Day One of New EU Patent War [LWN.net]

Day One of New EU Patent War

Posted Jul 20, 2006 12:37 UTC (Thu) by nim-nim (subscriber, #34454) [Link]

A big reason for the "No" vote in France (and in fact the main reason I personnaly voted "No") is it was not a constitution at all.

Aside from some timid advancements in democracy it tried to sanctuarise every single previous european treaty (even economic not political ones) in a gray "voted by European Nations with the constitution" zone the European Parliament would never have been able to change.

You may agree or not with the direction current european economy takes, but it should be freaking obvious putting economic rules above democratic oversight is not good for democracy or the average little guy.

The main arguments of the yes proponents was "but those treaties are in force now, they'll be in force even in the 'constitution' is rejected, why are they bothering you?". Which always striked me as deeply cynical and contemptuous of voters brains.

(The counter argument being "they'll be initially in force even if they're not included in the treaty, why does it bother you so much the democratically elected European Parliament may want to revise them in the future?")

Of course that's an angle the reporters have carefully downplayed, as making the French vote a misinformed europhobic thing is so much more confortable than admitting a little despicable attempt to neuter the future Parliament where it counts backfired big time.

Unfortunately these days democracy is viewed as an hindrance in european power circles (which is inclusive of local European politicians, don't be fooled by people who pretend to be shocked by decisions they made themselves directly or indirectly in Brussels)

Day One of New EU Patent War

Posted Jul 21, 2006 13:06 UTC (Fri) by kleptog (subscriber, #1183) [Link]

My personal experience was that the most common reason people voted against it was because they could. No seriously. I had several people sitting across from me basically saying variations on: they never asked me before and now that they are I'm saying no. Did they actually read it? Nope, that wasn't relevent to their decision.

But you're right, it wasn't a constitution and it was a mistake to call it one. You have to remember that the EU is first and foremost an economic union. It's about making it easier to buy and sell things and do business. At the end of the day the EU has no police force or army which can force anyone to do anything. There are large parts of your daily life where the EU has no role and never will.

However, right now I just want France to give in so we can start scrapping all the farm subsidies. There's a sinkhole for money if there ever was one.

Day One of New EU Patent War

Posted Jul 21, 2006 13:50 UTC (Fri) by nim-nim (subscriber, #34454) [Link]

> My personal experience was that the most common reason people voted
> against it was because they could.

Of course they did.
Given they had little voice on european policies before, and felt they'd have little after, what did you expect?

The whole "vote yes" argument was basically:

"We wrote europeans treaties without your input before, now it's time to rubber-stamp them. We hear you'd like some democracy so we called the thing a constitution. But really, you're too irresponsible to have your destiny in your own hands, so we've produced a massive document no one but experts can evaluate. It will constrain the parliaments you'll elect later, so you needn't worry about them making mistakes. Trust us, and vote for democracy!"

Contrast it with:

"We hear you'd like more democracy so we've written a short document defining basic democratic values and leaving the task of defining actual (economic) policy to the experts you'll elect to the european parliament later. If you actually believe in democracy, vote to give a democratically elected assembly actual decision power."

Day One of New EU Patent War

Posted Jul 22, 2006 16:30 UTC (Sat) by kleptog (subscriber, #1183) [Link]

I'm saddened to hear you feel so badly about the way the EU was set up. It's the result of 50 years of work. At each stage every elected government at the time had a veto on the result. They were governments that citizens of the EU at the time had elected to represent them. If you really think every government for the last fifty years was seriously not looking out for their own citizen's interests, well, I'm sorry.

However, what you're suggesting as an alternative as totally impractical. The treaty exists to protect the member countries from the EU, much in the same way as a constitution exists to protect citizens from their government. As much as I think the EP is good idea, I'm not going to trust them above my own national government. For that reason, there should be clearly defined limits to the power of the EU and no EP or anything is going to fiddle with that.

Are there really any sections of the TCE you want the EP or the European Council to be able to fiddle with? I say nail 'em down so they can't move and if it takes 60,000 words to do so, so be it.

Day One of New EU Patent War

Posted Jul 22, 2006 17:57 UTC (Sat) by nim-nim (subscriber, #34454) [Link]

I respectfully disagree (and I think last vote showed most of France disagreed too). Democracy, not arcane indirect power contructs, is what protects citizens.

Power without accountability corrupts. What the Europeans mandarins built during the last 50 years is a system where governments can do back-room agreements, then push hypocritical horrified cries when the european directives they had written are transposed in national law a few years later (ie a no-accountability bureaucrat and lobbyist dream). And I won't dispute the fact most of them are honest or delude themselves in thinking this is all for the greater good.

I'm perfectly aware a European Parliament won't always vote in my country or my own interest. This is all part of the normal democratic process. I accept and do not fear it. My directly-elected representatives at least will know if they don't push for my interests I'll vote for someone else next time.

There are many parts of the TCE I disagree with but I'd have accepted them as long as there was a possibility to change them later through normal democratic process.

What I fear is institutions so complex politicians can reasonably expect normal citizens won't be able to trace their actions, so they needn't take voters into account.

Last year vote showed the French governement parties were so used to doing european policy behind voters back they couldn't defend it before them the one day they had to account for it. What's worse they spent months no realising this time they'd have to account for every single word of their proposal, and wouldn't be given « carte blanche » as usual.

I'm sorry if you can't understand the difference between democracy and enlightened dictatorship. Enlightened dictatorship always works better on paper - wise rulers protected from the whims of voters or direcly elected assemblies. However enlightened dictatorship posits enlightened rulers in the first place, and they tend to get rather scarse once you remove the accountability part.

(Not to mention most of the people who dared pose as enlightened elites last year had lost the voters trust a long time before)