The Clash of Sovereignty in the EU

The resolution for this year asks debaters to dive into the European Union and its migration policies. This topic presents several layers of intricacies and debating it effectively will require not only knowledge on the specific subject matter, but also a much broader understanding of the history of Europe and the formation of the states therein. This policy spotlight will look at the development of the modern territorial state, how it is linked to sovereignty and why that matters for policy change in the European Union.  

Central to the modern nation-state are the concepts of sovereignty and territoriality that surrounds them. Max Weber famously defined a state as a “human community that successfully claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory.”[1] This however, is a relatively new conception of what a state should be. It is largely held that the transition towards the modern state defined by territory began with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. This peace marked the end of the Thirty Years war and began the transition in Europe from a hierarchical feudal system to one of centralized sovereign states [2]. One thing worth noting is that there is some debate on how much of an impact the Peace of Westphalia actually had on state formation, but that is not relevant to the topics discussed here[3]. Over the next few hundred years as states centralized and their demand for resources increased, the need for territorial expansion grew, as did the need for countries to protect their defined borders [4]. European states were surrounded by many other states also trying to centralize and consolidate their territory: “This meant that European state makers could not simply overrun and destroy their rivals; they had to absorb, subdue, or learn to live with them. From the start, therefore, establishing boundaries that defined and delimited spheres of power was a central part of the problem of sovereignty.”[5] The territorial system in Europe presents a paradox that existed over 300 years ago and exists still to this day. A system that both grants autonomy, but also requires states to work with others. 

Borders define the boundaries of a state's sovereignty but this also delineates the area’s where the state has no control.[6] This system created an inherent need for sovereign states to work together. With the formation of the European Union the narrative shifted and some argued that the system of sovereign states should be altogether removed. One of the designers behind the concept of European integration wrote in 1976 “The sovereign nations of the past can no longer solve the problems of the present: they cannot ensure their own progress or control their own future. And the Community itself is only a stage on the way to the organised world of tomorrow.”[7]  Despite this sentiment a nation's territorial sovereignty has not been replaced in the European Union. Instead territory has created a system where “the state and its body of servants have been compelled to replace command and control with leadership, hegemony, and negotiation.”[8] Territory remains an “essential dimension” in shaping the policies, culture and institutions of the European Union.[9]

The history of the paradoxical relationship between sovereignty and cooperation has a direct impact on European Union policies today. Every proposal for reform within the EU generates a clash between sovereign states vying for territorial self-interest and the supranational institution they are a part of. As much as the goal of the European Union may be to act in unity as one body, it still is comprised of twenty-seven individual sovereign nations each with their own interests. There are two clear examples of how sovereignty and territory clash in regards to EU immigration policy:

BREXIT: The most prominent assertion of state sovereignty in the European Union since its founding is the choice of Great Britain to leave the European Union. While the movement was not entirely motivated by immigration issues it was the most pressing.[10] Britain was already experiencing a rising sense of nationalism prior to their 2016 referendum to leave the EU, but the migration crisis became a focal point for the ways the EU was “infringing” on their state sovereignty.[11] This sentiment was held by many British citizens despite the fact that Britain had already opted out of several EU migration policies. 

DUBLIN REGULATION:  The Dublin regulation sets out the legal obligations of EU countries in processing Asylum requests. Under this agreement territory is the determining factor for which country is responsible for processing asylum applications. Whatever country the refugee enters first is the one required to process their asylum case. However, with the surge of Middle Eastern refugees this disproportionately affected the border states, especially Greece.[12]  In 2015 during one of the peaks of the Syrian and Middle Eastern refugee crisis multiple countries in the EU chose to absolve themselves from their legal obligations concerning refugees for a myriad of different reasons. These countries demonstrated that they valued their sovereignty to protect their borders over following EU requirements. 

“The EU is a state prevailing over its members in principle. In practice national states retain capacities to thwart and hinder, and in respect to migration policies they have used those capacities in ways consistent with their historical practices, sometimes with alarming echoes of European state behaviour in the decades before the EU’s creation”[13] This year whether you are debating affirmative or negative it will be important to remember that even though the resolution calls for the EU to make a reform, it will be the responsibility of its member nations to implement them. For debaters this year it will be vital to understand the struggle states experience between the principles of their own sovereignty and the principles of multilateralism that the EU is built upon.

Endnotes:

 1 Anter, Andreas, author. Max Weber's Theory of the Modern State : Origins, Structure and Significance. Houndmills, Basingstoke :Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.

 2 Daud Hassan, “The Rise of the Territorial State and The Treaty Of Westphalia” Yearbook of New Zealand Jurisprudence, vol. 9. (2006):  https://opus.lib.uts.edu.au/bitstream/10453/3289/1/2006006060.pdf 

 3 Derek Croxton, "The Peace of Westphalia of 1648 and the Origins of Sovereignty." The International History Review 21, no. 3 (1999): www.jstor.org/stable/4010907 

4 Francis Fukuyama. “The Origins of Political Order” (p. 332). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 

5 James J. Sheehan, “The Problem of Sovereignty in European History,” (p. 1-15) The American Historical Review, vol. 111, issue 1, (2006): https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr.111.1.1

6  Ibid., 

7  “Europe In 12 Lessons” European Union (2017) doi:10.2775/12586 

8 Sabino Cassese, "From the Nation-State to the Global Polity." In Reconfiguring European States in Crisis, Oxford University Press, (2017): doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198793373.003.0004.

9 Michael Keating, "The Territorial State." In Reconfiguring European States in Crisis, Oxford University Press, (2017): doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198793373.003.0006.

10 Will Somerville, “Brexit: The Role of Migration in the Upcoming EU Referendum,” Migration Policy Institute, (March 2, 2017), https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/brexit-role-migration-upcoming-eu-referendum.

11 Amanda Garrett, “The Refugee Crisis, Brexit, and the Reframing of Immigration in Britain,” EuropeNow Council for European Studies ( August 1, 2019):  https://www.europenowjournal.org/2019/09/09/the-refugee-crisis-brexit-and-the-reframing-of-immigration-in-britain/.

12  “Europe Situation” United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees. (October 2017): https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/europe-emergency.html

13 Desmond King, Patrick Le Galès, and Tommaso Vitale. "Assimilation, Security, and Borders in the Member States." In Reconfiguring European States in Crisis, Oxford University Press, (2017): doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198793373.003.0022.