European Integration - a new unit of political study

In his Postwar, Tony Judt describes the creation and stabilization of the European Union as the evolution from a “customs union – a ‘common market’ – bound together by not much more than a common external tariff” to something that resembles “many of the external trappings of a conventional government” (723). The development of the European Union in its current form is, in broad terms, parallel to the history of Europe from its moral and economic desolation following the end of WWII to today’s increasingly unified continent. Although it is historical in its original aim, Judt’s book thus forces an alternative, broader thesis onto its reader: a questioning of the continued relevance of using the nation-state as the fundamental unit of comparative political study, not to mention as the cornerstone of the grand master narrative that we use to organize modern political history.

Indeed, the first move toward a European Union began in the mid-1950s, with the formation of the European Steel and Coal Community. That this was seen as largely a way to avoid future conflict and integrate Germany into Europe speaks volumes about the way that economic mechanisms are intertwined with politics itself. The evolution of the European Union, as a successor to the European Economic Community, was itself just an outgrowth on the theme of integration. The fall of the Soviet Union and the need to rehabilitate ex-Soviet satellite states into the European community was a powerful and difficult issue, but its resolution into the 25 state European Union has proved to one of the most essential defining characteristics of the 21st century. Today, the European Union faces new crises, chief among them is how to expand or conserve the traditional definition of what it means to be a European – thus, we see an ongoing, and, some would say, irresolvable, issue of potential membership for Turkey in the EU. Furthermore, the home of the EU – Belgium – is undergoing its own European

All of this is instrumentally fundamental to our study of comparative politics. If we look at Europe as the birthplace and chief exporter of the modern nation-state, and if we see the state as the primary unit of measurement in sizing up the world, the integration of the various states of Europe into a single, cohesive unit poses new questions about ethnic, political, and social organization. These issues can be seen as just a by-product of the greater trends of globalization. But in the European sense, the European Union offers a new face of political life. We have studied extensively the different way states can look based on their economic and political makeup. In the case of the EU, we have a multitude of different types of people coming together to form something, which, although not a state, is stable and united.

Judt says that the European Union now is “coming to resemble Switzerland” (735). Despite the failure to ratify the Constitution of the EU, we can that this description says a lot about what has happened in Europe over the past 60 years. How have so many different states, with different political histories, different languages, different cultures, managed to come together like this? We have studied extensively the way in which different communities find their role in a state – think of the special status, and continuing conflict, of the province of Quebec for instance. The European community has somehow managed to emphasize its similarities and common goals over its differences. Underwriting all of this is something that Judt calls “the European way of life” – arguably analogous to Huntington’s description of a civilization. Whether such commitment to peace and stability can continue throughout the challenges of the 21st century – an influx of non-European immigrants, the question of Turkey, the lack of political constitution – is, of course, not certain. But the creation and success of the European federation thus far adds a whole new element to study of comparative politics.