Berlusconi as Gang Leader, simultaneously restoring all “control” of EU media to him. I’d also state-fund Matrix Chambers, Mrs. Tony Blairs nest of useful, value added, worthwhile and full of merit lawyers.
I give it 6 months before the whole thing blows.
Let’s Pump Up The Volume……
DSmith – People never clamoured for it. They were lied to by elected politicians like Traitor-in-Chief Edward Heath, who mockingly reassured them in his faux patrician voice (his mother was a lady’s maid – nothing wrong with that – but he wasn’t what he posed as) they were just being too silly for having doubts. Supported by the Trotsky left – much of it employed by the BBC – the message came through with the power of a jackboot. People had nowhere to protest. If they tried to put forth an opposing arguement, they were sneered at as “little englanders” – although Britain may have been the most outgoing nation the world has ever known – or “xenophobes” – again, given Britain’s history, clearly mumbo-jumbo employed to confuse and intimidate.
Lately, if you don’t want to be ruled by unelected apparachiks in Brussels, you’re a “racist” – and don’t forget, “racism” is illegal. How one Caucasian can be a “racist” when arguing with another Caucasion is not addressed. If an Englishman argues with a Scot, it is now “racism”.
They’ve made any form of dissent illegal.
They’re nationalising children.
The people who dissented originally, before it was made illegal, were sneered at with honking great laughs and snide, adenoidal comments by the like of “Sir” David Frost and gang. The British found themselves with no spokesman who wouldn’t be sniggered at by the media. So, until blogs, they had no way to make their discontent known. Now, it’s too late.
Too late for a peaceful resolve, that is. A rupture will come, but given how far down the road to “cohesive, harmonious” laws and regulations we have come, it no longer has the ability to be peaceful. But it will come.
Verity
Good on ya, girl. Your last sentence, my 7.14pm post. Amazing.
Oh, and does anyone have any comment on this, which I first read in this weekend’s FT.
The original article that inspired these comments had a link to the Centre for New Europe web site.
Proudly they announced the appointment of yet another ‘Fellow’, as follows:
Professor Philippe Simonnot has been appointed as a Visiting Fellow at CNE. A graduate of the Institute of Political Studies in Paris and a doctor of economics by background, he is currently a columnist with Le Monde and Professor of Law and Economics at the University of Paris.
A prolific writer and author of more than twenty books, his major works have covered such diverse subjects as health care, war, marriage, banking, and politics
Sounds just like us bloggers, – opinions on everything and knowlege of nothing, – except he’s getting paid handsomely for the privilege. Seriously, – how can one man be such an expert on such a wide variety of subjects? perhaps he is academia’s mythical ‘Jack 0f all Trades’.
I assume the funding for CNE is from some sort of grant.
Verity, – anyone told you you look beautiful when you are annoyed? 🙂
Not that I know anything about Professor Simonnot – but if he’s a prominent economist, and particularly if his interests are in the sphere of state regulation vs free markets, then looking *from a regulatory economic perspective* at health care, war, marriage, banking, and politics seems like a reasonable set of research interests.
ernest young – Very kind. Most people tell me I just look annoyed.
Tuscan Tony – Matrix is such a 1984-ish name, isn’t it? Faceless, threatening, sinister…
how can one man be such an expert on such a wide variety of subjects?
Easy. Given his background (Visiting Fellow at CNE; graduate of the Institute of Political Studies in Paris; a columnist with Le Monde; Professor of Law and Economics at the University of Paris), I assume he is a Marxist.
Marxism provides a comprehensive theory of everything. Once you have mastered Marxist theory, nothing is easier than applying it to any topic that takes your fancy.
The EU is bad enough, with France trying to establish itself in a permanent presidency – but you’re forgetting the EC, which is if anything worse and on paper looks to have authority over the EU.
What is needed is ways for countries to challenge regulations, including a requirement that each particular enforceable clause include a cost-benefit calculation excluding enforcement, and a specific enforce price tag. Such EC buro paper crap should need to be approved by the complaining gov’t before it’s accepted.
The EU constitution is the current battleground. It should be required to be accepted in a referendum — then defeated until better (if ever).