Last month during a speech in Madrid, the President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, boasted of popular support for EU integration. The boast came across more as a plea: “We can’t lose the people who always believed in us, the simple people who work, who aren’t any less intelligent than the elites. They’ve always supported Europe and it is about reconquering their heart.”
How gracious of the Commissioner to ensure we are aware that the simple people are just as smart as he is. However, Mr. Juncker seems to have forgotten that over the years, the European people have hardly given the EU a vote of confidence. In fact, over the past decade, there has been growing skepticism of the entire European project.
The EU is not what it once was. Many countries entered the EU by referendum when it was a customs union. Since then, it has expanded its regulatory powers and political influence beyond what the electorates of the time could have imagined. The EU, however, has been unwilling to let them vote to oppose its growth.
In 2005, several member states held referendums on adopting a new European constitution. It failed in France and the Netherlands. After that, six other referendums were canceled. The politicians’ solution was simply not to ask the people. In 2009, the European Parliament approved the Lisbon Treaty. The treaty amended the EU framework without referendums. As Juncker pointed out, the people are smart, but the politicians were convinced they would make the wrong choice—so the politicians made the choice for them.
If the lack of referendums isn’t enough, look no further than the rise of euroscepticism to find evidence of people’s discontent.
In last year’s European parliamentary elections, the U.K. Independence Party won nearly 30 percent of the vote in Britain. In the U.K.’s national elections, Conservatives who promised a referendum on the U.K.’s EU membership by the end of 2017 won re-election. Putting EU membership back in the hands of the people is a good thing. The British can openly consider the arguments for Brexit (British exit) and debate what is in their best interest.
The dysfunction of the European economy and its politics has also given rise to unsavory populist and left-wing movements, such as the National Front in France, Greece’s SYRIZA, and the Social Democratic Party in Portugal. These parties have the wrong solutions for Europe, but they have tapped into the mistrust and frustration with Brussels.
Mr. Juncker has marginalized these popular movements across the Union. If people are so content and supportive of the EU, why do these movements exist?
Juncker concluded, “Europe is also a love affair…a love story. We need to keep love alive.” Chaining the member states together has done little for love, let alone faith in the EU. Mr. Juncker says he wants to “reconquer” the heart of the people. He might start by admitting that the European project never trusted them in the first place.