The European Union is not a
military alliance, like NATO or the ancient Spartan League. Nor is the E.U.
merely a free-trade agreement like NAFTA. In terms of the history of
federalism, the E.U. instantiates “modern federalism,” wherein governmental
sovereignty is split between federal and state levels, rather than confederalism,
wherein all such sovereignty is retained by the states. Both the U.S. and E.U.
instantiate modern federal systems, although ironically the U.S. was originally
a confederal system of sovereign states. In likening the E.U. to NATA in 2023, President
Erdogan of Turkey unwittingly committed a category mistake. This in turn
weakened his attempt to leverage his power in approving Sweden as a country in
NATO with his demand that the E.U. admit Turkey as a state.
Just prior to the NATO meeting in
June, 2023, Erdogan stated at a news conference, “First, let’s clear Turkey’s
way in the European Union, then let’s clear the way for Sweden, just as we
paved the way for Finland.”[1]
Becoming a state in a political union, whether it is the U.S. or E.U., is
qualitatively different than joining a military alliance. Joining the latter
does not involve a transfer of some governmental sovereignty to a federal
executive branch (e.g., the E.U. Commission), legislative branch (e.g., the
Council of the E.U. and the E.U. Parliament), and judicial branch (e.g., the
European Court of Justice). A state in such a federal system is qualitatively
different than a country being in a military alliance because an alliance
itself has no governmental institutions and sovereignty.
To characterize a state in a
union and a country in a military alliance both as “member states” is
misleading. In fact, efforts to do so may stem from an ideological “state’s
rights” (or Euroskeptic) effort to deny that the E.U. is in fact an instance of
modern federalism rather than confederalism. In remarking that “almost all NATO
member countries are European member countries,” Erdogan unwittingly fell into
the trap of the ideologues who refuse to recognize that the E.U. and U.S. fall
within the same genre of unions of states (i.e., modern federalism rather than
confederalism).[2]
Because the term country implies full sovereignty, both E.U. and U.S. members
are states in the sense of being semi-sovereign political units in a federal
system. The U.S. states are members of the U.S., because they joined the U.S.
from being formerly sovereign countries (or assumed to have been of such
status) and the members of the U.S. Senate, which is based on international
rather than national law. The Council of the E.U. is also founded on
international principles, wherein political units rather than citizens are the
members.
It follows that the countries
that are members of UNESCO, the UN, and other international organizations are
not states thereof, and should not be referred to as member states. To do so in
an attempt to imply that the E.U., unlike the U.S., is also an international
organization flies in the face of the very existence of the E.U. Commission,
the European Court of Justice, and the European Parliament. International
organizations do not have legislatures and high courts and executive branches
to implement law and federal judicial rulings. That the Euroskeptic ideology
denies this just shows the downside of ideology in general as being
intellectually dishonest as regards empirical facts. To want to remake things
as they presently are is one thing; to claim or insinuate that things are
already different than they are is quite another. I contend that the Turkish president
fell into the trap laid by the intellectually dishonest ideologues in Europe.
2. Ibid.
