![Brussels does not exist – but it matters a lot [Promoted content] | INFBusiness.com](/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/90e08619ed1908f87135c84e0aaeb0cd.jpg "In Brussels, the European elections started earlier this year. But it was practically only here, in the capital of the European Institutions, that this was noticed. In the member states few are aware of the various movements taking place, with the exception of those who want to be part of the lists and of those who decide who is in and who stays out.")
In Brussels, the European elections started earlier this year. But it was practically only here, in the capital of the European Institutions, that this was noticed. In the member states few are aware of the various movements taking place, with the exception of those who want to be part of the lists and of those who decide who is in and who stays out.
Henrique Burnay is Senior Partner of Eupportunity – European affairs consulting.
We always say the same. But this time is really for real. The upcoming European elections are truly important. More than the usual.
In the last decade Europe has gained relevance and power. In particular the European Commission for the way in which managed the three recent crises. Without changing a line of the Treaties, European decisions are becoming increasingly important. And they are also about increasingly important things.
The sovereign debt crisis led the European Union to intervene much more deeply at national level. The pandemic has shown that there are crises that require a response only possible on a European scale. And Russia’s war against Ukraine showed, once again, that there are crises that can only be answered on a European scale, that Europeans identify a common threat when they see one, and that the post-Cold War world, in which Europe grew and transformed itself, has come to an end. And that has big consequences. External and internal.
The Green Deal already pointed in one direction. More European intervention in major national policies. Just like the European semester before it. But the need to have a global impact, be geopolitical and to respond to the economic effect of current international and economic circumstances reinforced the general orientation of European policy: geopolitics for the sake of economics.
Europe wants to have a place in the world through its economic power. And Brussels, above all the European Commission, but also the European Parliament, by its nature, believes that this place of the European economy in the world will be the result of European public policies. And of European funds. Or national ones, but authorized by the European Union. And some member states think exactly the same. But not all.
It is in this political and economic environment that we have to think about the next European elections. And in its consequences. Which are much more than the famous 60 or 70% of national laws resulting from European legislation. And much more diverse.
The tendency to reinforce economic interventionism, protectionism and nationalism (or regionalism) is not unique to Europe. Deglobalization, or more likely reglobalization, is reorganizing the world economy and the positioning of political blocs. And national governments, or supra-national ones like the EU, want to intervene in the process to determine its outcome. Or try. At the same time free traders are not all gone.
In this context, of greater intervention by public policies in more areas, and with greater ambition, the probability of its result being neutral or symmetrical for the different Member States, Regions, or European and national industries is low. There will be different impacts. And if that is taken into account or not depends on what is done about it.
Relations with China (including imports, exports and foreign investment), relations with the United States of America, enlargement, support for certain industries or sectors, social consequences of economic policies, choosing or not the successful technologies in response to climate change, different impacts in different member states of inflation and the increase in interest rates… All of this will be the result of decisions made in the coming years. Much more than before. That’s the new thing.
All this goes to say that it is necessary to start, right now, explaining to voters that it is important to participate. It’s decisive. More than ever.
But it is not just electoral representation that counts. In a democratic decision-making process, participation does not end with voting. And in a political decision-making process that will be as impactful as the one we are going to experience in the coming years, the role of representing legitimate interests is even more important. It does not replace or solve the lack of electoral participation. But it complements it. Continues it.
In the coming years it will be much more important to lobby in Brussels. Because Brussels exists. It’s just not the Brussels that is usually presented.
To say that Brussels is responsible for whatever decision made is an easy way of saying that decisions are taken by others, far from capitals, governments and national parliaments. Turns out this isn’t true. That distant and unaccountable Brussels does not exist.
The real Brussels of the European Union is the result of political decisions by representatives of national governments and Members of the European Parliament. That are accountable. And it is based on proposals from a Commission that corresponds to European political balances and that responds to the Council and Parliament.
The real Brussels that exists depends on the decisions of democratically chosen representatives. And a part of that choice is the European elections. Which will be more important than ever. Because the day after the 2024 elections, Europe will continue to matter even more in the lives of citizens and companies. That’s also why after the elections the role of stakeholders will be more important and impactful.
Source: euractiv.com
