"The question has to be raised of whether Germany can still unreservedly be called a parliamentary democracy"
EU policies lacking representation
Monday 15 January 2007
In an interview for newspaper Welt am Sonntag, Germanys ex-president Roman Herzog declared that EU policies suffer to an alarming degree from a lack of democracy and a de facto suspension of the separation of power. Noting that, with 84% of German laws emanating from Brussels between 1999 and 2004, by far the biggest parts of the current laws in Germany are agreed by the council of ministers and not the German parliament.
Herzog explained that despite there being a Constitutional anchor making the German parliament the central actor in the shaping of the political community, it is still being threatened as more and more powers are transferred to the EU level. Therefore the question has to be raised of whether Germany can still unreservedly be called a parliamentary democracy.
Commenting on Merkels attempts to revive the EU Constitution, Herzog said that it would not solve this problem, nor that of the democratic deficit in the EU itself. He urged the transformation of the EU parliament into a proper legislative assembly and the creation of a second chamber in the council of ministers whose task would be to check whether the EU is over-stepping its competences. Finally, he proposed a clear separation of competences between the EU and the Member States. The current mixing of competences in the Constitution will trigger an even more dynamic appropriation of responsibilities for the EU, Herzog said.
Herzog certainly did not make these declarations two weeks after the beginning of the German presidency by chance, and there is no doubt that it will have the effect of a small earthquake, on both the German and the European scenes! Firstly because it is in direct opposition with Merkels plans for reviving the Constitutional Treaty and secondly because it marks a rupture with the usual position held by Germany in favour of ever-closer integration. Are we witnessing the rise of real German critical opposition to the EU?
Source: EUobserver