eurealist.co.uk

The concept of democracy at the EU level is very much like the EU itself a top down arrangement, the leaders of the EU do make a big noise about democracy they claim it for the EU and demand it in member states and other states worldwide. It is a truism that if the EU applied to join the EU, its application would have to be rejected because of it lack of democracy.

Yet if you look at the make believe world that is the EU there is in reality no democracy. They simply invent organisations without any reference to what the people actually want and then demand that those organisations become the seat of popular democratic expression. And if the people do not accept the designations then it is the people who are at fault not the basic organisation.

The EU regions are a case in point, these did not exit until they were introduced to an EU blueprint, because the EU decided that it would use our money to buy itself power by creating a tension between the peoples and their nation states, and at the same time create an embryonic alternative system of governance, designed to by pass the nation states. Of course by creating some regions along the lines of old kingdoms in Britain for instance; Scotland and Wales, the EU has resurrected and instituted divisions in the British state that have not existed for hundreds of years. The regions have in that sense created both a focus and an engine for partition, where sub nationalists find a new direction within the EU and see a new and different future for their smaller sub national area.

The Scots for instance feel that they can better represent their region by dealing directly with the EU rather than through the British government as part of Britain. As an aside; I find this a particularly bogus claim in the present circumstances, because the Scots hold all the power in Britain and the British Prime minister has taken an oath to put the interests of Scotland and the Scottish people above all else. An oath that should have disqualified him from holding his office, which demands that he should put the interests of Britain and the British people above all else, not just part of Britain.

In England the regionalism process has stalled, the regions did not divide along natural or historical lines, and have no popular base to support them as their only reason for existing in the first place is to be a conduit for repayment of our money filtered through the EU. The English have outright rejected the politicisation of our regions even though the assemblies still exists their removal is only a matter of time but this will still leave us with the regional development agencies.

We pay our taxes to enable our national government to supply services to British citizens and protect the British state. Yet some of that money is being sent directly to the EU, which is, by careful channelled funding supporting sub national regionional development, this has the intention and the effect of undermining the British nation state and furthering the influence of the EU. The next step, once these sub national regions are established, is to create a further impediment to the nation state, by requiring the regions to build cross border political institutions between themselves. Obviously as these are cross border institution they will report to and react directly with the EU, which is the funding intuition that enables these cross border regions to exist in the first place. So now some of the EU funding for the regions is being re-direct away from the sub regions and towards the implementation of cross border regions, the regions still have accesses to that part of EU funding, but now only for cross border development, within the EU cross border regions, under the EU cross border programmes.

We are expected to believe that these cross border regions are nothing more than evidence of various regions deciding to cooperate with each other for the betterment of all. But this idea is firmly dispatched once it becomes apparent that they consider themselves to be the proper beneficiary of popular sovereignty. As popular sovereignty at present exist solely within the nation state and not with cross border EU institutions, this is a direct challenge to the concept of the nation state.

Confirmation of the claim for popular sovereignty can be seen in the The Interreg IVB North Sea Region Programme - Project Idea Book
Which says

The citizens’ interest in politics in the North Sea Region has dwindled to such an extent over recent decades that the legitimacy of the elected politicians is being brought into question. Figures show that:

* fewer people are using their right to vote (in non-mandatory circumstances);

* membership of political parties has plummeted, and

* the choice of political representatives is narrowing as fewer people put themselves forward for election.

To me this is evidence that the EU political landscape has evolved by simply ignoring the people and has removed so much power from the national parliaments that there is now very little purpose in voting as the people we elect no longer control power. But to the apparatchiks in the EU this is evidence that the EU needs to do more to fill the vacuum.

Therefore, Democracy needs continuous and constant care from municipal to European level, not only in election time, and especially in a growing Europe.

Building on Objective 5: ’strengthening participation and democratic decision-making in Europe’ in the i2010 EU eGovernment Action Plan (April 25th, 2006), the inventory ‘E-democracy initiatives in Council of Europe member states’ (Council of Europe, April 16th, 2007), earlier eDemocracy initiatives in European regions, e.g. at Bristol (UK), and the results of the Interreg IIIB North Sea Region project evoice 2004-2008 (see: www.evoice-eu.net), the future project Spirit of Democracy will transnationally explore and investigate how modern communication techniques and (interactive) e-services, combined with new forms of social/political organisation and governance,

might and should be used and implemented to reinforce democracy.
Some possible themes of interest are:

* how to join forces to empower democracy: a transnational approach;

* councils of the future: digitally enabled;

* interactive eConsultation and ePetition;

* web 2.0 technology: how to encourage political interaction.

There is you will note not a mention of holding elections or referendum or in any meaningful democratic manner involving the people, or even the simplest of questions, do we actually consent to the imposition of these cross border intuitions in the first place?

As Jo White wrote in the email introducing this “Project Idea Book”

Ask some prats to put a few daft ideas together and hey presto! Democracy!

I couldn’t even get half way through this, so nauseous did I feel.

This lot wouldn’t recognise the “Spirit of Democracy” if it punched them on the nose - something I wouldn’t mind doing myself.

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