Politics
The underlying reason of establishing the EU is to ensure the peace in Europe after WWII. The breaking down of Berlin wall is seen as the major landmark in the peaceful way of the EU. Therefore, there is no doubt that no wars involved the whole continent any more since the EU established. Thus this aim is effectively put into practice. In addition, two more policies are staring at the political issues---the common foreign and security policy in the Maastricht treaty of 1992 and European Security and Defense Policy in the Nice treaty of 2000. These two ideas of speaking with one voice in the world affairs are as old as the European integration process itself. (Europa(b)) But the EU has made less progress in dealing with foreign policy than in creating a single market. And the local governments sometimes difficultly manage their own policy compared with the ones of EU, such as the divisions among EU member states about the war in Iraq.
Society and others
The first right of a European citizen is the right to travel, work and live anywhere in the Union. Therefore, lots of principles have already been put forward, such as increasing in food-safety standards, the European Health Insurance Card, regulation of mobile phone changes, environment reports, the right to vote in local and European, elections in another Member State, etc. In this aspect, to make everywhere “the same” does not only mean no borders, every member state should be brought into line on the social welfare. Education is another significant impact on European identity. Nowadays the high level of education in any member state is available to any European resident. Free education offers more chances for the generation to acquire more multi-cultural knowledge, which helps people to become more tolerant in order to cancel the nationalism in their mind.
What cannot be involved in?
There are 23 kinds of languages in the EU and the number of the member states is just 27. That is to say almost all the states have their own language. As we all know, art like painting, sculpture, except literature can transcend nations. When the author is going to express their feelings, they usually choose to use their mother tongue that they always are good at; however, the brushwork is similar, such as the mathematical symbols. Furthermore, the diverse culture of the states has more impacts on literatures than paintings. Therefore, in this aspect of the culture, the EU cannot integrate the Europe.
For multi-culturalism, critical mass is a significant factor to build a cohesion society. The EU must certainly know the importance of how to make diversified religions live together; however, the reality is displeasure. Islam is widely considered as fastest growing religion in Europe, with immigration and above average birth rates leading to a rapid growth in the Muslim population. (BBC,2004) And many Muslims do not admit their European identity. “I am British and Asian. I am not European” (Condor,S 2007) Consequently, nowadays, some local governments have already encouraged secularism, such as France. The issue going on in France was about banning Muslim girls from wearing their headscarves in public schools and government facilities. Even though the law seems equal because of prohibiting Muslims, Christians, and Jews from wearing headscarves, large crosses, or skullcaps, perhaps it just focuses on Muslim only. As a country with various religions, the government should guarantee the stabilization in the society, should not make this situation more serious. Therefore, they choose to ban the religious symbols to provide Muslim girls more opportunities to assimilate into the community by making every one “same”. Another example is Turkey. It tries to ban headscarves as well, because Turkey wants to join the EU. Even though the EU is not so secular, Turkey strives to become secular to express that it no longer belongs to “Asia”. Many actions have been taken, but this social problem is still attached deeply in European society. The EU does not pay much attention to this kind of problems, thus in this kind of aspect, it is unsuccessful.
Who cares European identity?
Not everyone talks about the “European identity” every day, but every survey tries to contain the “European identity”, such as the Euro barometer survey in 2005, “10% of EU citizens identified as being European first while 42% identified with their nationality first and then as a European.”(Wikipedia(a)) So who cares the European identity on earth?
Maybe the answer is the world. WWI and WWII are both derived in Europe, a cohesion Europe definitely guarantees the peace. And besides that no one can doubt that a united Europe is an important component in the global economy. Just taking the EU into consideration, the export was increased by 4 times between 2001 and 2005. (Hui,Z, 2006) Because of the crisis credit in the United States, maybe the EU can catch this opportunity to become the most important economic component in the world. Recently, Iran claimed it had already decided to use Euro to trade oil instead of US dollars. It is the first time that oil is traded in non US dollars since the OPEC established in 1970. It will be a kind of shock and challenge for US dollar, which is also a threat for the United State just like the “fear” Salesse (1997) had already claimed. “The United States (were) increasingly opposing and subverting the creation of a politically and militarily united Europe with an integrated economic market.” (Jacobs, D) It should own everything to the EU. Without the EU, the whole Europe cannot reach this achieved stage.
As a common factor of the world economy, the businessman would like to see a more united Europe. The booming economy can give them more chances to get more profits, and the series of economic policies put forward by the EU, give lots of convenience for the company itself. For the businessmen, there is no difference which state they really belong to. They take efforts to make profits and at the same time make a contribution to the whole economy, which will make the world more united and peace.
However, there are still some residents belonging to the nationalism. They cannot abundant the tradition and history of their own state. So they do not care about the European identity. Whereas these “national” people do not know the truth that “today we always learn from the past to plan for the future, but we cannot live in the past”. And these people are always poor and lack of education. It is impossible to say that they are meaningless for the society because they must take their own responsibility to others, but they cannot aim the development of the whole world as much as educated ones.
On the whole, because of the dominant component in the world economy, the European identity is important and necessary for the world development, even though some one does not care about it.
Conclusion
Under the uniform administration of the EU, the whole Europe is developing in the vigorous direction by promoting the economy at first. Adding the peace that has existed in the Europe for years, the EU has already met its original goals. Religion is still a serious social problem that the EU has to face, but the European Union has been successful in “establishing” a coherent European identity in other aspects. On the other hand, a united, powerful, prosperous Europe is also beneficial to world peace. Although not everyone agrees with the European identity, there is no doubt that under the help of the EU, it exists in the Europe, and needs to exist forever.
Bibliography
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