After the U.S. took the
decision to impose reciprocal and car tariffs on the E.U., it did not take long
for several of the E.U. states to pressure the federal executive branch, the
European Commission, to punch holes in the E.U.’s counter-tariffs so favored
industries in the E.U. would not face higher prices on supplies from the United
States. As in U.S. states, E.U. states have their own dominant industries, whose
financial interests it is only natural for government to protect, as jobs
translate into votes. But pressuring the E.U.’s federal government to carve out
exceptions for imports desired by favored industries at the state level, such
as automobiles in the E.U. state of Germany, would deny the E.U. the full
benefit of a united front that federalism can provide against other countries.
For maximum leverage in trade negotiations, unilaterally removing
counter-tariffs is not wise; it is like a person intentionally tripping over
himself while trying to get to the grocery store. Given the regional pressures,
trade is rightfully one of the enumerated powers, or exclusive competencies, of
the E.U. rather than a shared competency or a power retained by the states.
At a basic level, first of all,
to pretend that the E.U. is merely a confederation, in which governmental
sovereignty still resides exclusively with the state governments, is a much
more subtle way of enervating the E.U., whether out of denial or a desire by
federal officials to appease purblind Euroskeptic governors, such as Viktor Orban
of the E.U. state of Hungary. Fortunately, though for some people regretfully antagonistically,
transparency is valued by truth-tellers. Both qualified majority voting and the
exclusive and even shared competencies enjoyed by the E.U. government are incompatible
with a confederation, not to mention a mere “bloc” or economic treaty like NAFTA.
Correctly “mapping” the E.U. is a prerequisite to being able to get “maximum
bang for the buck” (an American expression, wherein “buck” strangely means “dollar”)
in terms of collective action at the federal level.
On the summer solstice, 2025,
which by the way is not the first day of climate summer as some American meteorologists
were claiming as if they were deer in headlights or cows chewing cud, the E.U.’s
Commission warned state governments that some of their “sensitive goods” would
not be shielded “from planned retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods” because the E.U.
was “weary of undermining its negotiating hand in high-stakes trade talks with
President Donald Trump, three E.U. diplomats and officials” said.[1]
Not to resist the pressure would unilaterally weaken the E.U.’s negotiating
leverage even before sitting down to negotiate with the Americans. In a
confidential meeting at the Commission, it was determined that acceding to all
of the state requests would mean that the E.U. “would only target €25 billion
worth of U.S. exports . . . instead of the €95 billion” that the E.U. “initially
targeted as a response”.[2]
The sheer difference between €25 billion and €95billion attests to the leverage
that collective action at a federal level has over the negotiating power that
an aggregation of European countries would have. In other words, the dollar
value lost in the shielding can point to the power that is gained by collective
action from an exclusive competency residing at the federal rather than state
level.
In seceding from the E.U., the
former E.U. state of Britain lost any future benefits that can be gained from
collective action at the federal level of an empire-scale union of states, for
even a secessionist state is commensurate in scale and polity-type with the
remaining states rather than the union of such states. A leap in scale from
(early-modern) kingdom and empire, and a qualitative difference in polity-type between
a state and federal union of such states are why Britain is not equivalent to
the European Union. In other words, the United Kingdom is not a small E.U.
In conclusion, subtly letting air
out of the tire by insisting that the E.U. does not have a federal system or
intentionally allowing states to shield certain imports from America at the
expense of the federal stance is not exactly putting the best foot forward in arriving
at the negotiation table. Given the sheer amount of benefit that would be lost
were the Commission to acquiesce to every state request on carve-outs,
proposals to expand the federal competencies subject to qualified majority vote
instead of unanimity should be considered with greater urgency, and additional enumerated
domains of power federalized from the states. Fears of a leviathan “central
state” can be allayed by realizing that the E.U. has a federal system of
divided sovereignty and that the state governments have significant access to
policy-making at the federal level in the European Council and the Council of
the E.U. even though the executive branch, the European Parliament and the E.U.’s
supreme court provide less access and thus can protect federal prerogatives and
thus the benefits obtainable from collective rather than associative action. Unity
need not mean uniformity; collective action is possible at the federal level
while states can retain the ability to reflect their own interests and cultures
as long at the benefits from collective action are not unduly compromised.
